A few years ago, I was a very loyal AT&T customer. Ask anyone. I was willing to fall on the sword while everyone else was bitching. People complained that the network was slow. I disagreed. “It’s comparably fast,” I’d say. People complained the 3G network was very spotty. “Well it works everywhere I go,” I’d say. People complained that it’s not getting any better. “It will soon. They have a lot of iPhones to put up with,” I’d say.
I’d say those things no more.
AT&T has thrown a lot of shit at me over the years and I politely ignored it. I was very compassionate because they were dealing with a ton of iPhones, and it was understandable that the network got so bad. Has it improved over the years? Yes. Has it improved nearly fast enough? Absolutely not.
I started to get aggravated with AT&T about a year ago, when the network finally started showing its weaknesses for me. I normally have 4-5 full bars anywhere I go, and that’s with 3G too. The problem is even with a full amount of bars, the Internet just doesn’t work. I don’t get it. My iPhone is telling me I have the best AT&T service possible and it’s not even working. I imagine that folks with one bar just get a white screen that reads “Thanks for the shitload of cash per month, bitch.”
The next is not with AT&T’s network, but with U-Verse. I’m just going to be blunt: every single winter my U-Verse connection freezes. That’s right. Freezes. And it stays that way for a minute or two, but happens frequently enough that I just want to pull my hair out. During that time there’s no Internet and no television. And the best part of the story is that for years, AT&T has no idea what to do about it. We’ve had at least ten support guys come into my house, examine the wires, and even do repair work for an entire day with no luck fixing the damn thing. It just happens, and since Verizon isn’t in my area I’m pretty much stuck with it.
And whenever I complain to AT&T about it, they just want to give me free stuff. “I’m so sorry to hear about your issues, Mr. Tinari, here’s three months of free HBO to express our concern.” I don’t want fucking HBO. If I wanted it, I would buy it. I want my U-Verse service to work. That’s all. Is that so much to ask?
The final straw was a couple months ago, but I didn’t realize it until tonight, hence this rant. It’s when AT&T decided to screw us over and remove all text messaging plans except for the unlimited plan and called it “streamlining” their offerings. That’s not streamlining, that’s a severe case of douchebaggery. AT&T was scared of iMessage ruining its most profitable service. And AT&T should be. I was going to downgrade my messaging plan to the $10/mo for 1,000 messages plan after iMessage came out. Now I have to keep paying $20 per month to send and receive text messages so unfathomably small in size that even if it was $5 per month, they’d make a decent profit. And the worse part is I only text message two or three people that don’t have iMessage.
Tonight it hit me because I just checked my usage statistics for the current bill cycle. I’m already over half way through and I’ve used only 500 text messages — a number that’s going to increasingly get smaller as more people upgrade to iOS 5 or just buy new iOS devices.
No other carrier changed any of their messaging plans. Not Verizon. Not Sprint. Just AT&T, the greedy bastards who steal our money. Oh and not to mention all the other carriers actually work as advertised. If any representative from AT&T wants to contact me and explain the reasoning behind these recurring dick moves, I do have a dedicated Contact page.
Until that happens, fuck you, AT&T.
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Originally published on: www.gtdaily.net. Re-published with permission from the author.
