I declared war on Cingular today, and I think I lost. Yeah, I lost and I’m not happy. Here is the story. I was with AT&T, which of course was bought out by Cingular. I was informed through the mail that whenever I switched over to a Cingular plan I wouldn’t be penalized for ending my contract with AT&T, since they no longer exist. That is problem #1. Problem #2 is that my plan with AT&T was a local plan, which means I roam when I’m out of WV, KY, and OH…so I’ve been roaming everytime I’ve been to MD/DC. My cell phone bills have been over $100 for the past 2 months, and so far this month I already have about $88 in roaming fees. Problem #2 creates problem #3, because Cingular does not have local plans, only national plans. Great, sign me up. Oh no, they won’t do that.

Here is how it works out. If I just switch my number and my local plan with the non-existent AT&T to a local plan that includes MD I lose all my promotions, which means my pathetic plan would only include 400 minutes TOTAL. No nights & weekends, mobile to mobile, etc. Just 400 mintues. That just doesn’t work for me. So I say, just switch me to a national plan with Cingular. They say, we can do that but you have to buy a new phone at full price (unlike how they usually give you a free phone or $20 for starting a plan). I say, oh I have a phone. They say, that phone won’t work with Cingular technology. I say, you must be crazy. It works with Cingular now. It is only 1 year old. It has been working on the Cingular network for several months. They try to explain over and over about how Cingular has new technology, how the chip in the phone is different, how my phone CAN’T work on their network. And all I say, for about 2 hours on the phone and in the store, is “but that does not makes any sense because it works right now, I am using that phone right now to talk to you, on the Cingular network”.

So finally, I ask how much I must pay to cancel the whole contract so I can switch back to Sprint. Oh, they didn’t like that and switched me to some higher up person. This person said if I do this whole “migrate” to Cingular thing online I can get a free phone. Great, somebody should’ve said that 2 hours ago. So I go online, my account is locked, I call again, they unlock it, I get back online…and it says they can not do the switch online because I still am under contract with AT&T. What? So at the end of a 2-3 hour dilema I get back in car and drive to the Cingular store, defeated, head hung low, and ready to buy some stupid new phone. Guess what? The store closed 2 hours early because the air conditioner quit working. What a great day I’ve had.

I just can’t figure out why I have to be penalized for 1-moving and 2-AT&T no longer existing. If they were still a company I could just switch plans, start a new contract date, and be done with it. I kept saying that I didn’t want to cancel a contract, or move down to a cheaper one, or anything that would be negative to Cingular. I just moved and I don’t want to pay roaming charges. Grr.