Sprint PCS ripoff Pensacola Florida

Hi Angela,

I'm sorry to hear about your problems with Sprint. I don't work for Sprint per se, but I do work for a reseller and I understand how plan changes work, so let me explain what happened:

When you change a plan with Sprint you have the option of making your change effective immidiately or wait until the next billing cycle.

If you make the change effective immediately then the minutes through the end of the month are pro-rated, meaning you wouldn't get all 5000 minutes right away. What they do is take the 5000 minutes (or whatever the new amount is) and divide that by the days left in your billing cycle. Those will be your minutes until the end of the month. When the new billing cycle starts, you will have the whole 5000 minutes.

If you make the change effective at the beginning of a new billing cycle, you have the whole 5000 minutes starting with that new billing cycle. The key is knowing when your billing cycle ends, and it is several days before you get your bill. But Sprint has made that very easy; you can change your plan for the next billing cycle no matter when you call so it will be properly applied.

At .45 cents a minute (customary overage charge on 1000 minute plans), that means your husband went over his minutes by about 3556 minutes. I can understand a few to a few hundred... but 3000+? Something's not right. I have to question whether your plan was changed at the right time. Log onto Sprintpcs.com and log into your husband's account and check out your detailed billing. I would check the following things:

1. The current plan you're on. Make sure you have that 5000 minute plan applied, along with any night/weekend times (like 7 pm nights) and roaming options. Make sure they've got it right. Also, check the dates your plan was switched. If you can't find the date there, you'll see it in detailed billing by checking your calls line-by-line.

2. Take a look at your detailed billing and print it out, find out when in the month your new plan started. Do this by looking to see when you started being charged for minutes. Add up the minutes prior to that and it will tell you which plan you were on. Go further down your bill and see when they stopped charging you for minutes. That would be the date the new plan was applied. If they didn't stop charging you overages, then the plan wasn't applied that month.

3. If you called from your Sprint pcs phone, go back through your call list on your phone and see if you can get a date that you contacted Sprint for the plan change. Check to be sure the plan change and that phone call happened within a few days of one another. If not, contact Sprint PCS and dispute the charges.

How to protect yourself in the future:
1. Make note of the time and date you called. The operator will give you their first name, write that down. They also have an operator ID. It will be a jumble of letters and numbers. Ask for it and write that down, too. If anything needs to be disputed, you now have the ammo to do something about it.

2. Ask for the dates of your billing cycle and the date the plan change will take effect. Ask them how many minutes you'll have until the plan changes. Then ask how many minutes you'll have when the new plan takes effect. Write this down, too.

3. Ask for a summary of your next bill. When the plan changes, you must pay a portion of your old plan and a portion of the new, along with a month upfront of the new plan. Expect a bigger than normal bill even if you're lowering your minutes because of that. Write that down, even though that number is not set in stone. You may roam or go over your minutes, and drive your bill up in the meantime.

4. When the bill arrives go to Sprintpcs.com and check your detailed billing to make sure everything is in order. If not, get on the phone with Sprint right away and use the information (especially that operator ID) you've gathered as your ammmo.

Many times, people disputing large charges have gone over their minutes in a given month. People rarely believe it until I print out their monthly bill and go over it line by line until we come across the overages. The larger bills usually run out of minutes in the middle of the month.

How to avoid this situation:

For a national calling plan, I would suggest Sprint Fair and Flexible, in which there are no overage charges, you simply pay for what you use. Also check the number of roaming minutes on your bill.

For a local plan, you need to look at that detailed billing and adjust your plan to suit your usage. It is much cheaper to up your plan than to pay the overages.

It's tough for me to tell you what exactly went wrong without seeing your bill. My guess is that you called at the beginning of a new billing cycle and had it changed for the NEXT billing cycle. It wasn't applied soon enough, and you husband began making the calls, racking up the overage charges. This is just a guess, and I can't say for sure without reviewing your statement.

Take your statement to a local Sprint store and have them explain it to you line by line if you have any questions. That would be my best advice. Explain the problem you're having and talk it over with them. Try to get one of them on your side and see what can be done. It is doubtful they can help you with all $1600, but anything is better than paying the whole thing.

Good luck.