Billing snafus with my account

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Last week I discovered I could no longer download ringtones or screen
savers from SprintPCS. I called *2 and after describing my problem was
sent to 866-818-1858 (Vision Tech Support).

First call to Vision Tech Support: technician takes me through a series
of menus on the phone and we reinitialize my web connection. Tells me to
leave the phone off for 30 minutes then try again.

I do, and the problem still exists.

Second call: I call *2 again. CS agent says my account is overdue and
would I like to pay. I reply that I'm on automatic payment and it
shouldn't be possible to be overdue on bill payment. She repeats twice
more that I owe $60 and would I like to pay. Both times I state that I
am unable to download ringtones or screen savers. She finally routes me
to Vision Tech Support.

Vision Tech Support person says that he can see nothing on his screen
that indicates anything wrong with the payment status of my account. He
can't understand why the CS agent would have said I was overdue on
payment. He says he's "going to try something" and that I should take
the battery off the back of the phone while it's still running, then put
it back on a minute later, then not turn the phone on for two hours. He
said he was reprovisioning the phone.

I do these things and still cannot download ringtones or screen savers.

I call Vision Tech Support again. Spoke to a man who said that the only
thing left to do was to "re-provision the phone." I said that the last
person at Vision Tech Support who I spoke to said he was going to
re-provision the phone and it had had no effect. He said that his screen
showed my account had been "turned off and then turned on again," but
that it had not been re-provisioned. He said that re-provisioning the
phone would delete all the pictures I had in Picture Mail. I told him I
wanted to download all the photos before they did anything that deleted
them.

After downloading all the photos in Picture Mail to my PC, I called
Vision Tech Support back. Spoke to a nice woman who said that the reason
my internet service had been interrupted was I had "exceeded the
spending limit of [my] account." Impossible, I said, there is no
spending limit on my account. She looks at her screen and says, "yes,
I'm showing you have a $0.00 account balance." Then she said that
whenever there was a problem with billing this was often the result.

I asked her if she had had many customers calling in with this problem.
"No," she said, "but it's happened to me." I asked her if she meant that
SprintPCS had messed up her billing and caused her to lose internet
service. "Yes," she said.

She offered me a month of unlimited text messaging to compensate me. I
told her no thanks since I don't exceed the 100 messages a month I have.
I asked her if she could escalate the call and she said a supervisor
would be calling me within 36 hours.

Now, I would like to ask the newsgroup: what will that supervisor tell
me, and what should I be prepared to ask him/her?

Thanks,
Anne

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Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

News Reader wrote:
<sip yet another tale of woe from SPCS CS>
>
> Now, I would like to ask the newsgroup: what will that supervisor tell
> me, and what should I be prepared to ask him/her?
>
> Thanks,
> Anne

If I was a betting man I'd bet you won't actually receive that call.

Regardless, even if you have to call back again (you will), this is what
I would do first:

Check your account online at sprintpcs.com and make sure the account is
indeed current. You can't rely on automatic payments to be 100%
reliable. Check both the SPCS side, and whatever bank the funds are
withdrawn from.

Second, get a definitive answer on whether your account does, in fact,
have a spending limit. If it does, you would have been informed about it
from the get-go. Generally this occurs when someone's credit is
less-than-stellar, and SPCS puts a cap on how much one can spend.

Third, check, again at sprintpcs.com, your account's current usage. See
anything strange? Have you gone over your minutes? Downloaded a plethora
of ring-tones and/or apps and games? All of this could place you above
your spending limit, assuming there is one.

Finally, I'm assuming you are the primary account-holder. If not, make
sure the primary-account holder has not placed any restrictions on your
sub-account.

If none of the above is true (i.e., you are not past-due, you do not
have a spending limit, etc.) I'd say you need to escalate the matter
past the typical CS/Vision tech drones. You can sit around for another
day and wait for a call that probably won't come. Or you can take action
right now and call 866-866-7496 and ask for Executive Services. They may
or may not be able to take care of whatever demons, assuming there any,
that are possessing your account.

