I’m going on a four-day trip next weekend where I won’t have regular Internet access. T-Mobile has a great HotSpot (WiFi) network in the area I’m visiting. It’s a little expensive, at $9.99/day, but they offer a one-week prepaid card for $19.99. That seems like a fair deal, and I want to buy that. The only problem is, they don’t sell the 7-day prepaid service online; you have to buy a PIN at a T-Mobile retail store.
Last night, I went to the T-Mobile store near my house to buy the $19.99 card. They rang up the sale, swiped my MasterCard, but then got an error on the computer: “This store cannot sell PIN-based transactions right now.” It was closing time, but I was told I could just go to any other T-Mobile store, or come back to the same store today.
I called the 800 support number, thinking they would just sell me a PIN over the phone, but Bina told me it has to be bought in a store.
So this afternoon I just walked over to the T-Mobile store about a mile from my office — in another state. They sold me one, swiped it, and then got the same error: they can’t sell PIN-based transactions either. He said he couldn’t do anything about it except open a ticket with their help desk. He wasn’t rude, but he sure wasn’t very helpful either.
I called the 800 number again and got the same support rep, Bina. (They must never let her leave — she was there at 11PM and last night again at 1PM today.) She couldn’t tell me what the problem was, or when it would be fixed, or how I could find out if it was fixed, or even how the store could find out without swiping my credit card again. She said all I could do would be to go back to a T-Mobile store and try again. (But I tried that already!)
“As a courtesy,” she said, she offered me one free DayPass, but that’s not very useful. I need 4 days of service and even with one free DayPass, daily service at $9.99 would still be more expensive than a week for $19.99.
What is wrong with these people?!? I’m going out of my way to buy their product, and they can’t be bothered to sell it to me!! I’m a long-time T-Mobile phone customer, and I’m crazy about their customer service. But when their WiFi division is such a letdown, it really makes me want to rethink my entire relationship with the company.
Does anyone know of alternate short-term WiFi services in the San Francisco Bay area?
