Why AT&T is the Scourge of Modern Business
I have been with AT&T for many years. My phone was a Motorola Razor and I had a “bed head” when I joined. I got a “great deal” on a smart phone and I was thrilled! It’s been ‘meh’ ever since.
I’ve paid about $100 a month, $1,200 a year for about 9 years. So they’ve taken almost $11,000 of my hard earned money. To them, not a lot, to me a significant amount.
Granted, I’ve gotten to use some cool gadgets and bounce my memes and texts off their satellites. So there’s that.
Recently I’ve noticed something. If you choose to join plans or change your plan you get billed a month in advance.
I did all of those things in the span of two months. I closed a business line and added the # to my existing personal account. Then I changed my Data plan (upgraded, no less). And now my bill for the last two months have been over $400. I did get a $100 refund when I closed my business account, so there’s THAT.
Here’s my problem: I’ve been a customer for almost a decade, I’ve paid them the equivalent of a 2006 Honda Civic, I’ve offered to give them more money (please give me more of your terrific data, PLEASE!) and not a single person at AT&T knows this, much less cares.
Am I the most significant person/customer at AT&T, no. I’m not that dillusional. However, the company as a whole is the perfect example of what’s wrong with todays business environment: complete disconnect and total indifference.
Customers/clients today are merely a transaction. Here is my widget, give me your dollar, move over (with a smile), next! AT&T is a large corporation with many departments and thousands upon thousands of employees. Yet not a single one that I have met in my (almost) ten years of interactions have left me feeling cared for.
Am I a softy? Maybe. Do I need coddling? No. Would I like to be treated like my business matters? Yes. Would I like to be treated like my dollars are valuable? Absolutely. And that is what todays market is allowing us to do.
I can write this and tell you about my experience and you in turn can weigh your options. AT&T won’t “feel” it, but eventually they will realize that the “policies” that they hide behind when a customer feels overcharged won’t matter because market share will dictate that they should finally give a rip about us and not the bottom line.
The truth of today is that business is moving towards the direction it was back in the 50's. The relationship matters again. Your local butcher couldn’t bad mouth you or up his prices without word spreading and him feeling the pinch. People talked to one another and told their neighbor “Joe the Butcher is a jerk.” And guess what? No one went to Joe ‘the Jerk’ butcher and Joe went out of business.
Today is slightly different. Now I tweet about it or write a blog post about it. Now my voice doesn’t reach my neighborhood, it could reach the world. Now my neighbor doesn’t stop (or start) doing something, a teenager in Chicago or a Mom in LA will decide to stop (or start) doing something. That’s the power that consumers have now, but the majority of large corporations either don’t understand or are too slow to respond.
I’ll tweet my frustration and @ATTCares will respond with an “I’m sorry this is happening” and say they’ll look into it but it will end with “that’s AT&T’s policy”. They already have my $800. So no one really cares.
But now I have the power to tell you about it. I have the power to not just take my business elsewhere but to urge someone else who’s frustrated to do the same. Now I can say, I’m done. Are you? Do something about it.
Businesses can no longer hold their customers hostage because they’re the only widget maker in town. Business, once beholden to their customers, have veered off the path and drunk themselves into a stupor on their profits. They’ve wanted more and more and so have cut costs and expenses to the detriment of the consumer and their experience.
And then came Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, Dollar Shave Club, Birchbox, Bespoke Post, Uber & AirBnB. These are customer/consumer-centric businesses disrupting their respective space. So who will make AT&T wake up? Cricket? Will Grasshopper get into mobile? I don’t know. But what I do know is that if AT&T (and large corporations in general) doesn’t wake up they will find themselves in a tail spin with no way out.
Adapt or die. See Blockbuster, Circuit City, Radio Shack & Borders.