Good luck.

--
Mike | Last words of Thomas Grasso, executed in 1995:
| "I did not get my Spaghetti-O's, I got spaghetti.
| I want the press to know this."

Reply to tinman

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Tinman,

Thanks for the good advice. In short, there are no spending limits on my
account, I am the sole account holder, and so on. 18 hours later, I
still don't have the ability to download ringtones etc. I have noticed
that the Picture Mail link has disappeared from my account web page
since this snafu began. Thanks also for the Exec. Services phone number.
I will give it a try.

-Anne

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 07:50:40 -0700, "Tinman"
>News Reader wrote:
><sip yet another tale of woe from SPCS CS>
>If none of the above is true (i.e., you are not past-due, you do not
>have a spending limit, etc.) I'd say you need to escalate the matter
>past the typical CS/Vision tech drones.

Through my recent, mostly unpleasant, dealings with Sprint CS, the
biggest problem I've found is that the typical "CS/Vision tech drones"
are ill-equipped to handle anything beyond simple problems, and would
rather "ad-lib" to stumble across a solution then escalate the problem
to the next tech support level. This leads to all sorts of wasted
time and "solutions" that don't fix the problem.

I have a Verizon Wireless account for our family estate. My sister
called a couple of weeks ago to tell me that the voicemail had stopped
working. I dreaded making the call to Verizion, expecting the same
kind of inadequate assistance that I have been getting from Sprint
recently.

What a surprise! My call was answered by a well-spoken individual. I
explained my problem. This rep made a quick review of the account,
and in less than 30 seconds after I finished describing the problem,
transferred me to tier 2. Again, the call was answered by a
well-spoken individual, who idendified that VW had messed up when
updating the billing on our account. She fixed it, and then connected
me to the voicemail box, and stayed on the line to ensure that I was
able to login and that everything was working. The problem was solved
and the call was completed in less than 5 minutes.

Another interesting little tidbit...The VW tier 2 rep informed me that
our phone (Motorola StarTac) was not E911-compliant (which I knew),
and then made a comment about how she suspected I wouldn't want to
upgrade it. I asked her what she meant by that. She replied that the
StarTac and TimePort phones were very popular, and that most people
don't want to upgrade. She also mentioned that Verizon is inundated
with requests to bring back a phone similar to the StarTac and
Timeport.

Joe Huber
huber.joseph@comcast.net

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Joseph Huber wrote:

> What a surprise! My call was answered by a well-spoken individual. I
> explained my problem. This rep made a quick review of the account,
> and in less than 30 seconds after I finished describing the problem,
> transferred me to tier 2. Again, the call was answered by a
> well-spoken individual, who idendified that VW had messed up when
> updating the billing on our account. She fixed it, and then connected
> me to the voicemail box, and stayed on the line to ensure that I was
> able to login and that everything was working. The problem was solved
> and the call was completed in less than 5 minutes.

Verizon Wireless CS was great for the entire four years that I was a
customer of theirs.

--
Steve Sobol, Professional Geek 888-480-4638 PGP: 0xE3AE35ED
Company website: http://JustThe.net/
Personal blog, resume, portfolio: http://SteveSobol.com/
E: sjsobol@JustThe.net Snail: 22674 Motnocab Road, Apple Valley, CA 92307

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

In article <B%JKe.160318$X76.11072@tornado.texas.rr.com>, news-
reader@news.com says...
> Tinman,
>
> Thanks for the good advice. In short, there are no spending limits on my
> account, I am the sole account holder, and so on. 18 hours later, I
> still don't have the ability to download ringtones etc. I have noticed
> that the Picture Mail link has disappeared from my account web page
> since this snafu began. Thanks also for the Exec. Services phone number.
> I will give it a try.
>
> -Anne
>

If you don't mind my asking, what happens when you try to download a
ringtone?

