Captain's Log Supplemental - Last Word on Cingular

As you know, my phone now works. I did receive a call from the Cingular Office of the President in response to my angry letter. Bear in mind, I wrote that letter over the delivery issues. I had not even tried to activate my phone yet. Nina asked if my issue was resolved, and offered to cancel any shipping charges on my phone. I don't think I had any shipping charges, but I said "ok". I then tried to talk about all my activation problems, and she acknowledged them, but mainly seemed to want to talk about the issue for which I'd sent the letter...the slow delivery. She didn't tell me why the web page lied, but by this time I was so tired of the entire experience I didn't press the point.

I also got a call on Wednesday from Jaime at Cingular confirming that my phone was indeed working. She told me she would make sure my bill got pro-rated for those days my phone wasn't working, and offered to see if there was anything else she could do once she gained access to my actual bill.

So, lessons learned from this entire experience:

• All bets are off in terms of placing an order on the Cingular web site if you are a former AT&T Wireless customer - expect double the estimate time
  
• All bets are off in terms of porting your "Cingular Blue" number (former AT&T Wireless) over to a "Cingular Orange" number (actual Cingular). Expect it to take 10 business days, and be prepared to spend a lot of time on the phone with customer service.
• The staff in the stores and the staff at customer service on the phone line do not think highly of each other.
• Writing a letter and sending it via US Postal Mail to the Office of the President of Cingular with a complaint will elicit a response within 3 weeks.

I may post something later if they do something really nice for me in terms of my bill or any refunds, but otherwise I now consider this matter closed.

My jihad against Cingular is now over.

McLean, VA