Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Wireless users on phone to state

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 02 Jan 2003 14:35:08 -0500

Wireless users on phone to state

By Peter Lewis
Seattle Times consumer-affairs reporter

When Bill Darrigan of Sumner signed a one-year contract for wireless-phone service, he
figured he couldn't lose.

For $69.99 a month, VoiceStream (the company later became T-Mobile) included two phones —
one for himself, the other
for his fiancée living in California — and offered 800 shared minutes with no
long-distance or roaming charges.

A significant selling point for Darrigan was a "family plan" that offered unlimited
minutes anywhere in the U.S. for calls between
the two phones. He reckoned his wireless tab would easily be less than the long-distance
charges he and his fiancée were piling
up.

Within a couple of months, though, Darrigan was having second thoughts. The bills were
hundreds of dollars higher than he expected, primarily because those calls between the two

VoiceStream phones turned up as extra charges.

Darrigan complained to the Washington state attorney general's consumer-protection
division,
which went to bat for him and got his $2,400 debt erased.

Records show that Darrigan's complaint is hardly unique. It is one of 1,100 wireless
complaints
the state logged in the first 11 months of 2002.

Complaints about wireless-phone service have doubled since 2000. They now represent nearly

two out of five in the telecommunications category.

Newly released state statistics show that, for the fifth year in a row, telecommunications
ranks as
the No. 1 complaint category, with the bulk still tied to regular phones and involving
billing and
service issues.

Continuing a steady climb are complaints about Internet service, which ranked 15th in
2000,
14th last year and 13th in 2002, with 428 complaints.

Paul Silver, the assistant attorney general who runs the consumer-protection division,
said the
office's complaint numbers understate the extent of problems. That's because many
consumers
are either unaware of his office, think lodging a complaint is not worth the hassle or
figure it
would be futile, he said.

"These (telecommunications and Internet) services are the new utilities of this
millennium," Silver
observed. The public wouldn't stand for it, he noted, if water departments told customers
they
would face heavy cancellation fees if they signed up for service and then moved less than
two
years later.

Yet penalties for early termination are a staple — even though they are not always
conspicuously
disclosed — in many wireless-phone contracts, Silver said.

Despite growing discontent, at least as reflected in state and federal statistics, the
wireless-phone
business and Internet service remain largely unregulated.

Travis Larson, director of communications with the Cellular Telecommunications and
Internet
Association, a trade group, insists that competition is working and that 93 percent of
consumers
can choose among three or more wireless companies. In the Seattle area, there are at least
a
half-dozen carriers to choose from.

"Carriers are competing on the basis of service," he said. "Service truly matters to these
carriers."

One obstacle to meeting consumer expectations, Larson added, is neighborhood resistance
that
wireless companies sometimes encounter when they try to extend and improve their networks
by
adding transmitters.

Larson did not deny the industry has other problems to solve, including billing and rate
issues.
Despite them, wireless service "continues to be incredibly popular," he said.

The number of subscribers has nearly doubled in the past three years, from 76 million in
June
1999 to 134.5 million last June, Larson said.

'Grace-period' offers

He urged consumers to take advantage of "grace-period" offers available from every U.S.
wireless carrier. During such trial periods, which have varying lengths, customers may
quit at no
cost, he said.

But Liz Aberg discovered that such "escapes clauses" are not always all they're cracked up
to
be.

Aberg was living in Federal Way in April 2001 when she signed with Qwest for a pair of
cellphones.

"What really roped me in was the fact that I could cancel anytime" during a three-month
"free trial" period, Aberg recalled. "I
came to find that just was not the case at all."

In her complaint to the attorney general, Aberg noted that after becoming disillusioned
with the service, she tried on numerous
occasions to cancel before the trial period was over.

But she "could not get through because I was repeatedly put on hold for OVER 45 minutes. I
then submitted e-mails to Qwest
to request the phones be deactivated well within the allotted time period," Aberg said in
her complaint.

Her contacts with Qwest's customer-service representatives were frustrating. Whether it
was their problem-solving skills, their
training or the financial incentives built into their compensation packages, "they didn't
sound like they had time to hear it (her
complaint). ... It was a little disheartening," Aberg said.

Last July, Qwest's collection agency demanded she pay $767.96 to settle her bill. That led
her
to complain to the attorney general, which got Qwest's attention and ultimately helped
resolve
the case to her satisfaction. Most of the charge was erased.

Still, the experience caused Aberg, who has since moved to a Portland suburb, to quit
cellphones for more than a year. She said she caved in earlier this year, signing up with
Verizon
after "grilling" them thoroughly.

In general, Aberg favors competition and hates government regulation. But having been
burned
— and knowing many others in the same boat — she's reconsidering whether the wireless
industry should be regulated.

State barred from regulating

Believing that deregulation would help foster development of the fledgling wireless
industry,
Washington legislators in 1985 passed a bill explicitly barring the state's Utilities and
Transportation Commission from regulating terms and conditions of wireless service except
in
very limited circumstances. And federal law pre-empts states from regulating prices.

But such restrictions do not block the Attorney General's Office from applying the state's

Consumer Protection Act when it sees evidence of deceptive business practices.

A case in point is the consent decree filed in King County Superior Court last month
involving
Qwest. The company admitted no wrongdoing but agreed to change its ways, pledging to
upgrade its customer service. Other provisions addressed terms and conditions of
wireless-telephone service, as well as the marketing of high-speed DSL (Internet) service.

Attorney General Christine Gregoire noted that Qwest was not the only wireless company to
engage in deceptive business practices. Her office is talking with others in the industry,
she said,
to ensure that consumers get a fair shake.

Qwest's Annette Jacobs, whose signature appears on the consent decree, insists the company

is committed to improving customer service. There has been a significant reduction in
recent
months in wireless-phone cancellation rates, along with a simplification of rates, said
Jacobs,
who serves as vice president for consumer markets.

To send a message to employees that it values customer service, Qwest worked with its
union to restructure the pay system to
put greater weight on customer satisfaction. "It was 10 percent or less in the past,"
Jacobs said.

Starting in January, customer satisfaction, as measured by follow-up surveys done with the
customer, will count for 35 percent
to 50 percent of a Qwest employee's compensation, depending on the position, Jacobs said.

A T-Mobile spokesman had a similarly sunny outlook, saying that since the beginning of
2002, there has been a 50 percent
reduction in the number of complaints filed with the attorney general relative to the size
of the company's growing customer
base.

The company "is dedicated to our customers and providing high-quality service to them,"
said T-Mobile spokesman Bryan
Zidar.

Zidar had nothing to say, however, about the case of Bill Darrigan. When Darrigan called
to complain about the "family plan" he
had agreed to, salespeople told him to ignore the bills for more than the agreed-upon
monthly service charge. They blamed a
computer snafu.

When the problem persisted, Darrigan approached a manager. She told him the
unlimited-minutes offer "did not apply to the
Santa Rosa area."

"I then asked her what (was) meant by 'nationwide' or 'anywhere in the U.S.A.' She
instructed me to 'look it up in the
dictionary,' " recounted Darrigan, who had to dig deep to control his temper.

Darrigan became so soured as a result of his experience that "I won't even look at them
(wireless phones) anymore," he said. "I
just don't trust any of them."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/PrintStory.pl?document_id=134605182&zsection_id=268448406&slug=wireless30m0&date=20021230

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