--
RØß
O/Siris
-+-
A thing moderately good
is not so good as it ought to be.
Moderation in temper is always a virtue,
but moderation in principle is always a vice.
+Thomas Paine, "The Rights of Man", 1792+

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Rob,

I get this error message:

LOGIN ERROR
Application error. We regret this inconvenience. Please try again later.

However for several hours today I got a different error saying the
Vision service was down for upgrades. At the same time my account web
page also had a message saying they were temporarily down for upgrades.

Got any ideas?

-Anne

O/Siris wrote:
> In article <B%JKe.160318$X76.11072@tornado.texas.rr.com>, news-
> reader@news.com says...
>
>>Tinman,
>>
>>Thanks for the good advice. In short, there are no spending limits on my
>>account, I am the sole account holder, and so on. 18 hours later, I
>>still don't have the ability to download ringtones etc. I have noticed
>>that the Picture Mail link has disappeared from my account web page
>>since this snafu began. Thanks also for the Exec. Services phone number.
>>I will give it a try.
>>
>>-Anne
>>
>
>
> If you don't mind my asking, what happens when you try to download a
> ringtone?
>

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Enjoyed reading your story! How does any of that information answer any
of my questions?

-Anne

Joseph Huber wrote:
> On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 07:50:40 -0700, "Tinman"
>
>>News Reader wrote:
>><sip yet another tale of woe from SPCS CS>
>>If none of the above is true (i.e., you are not past-due, you do not
>>have a spending limit, etc.) I'd say you need to escalate the matter
>>past the typical CS/Vision tech drones.
>
>
> Through my recent, mostly unpleasant, dealings with Sprint CS, the
> biggest problem I've found is that the typical "CS/Vision tech drones"
> are ill-equipped to handle anything beyond simple problems, and would
> rather "ad-lib" to stumble across a solution then escalate the problem
> to the next tech support level. This leads to all sorts of wasted
> time and "solutions" that don't fix the problem.
>
> I have a Verizon Wireless account for our family estate. My sister
> called a couple of weeks ago to tell me that the voicemail had stopped
> working. I dreaded making the call to Verizion, expecting the same
> kind of inadequate assistance that I have been getting from Sprint
> recently.
>
> What a surprise! My call was answered by a well-spoken individual. I
> explained my problem. This rep made a quick review of the account,
> and in less than 30 seconds after I finished describing the problem,
> transferred me to tier 2. Again, the call was answered by a
> well-spoken individual, who idendified that VW had messed up when
> updating the billing on our account. She fixed it, and then connected
> me to the voicemail box, and stayed on the line to ensure that I was
> able to login and that everything was working. The problem was solved
> and the call was completed in less than 5 minutes.
>
> Another interesting little tidbit...The VW tier 2 rep informed me that
> our phone (Motorola StarTac) was not E911-compliant (which I knew),
> and then made a comment about how she suspected I wouldn't want to
> upgrade it. I asked her what she meant by that. She replied that the
> StarTac and TimePort phones were very popular, and that most people
> don't want to upgrade. She also mentioned that Verizon is inundated
> with requests to bring back a phone similar to the StarTac and
> Timeport.
>
> Joe Huber
> huber.joseph@comcast.net

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

If you ever get a rep that is located in India, hang up immediately in order
to avoid a total waste of your time.

"Steve Sobol" <sjsobol@JustThe.net> wrote in message
newsdh43a$vd6$2@ratbert.glorb.com...
> Joseph Huber wrote:
>
>> What a surprise! My call was answered by a well-spoken individual. I
>> explained my problem. This rep made a quick review of the account,
>> and in less than 30 seconds after I finished describing the problem,
>> transferred me to tier 2. Again, the call was answered by a
>> well-spoken individual, who idendified that VW had messed up when
>> updating the billing on our account. She fixed it, and then connected
>> me to the voicemail box, and stayed on the line to ensure that I was
>> able to login and that everything was working. The problem was solved
>> and the call was completed in less than 5 minutes.
>
> Verizon Wireless CS was great for the entire four years that I was a
> customer of theirs.
>
> --
> Steve Sobol, Professional Geek 888-480-4638 PGP: 0xE3AE35ED
> Company website: http://JustThe.net/
> Personal blog, resume, portfolio: http://SteveSobol.com/
> E: sjsobol@JustThe.net Snail: 22674 Motnocab Road, Apple Valley, CA 92307

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 04:04:14 GMT, News Reader wrote:

>Enjoyed reading your story! How does any of that information answer any
>of my questions?

