AT&T WP7 for $0.01 on 11-26-11

Well, I'm returning my Focus S, later today. Nothing's wrong with it, but AT&T really screwed up my order. They mistakenly sent a Focus Flash when I ordered an S on 11/26 during their 1 cent sale, but made arrangements for me to exchange it for an S at an AT&T store. Took it last Friday, made the exchange, everything seemed fine.

Yesterday, I got an e-mail from them stating I would be billed $199 for the S.

WTF?????

I called to find out what was wrong and it came down to AT&T claiming they had no record of me ever buying the S for 1 cent... despite the fact that I had a full print out of the invoice in my hands.

WTF?????

I grew increasingly angry at their utter failure to honor my legitimate order, so after 84 minutes and being transferred 5 times I just canceled everything. Back goes the phone and I now understand why so many people despise AT&T's customer service.

:mad:

Wow, I would be furious about that. Do you have any confirmation emails?
 
Well, I'm returning my Focus S, later today. Nothing's wrong with it, but AT&T really screwed up my order. They mistakenly sent a Focus Flash when I ordered an S on 11/26 during their 1 cent sale, but made arrangements for me to exchange it for an S at an AT&T store. Took it last Friday, made the exchange, everything seemed fine.

Yesterday, I got an e-mail from them stating I would be billed $199 for the S.

WTF?????

I called to find out what was wrong and it came down to AT&T claiming they had no record of me ever buying the S for 1 cent... despite the fact that I had a full print out of the invoice in my hands.

WTF?????

I grew increasingly angry at their utter failure to honor my legitimate order, so after 84 minutes and being transferred 5 times I just canceled everything. Back goes the phone and I now understand why so many people despise AT&T's customer service.

:mad:

Have you tried calling back, and just trying to speak with somebody different? Just be extra nice, don't let them know you've called before. I mean, you have the email from them that details your order. I don't see what the problem is.

If that doesn't work, what if you try to sell the phone outright? Craigslist or eBay, and use the money to buy the Focus S? In the end, you'll come very close to paying just a penny for it. Sorry you have to go through that :(
 
I've already got the phone packed up for UPS. Besides, I'm really not in a mood to be nice with AT&T after yesterday's insanity. Maybe this is some sign from the cell phone deities that I'm just not supposed to get a new phone at this time.
 
The bizarro world of my AT&T odyssey continues. I got a call from them a couple hours ago. The rep apologized strongly for the royal screw up. She said there was a big mistake on their part and my 1 cent order was indeed valid. She offered to honor the order, but I already dropped the phone at a UPS Store, earlier this afternoon. So, they're shipping a new Focus S and giving me 3 months credit on my service. Not a bad deal after all the trouble from yesterday. ;)
 
The bizarro world of my AT&T odyssey continues. I got a call from them a couple hours ago. The rep apologized strongly for the royal screw up. She said there was a big mistake on their part and my 1 cent order was indeed valid. She offered to honor the order, but I already dropped the phone at a UPS Store, earlier this afternoon. So, they're shipping a new Focus S and giving me 3 months credit on my service. Not a bad deal after all the trouble from yesterday. ;)

Hurray! Let's hope this is a case of all's well that ends well.
 
Yeah, things definitely seem to have worked out for the best. I celebrated by buying myself a Nook Tablet for an early Christmas present. :D
 
Just an update on my Titan experience. The phone is my daughters, but I have had time to play around with it. I'm already a metro ui fan, but the Titan is very responsive and th screen looks great. She likes it, even though it's a bit of a brick. Put an invisibleShield on it and still need a good case (she's clumsy), but she is a texting demon and she really likes the touchscreen keyboard. The phone itself is really cool.

Now, on the actual OS front. I have a HTC Surround I got cheap for dev this week. I've only played with WP7 at meetups and launch parties, so this was my first week really using the phone as a general purpose device. So this is my experience of just WP7.

