AT&T'S ABSOLUTE LIES & STUPIDITY - My Colorful Case in Detail, 48+ Hours and Counting
In my particular case...
VERDICT: Glitch with Number Porting Across Regions
WHO'S GUILTY: AT&T, NOT Apple
CAN YOU BELIEVE IT: AT&T is blaming everything on an imaginary iTunes crash on Friday.
ADVICE: Don't sit and wait. You must call to find out what the problem is.
My story:
I am a new AT&T customer, porting a number from Cincinnati Bell. Since I set up my Cincinnati Bell wireless account years ago, I have moved from Cincinnati to New York City. Therefore during the iTunes activation process,
my porting number's area code did not match my new usage address' zip code. This change of regions was the problem, as AT&T's software puts all porting requests on hold if the number is attempting to enter a different region than it originated.
This glitch is also detailed in
this AppleInsider post, but at first I didn't think it applied to me because -- unlike that post's author --
I was never notified that my "number is ineligible for porting," nor was my activation ever cancelled.
So after receiving my "requires additional time to complete" iTunes screen and my "Processing Activation" AT&T email, I thought I was in sit-and-wait hell like everyone else, but at least being slowly processed. Apparently not. Here in detail is the painful process I went through to discover what I've learned. Hopefully it might help someone else navigate this maddening cluster%$#@:
1.) FOR THE FIRST 36 HOURS: Waited patiently for activation.
2.) FOR THE NEXT 2 HOURS: Called AT&T iPhone Activation Support, 1-877-800-3701 (pressed #3), and waited on hold for 1.5 hours. Eventually got a perky AT&T iPhone Activation rep who checked my activation request order via my six-digit order number from the email. She put me on hold while she did some stuff. She kept coming back, making sure I was still holding. Said there were a couple of system errors she was correcting, was consulting a manager. Came back and said everything was ready except for a problem porting my existing number, so she had to transfer me to the AT&T Porting Department.
4.) NEXT 45 MIN: Talked to AT&T Porting Dept. rep who could not help me in any way because apparently no general AT&T account had yet been officially created for me, even though I had initiated the iPhone activation process. So to him, I didn't even exist yet. He was at a loss, and began to assume that maybe my activation was in a bottleneck on Apple's end.
5.) NEXT 30 MIN: AT&T port guy kept me on the line and we called Apple Support, 1-800-694-7466, and waited on hold for 15 minutes. Got an Apple rep who denied all responsibility, claiming that until my activation is complete and I start syncing, it's all out of Apple's hands. I tend to think he's probably right.
DEAD END, EVERYONE CLUELESS, MUST START PROCESS OVER.
6.) NEXT 30 MIN: Called AT&T iPhone Activation Support AGAIN (pressed #3), and waited on hold for 15 minutes. Got another rep, explained my situation thus far. She informed me that apparently
my activation order had been placed "on hold." She then checked to see whether an account had been created for me, and had to check two different systems before she found it. She then discovered that the problem was with my porting area code not matching my new address. She said I'd have to call AT&T Customer Care to authorize the cross-regional port to New York.
7.) NEXT HOUR: Called AT&T Customer Care, 1-800-331-0500, and waited on hold for 15 minutes. Got a Customer Care rep who eventually figured out that authorizing a port to New York wasn't the solution. Apparently, it doesn't matter where I live, as long as I'm using AT&T's network. She suggested fixing this logjam by making my area code simply match my address in my account, and forget about where I "really" live. Therefore, the New York address would simply have to be deleted from my account. BUT, she said Customer Care was not able to do this; she would have to transfer me to New Accounts to set it up.
8.) NEXT 45 MIN: Transferred to a New Accounts rep, who thought I had just called to open a new AT&T account from scratch and knew nothing about my existing iPhone activation order. She pretty much put up the wall as soon as she heard me say the word "iPhone." Couldn't help me. Transferred me BACK TO SQUARE ONE.
9.) NEXT 15 MIN: Transferred BACK to AT&T iPhone Activation Support AGAIN. Told the rep my story. This incredulous rep basically ripped all the previous reps, telling me I had been transferred all over the place unnecessarily. Buuuuuuut, he'd have to transfer me too: back to Customer Care to fix my address, who IS able to do this after all. But he promised me that I wouldn't have to be transferred any more after that! LOfrigginL.
10.) NEXT 15 MIN: Transferred BACK to Customer Care AGAIN. Friendly rep changed my address, so New York was out, Cincinnati was in! She said this should fix the delay problem. She said I should be up and running within a couple of hours. If not, call back AT&T iPhone Activation Support... AGAIN.
2 hours later... no activation...