I wasn't responding to your questions, I was responding to a comment
made by Tinman.

However, if you would like my advice on the matter, I suggest taking
your phone and going to a Sprint store with technicians on staff (not
one of those "stores" in Radio Shack, or Costco, or a mall kiosk).
Hopefully, there is one within a reasonable distance. It seems that
the techs at the Sprint stores can directly contact higher tier
technical support at Sprint when they get stumped. O/Siris can
probably tell you about the capabilities of the technicians at the
Sprint stores.

This has worked for me and also for colleagues of mine when we ended
up in a similar situation to yours, where we could make no headway on
the problem via phone tech support.

Joe Huber
huber.joseph@comcast.net

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Mij Adyaw wrote:
> If you ever get a rep that is located in India, hang up immediately in order
> to avoid a total waste of your time.

You won't with Verizon. My CSRs, when I lived in Cleveland, operated out of
the VZW regional corporate office just outside Columbus, Ohio.

--
Steve Sobol, Professional Geek 888-480-4638 PGP: 0xE3AE35ED
Company website: http://JustThe.net/
Personal blog, resume, portfolio: http://SteveSobol.com/
E: sjsobol@JustThe.net Snail: 22674 Motnocab Road, Apple Valley, CA 92307

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Anne,

I have four Sanyo PM-8200's. In June, two of the four phones developed the
problem you described. Although I have called Sprint a number of times,
even the Vision representatives were unable to solve the problem.

I have the Sprint Vision package. Internet access is still available. 100
included SMS messages are still there. But on two of the four phones I can
no longer download games, ringers, screen savers, and applications. The
option to select these four has also disappeared from the phones' associated
web page Sprint provides.

Unfortunately, I have no solution to offer since my calls to the Sprint
customer service have been dead-ends. I am hoping you will have better
luck!

Rick

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

The technicians at the Sprint store and any other cell phone provider store
were probably flipping burgers the previous week. :-(

"Joseph Huber" <huber.joseph@comcast.net> wrote in message
newshaof1t859a7o2v1nqugjaq3buqtvhe2l2@4ax.com...
> On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 04:04:14 GMT, News Reader wrote:
>
>>Enjoyed reading your story! How does any of that information answer any
>>of my questions?
>
> I wasn't responding to your questions, I was responding to a comment
> made by Tinman.
>
> However, if you would like my advice on the matter, I suggest taking
> your phone and going to a Sprint store with technicians on staff (not
> one of those "stores" in Radio Shack, or Costco, or a mall kiosk).
> Hopefully, there is one within a reasonable distance. It seems that
> the techs at the Sprint stores can directly contact higher tier
> technical support at Sprint when they get stumped. O/Siris can
> probably tell you about the capabilities of the technicians at the
> Sprint stores.
>
> This has worked for me and also for colleagues of mine when we ended
> up in a similar situation to yours, where we could make no headway on
> the problem via phone tech support.
>
> Joe Huber
> huber.joseph@comcast.net

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

News Reader wrote:
> Last week I discovered I could no longer download ringtones
> or screen savers from SprintPCS.

Anne:

Do you have the Vision option on this phone?

Could this be a _Vision_ password problem?
(As opposed to an _account_ password.)

