Cellular Plus - AT&T, Scott Jones Liar, Fraud Clarksville, Tennessee

I was employed for Scott Jones for less than a year, and thank God, no longer than that. Cellular Plus conducts dishonest business and mistreats both the employees and customers.

The most upsetting thing I noticed was the trade in phone policy. To my knowledge, Cell Plus is the only independent retailer to implement such a policy. Customers were forced to trade in their old cell phones upon completing any and all upgrades to their accounts. This is ludicrous! You mean to tell me, Scott Jones, that you think it is ok to take your customers personal property as a thanks to gaining their business? We were also encouraged to tell customers that the phones go to a "battered women's shelter" which is a total lie. Chad Jones (Scott's brother) let it slip that his slimy brother actually sells the trade in phones and makes a profit off of them. Nice. Oh, did I mention that if we did not collect a trade in phone, we were instructed to charge customers a $20.00 fee! And if we neither collected a trade in phone nor charged the fee, it got taken out of our pay! We were forced to maintain an 80% trade in phone rate, meaning we had to collect trade in phones for at least 80% of the upgrades we completed. This has to be illegal in some way, as the trade in phones are the property of our customers, not AT&T.

Cell Plus also charges a higher price for their phones than any other retailer. We were told by Scott Jones that this is because Cell Plus is a smaller retailer and does not get the same low prices on the phones from AT&T that other, larger, companies such as Radio Shack get. As employees, that made sense, so we believed them. Then we received a visit from a man whose name eludes me at the moment. Rick something or another. He was a regional manager from AT&T corporate, or something to that effect. He was checking on the retailers in the area and showed up on a day while me and one of my co workers were alone in the store. He asked why the prices were so high and we explained the reasons we were told to him. He promptly told us that all retailers get the same fixed price from AT&T on the phones. Hmmm.....I do understand that the higher we mark prices, the more profit is made, but at least have the common courtesy to tell your employees the truth Scott!!

On the same note, when customers were astounded by how much higher our prices were from everywhere else they had checked, we were instructed to "sell them on our customer service". Kind of hard to do when our phones were sometimes upwards of $100.00 more than everywhere else! Despite the prices being so much higher than everywhere else, we were still expected to meet our ever changing quota without fail or we would not be paid our commissions. Hardly anyone ever made quota, thus meaning that we were sometimes working for less than minimum wage. And they wonder why the turnover rate was so high.

There were so many more inconsistencies involved in this company. The quota, as I have already mentioned, changed constantly to the point that employees become apathetic to the changes. The "price sheet" was also baffling. I have seen the prices of phones change dramatically four, five times a week. Just because. No reasons were ever given. Kind of makes it hard to sell a phone to someone on Friday when they saw it for $50.00 less at the same store on Thursday.

Cell Plus also charges a $10.00 programming fee on every activation. Why? Where does this money go?

Health insurance is also not provided by this company. When hired, I was told that I would receive information in the mail within a few weeks regarding enrollment. I asked for this information several times and was never given it. Then one day we received a mass email informing employees that Cell Plus would no longer offer insurance and that anyone who had insurance through Cell Plus had until the end of the month to find something on their own. Nice.

The bottom line is, this company mistreats their employees. They do not even make an effort to retain people. Really, no one seems to make it far beyond the one year mark. They just keep the churn going without fail. My only guess is the know they have shady practices.

Oh, another thing we were told was that if we don't make our quota then Scott Jones doesn't make his quota and thus, doesn't get paid. So how does he pay us? Takes out loans? Pays us from the kindness of his heart? Doubtful. I was told by a reliable source that this is not true and that he does, in fact, get paid on every activation we process. He just doesn't make his "bonuses" if he doesn't make quota. Boo h*o. Then maybe give your employees some incentives to make quota. Even making quota, the commission checks are far beyond what I was told they would be upon hire. I was told that not even trying I would clear $30,000 a year when in fact I could make more money at McDonalds.

The whole company is ran by family members and it's creepy. While a few members of upper management were very nice and helpful, most of them are just as spineless as Scott Jones himself.  Also noted, was that the manager's are the most abused. While I do not know what the pay for a manager is like, I do know that they are forced to work well beyond 40 hours a week, and I doubt there was overtime pay.

My advice is that if you are offered a position within this company, run! Go to McDonalds, you will probably have better paychecks there. If you are a customer, go to a corporate store. While they may not be as "nice" as the workers at Cell Plus, you won't get ripped off as much. 

I could really go on and on about how shady this company's practices are but I believe this will suffice. Trust me, steer clear of Scott Jones and Cell Plus!