Oh how I truly despise AT&T...

[Javaman]

I have been getting the run around on their "automated operator system" for the past 1 1/2 hours.

I how ever have figured out how to beat them.

when those smarmy patronizing voices come on, acting in that, "I'm so friendly and act just like a human" way, I just want to reach into the phone and pull out their cybernetic guts.

Well this is how I got a human, when that crappy voice comes on and asks you what you need just start talking gibberish. it defaults to a human operator!!!

worked every time!!!

My gibberish was in the form of frustrated obscenities. :) :rofl:

[dembotoz]

1. just got off the phone to them

generally with most phone tree attendant systems, you can usually get to an operator or human by hitting the zero when cued to push a number.
Does not work everytime, but phone systems are usually set to "set you free"
when you hit the zero.

[hunter]

2. I don't know how they stay in business.

My only good guess is that they are secretly run by FEMA. A real company wouldn't go out of its way to irritate and alienate its customers.

When SBC recloaked itself with the AT&T brand name, it was obvious the company was going from bad to worse.

My most amusing experience with them was making it through one of their automated phone trees to someone who wasn't allowed to help me... When I asked this person if they could transfer me to someone who could help me, they said they couldn't. When I asked if there was another number I should call to get help they said "Oh, um,... We're not allowed to give you that number."

:wtf:

Eventually (on another day!) I did get a guy who knew what to do. He said, "just stay on the line and listen until I get through." He then proceeded to go through this rather large automated menu system, touch tones and inane automated blather blasting in my ear. He got a real person on the other end, asked to be transfered to another real person with a real name and title, and said to her, "I have a customer on the line who..."

She sounded highly annoyed that she had to talk to a real customer, but she did have the authority to solve the problem.

That was one of my better interactions with them. Their collections department is such that if you or a client ever has problems with a bill you will NEVER EVER want to do business with AT&T again.

These days I simply try to avoid doing business with AT&T whenever possible.

[jilln]

3. I've been there with them and I sympathize...

It took 2 months to convince them that caller ID was NOT working. Apparently they could see through the phone lines into my house and saw that there were words on the caller ID screen that were invisible to everyone else.

[purr]

5. ROFL!! same with my dsl

Oh I can see its working just fine. Sure ya can.. thats why I cant connect

[jilln]

12. Haha.

I'm so sick of being forced to use these huge, incompetent companies.

I got rid of AT&T but now I have Comcast, who came to install my cable Internet on a Tuesday and then sent someone on Wednesday to DISCONNECT it from the previous residents. They can't even keep their database straight!

[purr]

4. OMG!!!! I'm up to HERE with AT&T

I even have the BBB involved whos not doing much either to help me with my case..

It all started when we had a bad storm that knocked out my phone and dsl. The storm fried my phone router and modem (which is on a surge protector oddly enough). They couldnt come out to repair my lines for a WEEK, and I do my work online and have 3 young kids in the house. Needless to say, now they're charging me $330 for the repair and I have inside wire maintenance.

Now my dsl cuts out constantly when it rains, the latest technician told me 'its power fluctuations' in my house ROFL!! YEA RIGHT! Their corporate offices are just as condescending as their tech support which really sucks. Not to mention I always get the reps who are impossible to understand and hang up on you when you ask them to say it clearly because I cant understand what theyre asking me.

I hate this co.. cant wait to go to verizon after this is all said and done.. AUG 1st BYE BYE AT&T.

[Taverner]

6. As was the case pre-deregulation: "We don't care - because we don't have to"

Love, the Phone Company

[conscious evolution]

7. AT&T sucks

They sent me a text the other day saying they are going to start charging me for 911 service.
Looking for a new carrier now.

[Tripper11]

8. See if this helps...GET HUMAN

Check out this website...it does work, I'm just not sure how updated they are vs the damn corporations trying to stay ahead of US!

http://gethuman.com/">Get Human

[hunter]

10. That's a cool website, but with AT&T it often doesn't matter much if you get a human.

Most of the humans they have are simply there to shield their supervisors from customer contact.

I suppose they figure if their customers get frustrated enough, they'll go away.

[Kali]

9. I hate them too, but for a slightly different reason

I live on a ranch in SE AZ and there are numerous right-of-ways through this place, including a major underground fiber-optic bundle belonging to those a-holes. Last year we had a freak storm, very localized dumping 2.25 inches of rain and hail in about 20 minutes. This was after the worst 10 months of drought in 100 years. Needless to say it did some damage. Well it washed their cables out along the access rode to our headquarters and left a huge ditch in the road in one place and a huge cut ACROSS the road in another - we couldn't get in and out of here from that direction for over a month because they didn't seem to give a shit about their exposed cables. I should have taken a hacksaw to them the first week!

When they finally came out to fill in the ditch did they do ONE EXTRA INCH of work on the road? Hell no! And this "road" IS their right-of-way. Maintenance would seem to be a foreign concept to this company.

looking uphill along washout/at&t cable ditch - orange caution tape is buried along with the FO conduit (as a warning?)



looking downhill



close-up of cable and caution tape



washout that went across the road (MY traffic cones!)

[hunter]

11. I'm sorry, somehow your cable got stuck to my truck...

... and it was like maybe five miles before I noticed it back there trailing behind me.