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 20:15:50 -0500, Joseph Huber
<huber.joseph@comcast.net> wrote:

>Another interesting little tidbit...The VW tier 2 rep informed me that
>our phone (Motorola StarTac) was not E911-compliant (which I knew),
>and then made a comment about how she suspected I wouldn't want to
>upgrade it. I asked her what she meant by that. She replied that the
>StarTac and TimePort phones were very popular, and that most people
>don't want to upgrade. She also mentioned that Verizon is inundated
>with requests to bring back a phone similar to the StarTac and
>Timeport.

Whenever I hear good things about the Moto StarTac, and to a slightly
lesser extent the Moto TimePort, I experience a small involuntary
shudder as I remember how poorly both of those models performed for
me. As the saying goes, one man's trash is surely another man's
treasure. <G>

--
Paul Miner

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

In article <8bVKe.134482$0f.72897@tornado.texas.rr.com>, news-
reader@news.com says...
> Rob,
>
> I get this error message:
>
> LOGIN ERROR
> Application error. We regret this inconvenience. Please try again later.
>
> However for several hours today I got a different error saying the
> Vision service was down for upgrades. At the same time my account web
> page also had a message saying they were temporarily down for upgrades.
>
> Got any ideas?
>
> -Anne
>

Well... depending on what I would have seen in the Vision support tools
I used to be able to access, it sounds like the reps were, at least, on
the right first step.

Actually, I take that back. Step one would have been to see if you
could purchase a download using the Sprint PCS web site on a PC. I'm
seeing on some web sites that the web site is problematic right now.

Are you able to log in to your Sprint PCs account on the web site? I'm
betting not. But that may be unrelated. Let me know what the results
are.

And yeah, I have... let's see... two ideas. #3 is the provisioning
thing I know you've (theoretically) been through already.

OH! One more thing. I think you mentioned it already, but go into your
Settings menu, to "Vision", and Update Profile. Let me know how that
goes. Including how long it took to do what it did (not to the second,
just ballpark). CAUTION: if this fails, it can render Vision completely
down for you until it gets fixed, so you decide if that's worth the
risk. We can work around this if not.

--
RØß
O/Siris
-+-
A thing moderately good
is not so good as it ought to be.
Moderation in temper is always a virtue,
but moderation in principle is always a vice.
+Thomas Paine, "The Rights of Man", 1792+

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

"News Reader" <news-reader@news.com> wrote in message
newsbwKe.130070$0f.76367@tornado.texas.rr.com...
> Last week I discovered I could no longer download ringtones or screen
> savers from SprintPCS. I called *2 and after describing my problem was
> sent to 866-818-1858 (Vision Tech Support).

Anne- The same thing is happening with my phone. Ringers, games, etc., are
suddenly gone. Previously downloaded content is still available--- I just
can't download anything new. When I try to download, I get a message: LOGIN
ERROR
Application error. We regret this inconvenience. Please try again later.

Ringer and game choices have also disappeared from the web site.

I have the Vision package. Other stuff is still fine--- Internet still
available. And the Sprint web site is accessible, but content items are
gone.

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

In article <yihLe.1341$A%3.1302@newssvr33.news.prodigy.com>, rcr@are.com
says...
> Anne- The same thing is happening with my phone. Ringers, games, etc., are
> suddenly gone. Previously downloaded content is still available--- I just
> can't download anything new. When I try to download, I get a message: LOGIN
> ERROR
> Application error. We regret this inconvenience. Please try again later.
>
> Ringer and game choices have also disappeared from the web site.
>
> I have the Vision package. Other stuff is still fine--- Internet still
> available. And the Sprint web site is accessible, but content items are
> gone.
>

Then Sprint is likely having some kind of problem with Content Manager.
Or, to be more precise, the server that controls it.

If more than one person is experiencing the same problem, it's
exponentially less and less likely that it's a user or phone problem.

--
RØß
O/Siris
-+-
A thing moderately good
is not so good as it ought to be.
Moderation in temper is always a virtue,
but moderation in principle is always a vice.
+Thomas Paine, "The Rights of Man", 1792+

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

As many people have noticed by now the Vision web site has been
unavailable for over 24 hours. Yesterday there was a message saying
they'd be back this morning, but it's getting late and they're still
down. Sounds like they must have hit some unexpected snags.

