Sprint Pcs shutt off my phone and called me a high risk 3 days before my first bill was due ripoff Belingham Washington

Well after about 3 hours on the phone with customer sevice on wednesday it all boils down to this.

My acount was sent to the fraud division at sprint. Aparently if you put a wrong number in your routing number to make a payment on line the payment is rejected (fair enough) they cancell your account and stereo type you,and shut your phone off. Keep in mind that i tried to make the paymnet on the 25 of april bill is due in the 3rd of may.

so after all this i had to get a new acount and number (not happy I ported over from cingular).

The real funny thing is that on Thursday morning the sprint store rep (Jeff) called to tell me that he could get my Phone back on if I paid off the old account. I will pay off the old account but really feel that I should not have to they caused all this greif and all they can say is
"I am really sorry for all this but it happens"
Why not just call if there is something wrong with routing or acount number. Surely sprint has a least one phone that they can call out on.

I worked at sprint pcs for 5 years, and it suprises me how unorganized the company still is. I was there in the first year of the company, and seems like nothing has changed!

Dear Barbara,

I wish there was something I could do to help you switch your phone back on. I would assume you just got your phone and you are facing being nickel and dimed by the first month's charges. There may be an unpaid deposit in the mix somewhere, if there is, it should have been up to the people that sold you the phone to inform you about it.

Structure of a first month's bill:

Deposit
ASL customers, or people who require a deposit for service (and even some people who don't) will have an Account Spending Limit attached to their account. Generally it is $125-$150 per line. If you did not pay this deposit at the time of purchase (which most reputable dealers will insist you do), either because you were not informed of it, or because you chose to wait and take a few more days, it is added to the amount you owe on your bill. If this amount raises you over your spending limit, your phone is shut off after a few text message warnings.

Pro-rated charges:
That first month's bill is a bear. You get prorated for your rate plan: which means you divide the amount of money you have agreed to pay Sprint per month for all services, and then multiply it by the number of days left in your billing cycle. You rbilling cycle will be on someof the paperwork they gave you on the "Estimated First Month's Bill" sheet. If you can't find it, you can get that information by dialing *2 (even if your phone is shut off).

Full Month's Service:
Like many other companies (like the cable TV company for instance), Sprint will charge you a month ahead for service on all lines. So you will also face a full month's service charges on that first bill.

Activation Fees:
The last line item charge regularly seen on the first month's bill would be Activation Fees. This is $36 for the first line and $18 for each additional line.

Taxes:
In my area taxes are 10-12% of the total month's bill.

These are the most common charges on a first bill, but by all means not the only ones. You could run into roaming charges, Internet downloads and games, ringer purchases...It is easy to see knowing that how you could have come up with a $270 bill. It doesn't make it any easier to pay, but let me make a few suggestions:

1. Check your contract or call Sprint at *2 from cell phone (it will still call customer service even though it won't dial out). Ask them to help you understand your bill. Ask if you needed a deposit. If you weren't informed of this at the time you bought your phone, I would definitely go back and complain to the manager of wherever you bought it. It will not get you off the hook for the deposit, but if you are still in your 14 day trial period, you could return your phone and buy it from someone more reputable, and that will give you the service you deserve. If you find that the person you bought the phone from was not working in a corporate Sprint Store and was not disclosing the deposit amount to you, and you are out of your 14 day window, try to get the name and contact info of the IE. This is Sprint's Individual Account Executive, they are the ones responsible for training and maintaining the standards of service in that store. It is possible that you can get out of the contract with their blessing (and help in eradicating the early termination fees). Although you're angry, do try to be reasonable with the IE, you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar. They will probably do it if you agree to re-activate in another store within their market.

2. If your phone has been shut off, be aware you have an account spending limit. While you are on the phone with Sprint Customer Care, find out what that spending limit is and make sure your monthly rate plan will not throw you over that limit every month.

3. If you choose to stay with Sprint, you can make payment arrangements with them by speaking to someone in billing. If you have a checking account, debit or credit card, you can pay down your initial balance until it gets under your spending limit. If you have never made an electronic payment to Sprint before, your payment can take from 2-6 hours to post to your Sprint account and you will get a confirmation number. Write those numbers down and keep track of them. If a situation ever happens like this again, you will have a number that says you paid from their own billing system.

4. When dealing with tricky billing issues or troublesome customer service issues, ALWAYS ask for the operator ID of the person at Sprint Customer Care. Take down their first name, operator ID, date and time of day that you spoke with them. Document, document, document. If this issue comes back to haunt you for any reason, another CSA can look into your file and see what transpired on that day. If you received greatsrvice, let the IE know. If you received poor service, let them know as well.

I hope all of this helps. I really had to speak in generalisms as I can't look directly at your bill. I wish you the best of luck.

Kym Mory
Store Manager
Sprint-Bellevue