11.) NEXT HOUR: Called AT&T iPhone Activation Support AGAIN (Pressed #1 this time), and waited on hold, again. After an hour had passed, someone picked up the phone and HUNG UP ON ME.
12.) Called AT&T iPhone Activation Support AGAIN, this time from 2 LINES (Pressed #1 on one, #3 on the other). Eventually #1 picked up first. Talked to the 9TH REP OF THE DAY. Yadda yadda, my tale of woe, yadda yadda. She informed me that actually no, my New York info was NOT eliminated, it was still there. So now SHE would change the address for me. (My guess: they had killed New York in my general AT&T account, but not in my specific iPhone Activation order.) Meanwhile, she noticed that
my account is marked "arrears, " which means I must still have an outstanding debt or bill to my old carrier Cincinnati Bell!!!!!!! And until it's paid, they won't release my number to port. WHAT??? First of all, I've talked to NINE reps today, and no one noticed this until now??????? But more importantly, my old account shows NO OUTSTANDING ACCOUNT BALANCE!! So the "arrears" status was patently false. She then kept me on hold for the next hour, checking in every few minutes to apologize about the wait. Eventually, she said that the
"floor staff" had just confirmed to her that MY NUMBER IS SUDDENLY INELIGIBLE FOR PORTING after all, and that I had no choice but to ABANDON MY EXISTING NUMBER AND START ALL OVER WITH A NEW NUMBER!!! "So, yeah, um, sorry sir."
Started to think I was getting punk'd, and Ashton was going to pop out at any second.
13.) NEXT HOUR: I just about BLEW MY LID, saying this was absolutely unacceptable, this was the first time I had heard this in the entire process. I demanded to speak to a supervisor or manager. Once I got the supervisor, named Angel, she again combed over my account's status and said she finally found out what was going on. Excellent. FINALLY. Apparently
my "market code" did not match the "biller" that was processing my order. So again, this was smelling like an Ohio-vs-NY issue. So she basically had to redo everything for me for Ohio. She placed me on hold for a while, kept checking in on me, consulted another manager, and asked to verify my
driver's license expiration date, of all things. (Huh? I guess that came on the scene once had given my Social Security Number back at the begininng of the process?) She eventually said that during the activation process my credit had already been run in New York, but since everything had to now be Ohioized, they'd have to run my credit again in Ohio. Then, she had to call two different Customer Care numbers AGAIN with me on the line to change my rate plan from a New York market code (called "Care") to an Ohio market code (called "Intelligent 3") so that she could run my account through her biller. After a few more tweaks and checks, she said I'd be up and running in 20 minutes. She told me to keep my iPhone powered off for those 20 minutes, then turn it back on, dock it, and I should be activated!!!!!!!
I thanked Angel immensely and even made her pur HER supervisor on the phone so I could tell him how helpful she had been in solving my problem.
Angel then put her original rep back on the phone, whom I had transfer me to Customer Care one last time so I could
DEMAND THAT MY ACTIVATION FEE BE WAIVED. On hold. Got an agent. The Activation rep explained to the CC rep that they'd like to waive my activation fee for this customer's patience. He said he couldn't do it. I asked for a supervisor. He said hold on.
He came back, he held firm.
He tried to BLAME EVERYTHING ON APPLE. He said that iTunes had crashed on Friday, and that Apple had issued a public apology about it. What?? No they didn't, buddy!! (I'm not living under a rock here, I am on MacRumors!!) He also tried to sympathize with me by saying that he himself had even bought an iPhone that wasn't activated yet. WHATEVER. I was furious. I then went into a 20-minute long absolute DIATRIBE, detailing my entire story (above) which describes precisely how it was
AT&T'S TECHNICAL MISTAKES -- and subsequent ineptitude by many reps over several departments -- that were clearly at fault, not Apple. At the end of this, he had no further defense, and seeing that they would never get rid of me otherwise, they
finally agreed to waive my activation fee.
So then, of course, after the phone did NOT activate in the 25 minutes as promised (big shocker)...
13.) NEXT 45 MIN: Called AT&T iPhone Activation Support YET AGAIN FOR THE FIFTH TIME (Pressed #3) and got a rep who told me they had just started a systems upgrade, so try calling back in a couple of hours. Are you KIDDING ME??? That has got to be THE ultimate masterpiece of bad timing. The only reason I have to even believe this is that it is now the middle of the freakin night!!!!!!!
And that brings us up to the present and I still do not have a working iPhone. I'm going to bed.
In my case, it's all AT&T's fault:
In summary, AT&T's idiotic software means that very normal information submitted during the activation process can SCREW YOU WITHOUT WARNING OR EXPLANATION.
Inept.
Insufficient.
Inexcusable.
This entire ordeal is a colossal disaster.