RCR's symptoms are exactly what I've been experiencing. My phone was
re-provisioned yesterday but the Vision web site hasn't come back online
since then, so I haven't had the chance to check to see whether this
fixed it.

I wonder what RCR's account and mine have in common? Any Sprint folks
here who can tell us what's going on with these site upgrades that are
taking longer than predicted?

-Anne

O/Siris wrote:
> In article <yihLe.1341$A%3.1302@newssvr33.news.prodigy.com>, rcr@are.com
> says...
>
>>Anne- The same thing is happening with my phone. Ringers, games, etc., are
>>suddenly gone. Previously downloaded content is still available--- I just
>>can't download anything new. When I try to download, I get a message: LOGIN
>>ERROR
>>Application error. We regret this inconvenience. Please try again later.
>>
>>Ringer and game choices have also disappeared from the web site.
>>
>>I have the Vision package. Other stuff is still fine--- Internet still
>>available. And the Sprint web site is accessible, but content items are
>>gone.
>>
>
>
> Then Sprint is likely having some kind of problem with Content Manager.
> Or, to be more precise, the server that controls it.
>
> If more than one person is experiencing the same problem, it's
> exponentially less and less likely that it's a user or phone problem.
>

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Anne,

Any improvement now that the web has returned?

The Sprint site is now available again, but my phone is still absent the
content manager--- ringers, screensavers, games, etc. I can not download.

If your phone has returned to normal, then there is hope. Mine has been a
mess for over a month. If your phone is back to normal, please drop a note
as to what you think fixed it. I can use your insights when I call in to to
try to get my phone fixed. If your phone is still a mess--- well, you're
not alone.

RCR

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

The Sprint Vision web site came back up today. However I cannot download
ringers or screen savers from Sprint. Yes, still. However, the error
message changed slightly and there's a new little icon that looks like a
key below the error text. I am losing hope. I wonder if they would
consider temporarily moving my ESN to another phone to see if that fixes
the problem.

I'm using a Sanyo VM-4500, what are you using?

Anne

RCR wrote:
> Anne,
>
> Any improvement now that the web has returned?
>
> The Sprint site is now available again, but my phone is still absent the
> content manager--- ringers, screensavers, games, etc. I can not download.
>
> If your phone has returned to normal, then there is hope. Mine has been a
> mess for over a month. If your phone is back to normal, please drop a note
> as to what you think fixed it. I can use your insights when I call in to to
> try to get my phone fixed. If your phone is still a mess--- well, you're
> not alone.
>
> RCR
>
>
>

Reply to Anonymous

Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (More info?)

Anne,
I am using a Sanyo PM-8200. Since you are also a Sanyo user, I wonder if
this problem is brand-related. I have made many calls to Sprint regarding
this problem, and still the phone remains unfixed. I haven't given up---
I'll probably give them another call in a few days and hope to hit on
someone who knows how to deal with this problem.

If (big "if" ) I am able to solve the problem through their customer service,
I will be certain to post whatever I learn about what the fix was here.

By the way, I am now getting the little graphic too. Maybe they're taunting
us by glamorizing the error page we receive. What if we promise to buy much
more content than we used to?

Good luck with your phone.
--RCR

"News Reader" <news-reader@news.com> wrote in message
news:5lbMe.173597$X76.36819@tornado.texas.rr.com...
> The Sprint Vision web site came back up today. However I cannot download
> ringers or screen savers from Sprint. Yes, still. However, the error
> message changed slightly and there's a new little icon that looks like a
> key below the error text. I am losing hope. I wonder if they would
> consider temporarily moving my ESN to another phone to see if that fixes
> the problem.
>
> I'm using a Sanyo VM-4500, what are you using?
>
> Anne

Reply to Anonymous

Forum Mobility Networks : Sprint PCS - Billing snafus with my account

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