AT&T

This will begin a new series on my blog, in which I will write open letters to people/companies/etc. that make me angry.

Dear AT&T Wireless:

I wish I wasn't so easily distracted by shiny things. If the lure of that reflective silver phone hadn't been too much for me to resist, I surely never would have signed any sort of contract with you. I'll admit, the promised (yet never received) 20% student discount was also pretty tempting. It's too bad that the four months of our relationship have been filled with harassment and incompetence.

I would like to apologize though, because I believe while I was on the phone with customer service representative Chuck Hildebrand(t?), I referred to the guy who sold me my cell phone (hereinafter referred to as "salesman") as "an idiot" and "a moron," because I was led to believe that it was he who entered my Social Security number incorrectly into your system, thereby making it impossible for me to sign up for online billing, or to ever make any changes to my account. As the conversation with Chuck progressed, I figured out that when the salesman assigned me my "temporary" New York number to use until my old number could be ported over, he entered my SSN correctly. You see, I received a collection notice for a random New York cell phone number from you, with my name on it. After Chuck informed me that I cannot make any changes to my current account because my Social Security number is not linked to it, I commented that it was a good thing the SSN for the New York number was incorrect, because that way the collection agency could never catch me. Chuck informed me that AT&T actually has the correct SSN on the collection account though, meaning that it was someone further down the line from the salesman who is the idiot and/or moron.

So, I would like to apologize, and I hope you can add a note to my file that the salesman was helpful and nice, and I'm sorry I prematurely called him a moron and an idiot. I'm also pleased to know that should I remain supremely frustrated with you, I can stop paying the phone bill for my real phone number, since I KNOW you do not have the correct SSN on that account. Since you cannot link the correct SSN from my first account with you to my current account with you, I am confident in your incompetence that you will never connect the two should I decide to stop paying. Don't say I didn't give you a hint on this one.

I would have just e-mailed this letter to you, but I can't log in to your website, since I don't know the last four digits of the Social Security number you have on file for me. I hope you understand.

Talk to you soon!

Mandy