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Just called AT&T, asked to bump my eligibility date a month - WOW!

iBreatheApple

iBreatheApple

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Sep 3, 2011
3,109
1,400
Florida
I'm going to condense this, but here's how it went down:

  • I stated a new iPhone is announced tomorrw, my eligibility date is next month...
  • Can push my date back a month because it'd be $175 for me to cancel and go to Verizon and $199 to get the new phone VS. paying you $199 for new phone +$250 upgrade?
  • She asked to put me on hold to speak with her supervisor...
  • She came back and said that she can upgrade me to anything today for free except the iPhone, no Apple products...
  • I asked the exact amount of my cancellation fee and she said $175
  • She then asked if that's what I wanted to do and I said I'm thinking about it because obviously I'm going to do what's cheapest for me.
  • (THIS WAS NOT A CANCELLATION SPECIALIST BTW)
  • She said they can credit my account $250 if I stay (they didn't even mention I had another (ghost) line that would cost to cancel but I guess they didn't realize that my theory as far as cheaper to cancel is actually incorrect.
  • I explained how I didn't understand the rationale of them GIVING me $250 rather than just moving my upgrade date up 4 weeks, she said they CANNOT move Apple dates
  • She asked if I wanted to speak with the cancellation department (I had no intentions of ever leaving, just getting a possible sooner upgrade date) so I just said "what would you advise?"

Anyway, my upgrade date was 11/25/11 and she swore she couldn't change it but she did pay my bill this month and then credited what was left of $250. I figured it would be hit or miss and while it was a miss in terms of my goal, I got $250 free dollars. :eek: Sweet! :D

You might try yourself as I want to see if anyone else can get their dates moved because initially, when she put me on hold, she said she could probably do it as my date was so soon. But I still don't understand why they can't push a date up a month over giving me $250.
 

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Last edited:
Great deal!

Congratulations! You are an expensive commodity to replace - you got a free $250 and can still upgrade in a month.

Good show!
 
i think my advice would be to wait a month. maybe camp out for some kind of black friday deal if buy nothing day isn't your thing.
 
I'm going to go into att over the weekend and see if they will move my upgrade even though its 2/18/12 i want to try. The thing was i had 2 upgrades but my father decided to use one then decide to loose that and proceed to use the last upgrade. so i will try, it can't hurt can it
 
LagFighter said:
It sure does feel great to lie to a company in order to coerce them into paying you money, doesn't it?
Click to expand...

I didn't lie. My INTENTIONS weren't to cancel but if it came down to it I might have cancelled eventually (sometime pre launch). Why wouldn't I if it's cheaper? I work in an ER, I have no signal no matter what so I don't care what carrier I'm on. They didn't want me to leave and couldn't give me what I asked for so they gave me $250, I didn't do anything wrong. Thanks for the moral lecture though.

And +1ing our own posts, are we? :rolleyes:
Dr Kevorkian94 said:
I'm going to go into att over the weekend and see if they will move my upgrade even though its 2/18/12 i want to try. The thing was i had 2 upgrades but my father decided to use one then decide to loose that and proceed to use the last upgrade. so i will try, it can't hurt can it
Click to expand...

Good luck, I definitely wanted to get my call in before the announcement because I didn't want to have to deal with a frustrated rep that had been getting the same type of calls all day.
 
LagFighter said:
Whatever helps you sleep at night.
Click to expand...

Usually white noise, and air blowing on me. But usually I can hit two birds with one stone because the fan creates noise. Not too picky otherwise. Lights and other noises never really affect my sleep.
 
More likely than not, when you do go to upgrade, you'll find that they started you on a new 2 year contract the day that they applied the $250 to your account.
 
Just tried, got nowhere.

If what I read earlier about Verizon honoring unlimited data for the iPhone 5 if you ask, I may make the leap.

I'll wait until tomorrow to see how things turn out.

Don't think I can sleep tonight. (J/K)
 
If you have another line that's upgrade eligible, you can swap upgrade dates with it.
 
LagFighter said:
Whatever helps you sleep at night.



?
Click to expand...

Even if he did lie and say he was considering cancellation - what does that matter? The fact is that AT&T decided it was worth $250 to keep him as a customer, and they kept him. Calling to "renegotiate" is by no means shady, and as someone who used to work in a call center - it's absolutely expected.

They know damn well that 80% of the people who threaten to cancel their service are just fishing for freebies, and they give most of them something to keep them happy. $250 is nothing compared to another guaranteed year with him as a customer. They don't give out freebies to keep customers in the short term so much as the long term.
 
det2004 said:
More likely than not, when you do go to upgrade, you'll find that they started you on a new 2 year contract the day that they applied the $250 to your account.
Click to expand...

No because when I asked what she advised (I didn't include this) she said well I'll credit you $250, and then when you hit your upgrade date you can upgrade for $199.

Geckotek said:
Just tried, got nowhere.

Don't think I can sleep tonight. (J/K)
Click to expand...

Lmao! :p

blurb23 said:
If you have another line that's upgrade eligible, you can swap upgrade dates with it.
Click to expand...

True, but my second (ghost) line was just used when the white iPhone 4 came out in April to get that.
 
Come on people ATT does this every year...if you are within 6 months of your upgrade date, they will let you upgrade. They can't tell you right now, because a new iphone has not been announced. After tomorrow, you will be able to log into your ATT account and you will see that you are eligible for an upgrade. I got my iphone 4 on release date. But my ATT account says i am not eligible for an upgrade till 11/25/11.
 
tripjammer said:
Come on people ATT does this every year...if you are within 6 months of your upgrade date, they will let you upgrade. They can't tell you right now, because a new iphone has not been announced. After tomorrow, you will be able to log into your ATT account and you will see that you are eligible for an upgrade. I got my iphone 4 on release date. But my ATT account says i am not eligible for an upgrade till 11/25/11.
Click to expand...

I hope you're right, I'm in the exact same boat. Launch-day iP4, upgrade date of 11/25/11. I've only been a customer since '10 though, and my bill is pretty low ($75).
 
tripjammer said:
Come on people ATT does this every year...if you are within 6 months of your upgrade date, they will let you upgrade. They can't tell you right now, because a new iphone has not been announced. After tomorrow, you will be able to log into your ATT account and you will see that you are eligible for an upgrade. I got my iphone 4 on release date. But my ATT account says i am not eligible for an upgrade till 11/25/11.
Click to expand...

IF that is the case this year then I'll be stoked. :D
 
Use the credit to pay the ETF. Then have them send you the extra $75 when you cancel your service. Profit!
 
Geckotek said:
Just tried, got nowhere.

If what I read earlier about Verizon honoring unlimited data for the iPhone 5 if you ask, I may make the leap.

I'll wait until tomorrow to see how things turn out.

Don't think I can sleep tonight. (J/K)
Click to expand...

verizon is gonna honor unlimited data for the iPhone 5 for new customers ? if so i will switch
 
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