T-Mobile: deceptive and incompetent

After nearly five months of trying to get the $30 rebate that T-Mobile has admitted—many times—that they owe me, I finally filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. I am also considering sending this to Hank Phillippi Ryan, the “Real Deal” consumer crusader/reporter at WHDH in Boston. This entire ordeal is just so ridiculous.

So, for anyone looking for a mobile phone provider, here’s why you should steer well clear of T-Mobile. What follows is basically what I submitted to the BBB.

I purchased my phone on June 22, 2008 via T-Mobile’s website. The phone was clearly advertised as being free after an instant rebate and a $30 mail-in rebate—it said this on the website, right next to the link to buy the phone online, and at the time of checkout, as well.

My phone arrived just in time for my trip to New Orleans. I sent in the mail-in rebate the day the phone arrived, fulfilling all terms and conditions and making sure it was in the mail well before the submission deadline. The rebate was sent in sometime between June 24 and June 27, 2008.

I returned from New Orleans in late July to find my first rejection letter, dated July 28. It said that I was not eligible for the $30 mail-in rebate because I had not activated the phone in an authorized T-Mobile retail location.

Thus, my first complaint. I bought the phone online because I did not want to buy it at a T-Mobile retail location. The only instructions in the box instructed me to activate my phone by calling T-Mobile’s toll-free number, which I did. For T-Mobile to then claim that a phone bought online, with instructions that explicitly tell the consumer to register over the phone, should’ve been activated in an authorized T-Mobile retail location in order to be eligible for the rebate, is misleading and deliberately deceitful.

From the time of purchase through the time I submitted the rebate, T-Mobile had made it clear that the phone, purchased online, would be free after rebates. If the rebate was to be valid only if the consumer activated the phone at a retail location, then T-Mobile should have made it clear in the instructions that activating by phone was only one of many options for activation. Besides, it’s pretty silly to ask a customer to take a phone, delivered to his home, to a retail location just to set it up, when the instructions offer a way to do so from the convenience of his own home.

I called T-Mobile on August 5 and talked to an employee with ID ——. I politely informed the employee of the circumstances of the rebate, and that T-Mobile’s web store had said at the time of purchase that the phone would be free after rebates, including the $30 mail-in rebate that was rejected, as reported in their letter. The employee reported that my rebate would be put into the system again. I was given a new tracking ID, ———, and told to wait another 4-6 weeks for the rebate to arrive.

On August 12, I received my second rejection letter from T-Mobile, with the previous tracking ID. It was otherwise identical to the first letter I had received.

I called T-Mobile for the second time on September 3, talking to Natalie (ID ——). She spoke with a supervisor and told me that there was a problem in T-Mobile’s computer processing system, that the Nokia 2610 model was supposed to be eligible for the $30 rebate but that the computer was not recognizing that. I was told that the system was being fixed, and that it would approve my rebate.

I received no rebate after 6 weeks, and made my third call to T-Mobile on October 27. I spoke with Gina, employee ID ——. I was very disappointed with T-Mobile, and firmly said so to Gina. She explained that, because of my frustration and because it was T-Mobile’s fault, she was putting my rebate request into an “expedited” queue that would not go to the rebate processing center, so that instead of 4-6 weeks, I would receive my rebate by mail in 7-10 days.

No rebate arrived. After 14 days, I made my fourth call to T-Mobile. This time, on November 10, I spoke with Larry (ID ——). Larry told me the same things that I had been told three times before, and so I asked to speak with his supervisor. His supervisor, Jeff (ID ——), talked to an administrator. He told me that he had no answer for me; that Gina had, indeed, approved my request, but that it was waiting to go to the credit card company for the printing of the rebate card. He was unable to give me any answers beyond this; he could not or would not tell me how long that would take, and could not or would not elevate my problem to anyone else at T-Mobile who could give me an answer and rectify the problem.

Jeff ended the call by telling me to call back at the end of the week to check for an update. I informed him that this was entirely unacceptable, and that I had been calling for 4-5 months for a $30 rebate that, as far as I can see, T-Mobile is deliberately denying me by causing endless delays in the hope that I will stop pursuing the matter.

As of November 19, I still have not received the rebate. In one more week, it will have been exactly five months since I submitted the rebate. I am extremely frustrated and, frankly, I think T-Mobile owes me more than $30, to compensate for the hours of my time lost to what has become the biggest consumer frustration with which I have ever been forced to deal.