  • Just having the main screen of tiles and the list of apps mixed in with settings/3rd party apps is off-putting. I'd like to be able to scroll horizontal/vertical to pin my tiles. Maybe group by screens, ala multiple desktops.
  • The "People" tile integrates with Facebook, but I can't see a way to post to FB, so I still need a FB app... maybe I'm missing something.
  • I'm an avid eBook reader on my phone. Especially since I vanpool and have at least an hour drive in, hour drive home to kill. eBook support seems to just blow. I haven't researched if Zune on desktop is limitation or not, but in iTunes, you can add your own .mobi books to iPhone. Not with Zune. I actually can't find any way to get my books to WP7 that were purchased from publishers like O'Reilly, Pragmatic and Manning. ePub will slightly work with an app called Freda, but again, you need to add dropbox to Freda to read your material since Zune doesn't seem to have a sync for books and Freda is crap anyway. It displays my dropbox password in plain text so that if my phone is lost/stolen anyone can read it. These are not necessarily faults of WP7, but I believe these are results of shortcomings of the Zune/WP7 integration. I would love to hear if anyone has a solution for this. Maybe even a paid app.

That's all I got so far. The OS is great and intuitive, although when actually using it, lots of places still feel unfinished, but maybe it's just adjusting to a new phone for daily use. Either way, it's not going to my daily phone mainly because the eBook issues are just deal breakers for me.
 
Just an update on my Titan experience. The phone is my daughters, but I have had time to play around with it. I'm already a metro ui fan, but the Titan is very responsive and th screen looks great. She likes it, even though it's a bit of a brick. Put an invisibleShield on it and still need a good case (she's clumsy), but she is a texting demon and she really likes the touchscreen keyboard. The phone itself is really cool.

Now, on the actual OS front. I have a HTC Surround I got cheap for dev this week. I've only played with WP7 at meetups and launch parties, so this was my first week really using the phone as a general purpose device. So this is my experience of just WP7.

  • Just having the main screen of tiles and the list of apps mixed in with settings/3rd party apps is off-putting. I'd like to be able to scroll horizontal/vertical to pin my tiles. Maybe group by screens, ala multiple desktops.
  • The "People" tile integrates with Facebook, but I can't see a way to post to FB, so I still need a FB app... maybe I'm missing something.
  • I'm an avid eBook reader on my phone. Especially since I vanpool and have at least an hour drive in, hour drive home to kill. eBook support seems to just blow. I haven't researched if Zune on desktop is limitation or not, but in iTunes, you can add your own .mobi books to iPhone. Not with Zune. I actually can't find any way to get my books to WP7 that were purchased from publishers like O'Reilly, Pragmatic and Manning. ePub will slightly work with an app called Freda, but again, you need to add dropbox to Freda to read your material since Zune doesn't seem to have a sync for books and Freda is crap anyway. It displays my dropbox password in plain text so that if my phone is lost/stolen anyone can read it. These are not necessarily faults of WP7, but I believe these are results of shortcomings of the Zune/WP7 integration. I would love to hear if anyone has a solution for this. Maybe even a paid app.

That's all I got so far. The OS is great and intuitive, although when actually using it, lots of places still feel unfinished, but maybe it's just adjusting to a new phone for daily use. Either way, it's not going to my daily phone mainly because the eBook issues are just deal breakers for me.

Update your FB status from within the Me tile, or else the opening screen of the People tile. Tap your face or "recent activity" and post away.

Also, if you don't like to have your contacts list cluttered up with FB people, you can filter it. Hit People, then hit the ellipsis, then hit settings. I got rid of FB there. Because it links your profiles (Eg google, facebook, twitter), your google contacts that you DO keep in the list will have their FB pic there. Tap a contact and you can contact them a million different ways if you have them linked. Had to link some profiles manually, Eg "Dad" in google to his real name in facebook.
 
Got my S, this morning. It's fast and fun, but no online banking apps?

Oh, is there a way to create sounds for incoming mail, texts, etc.? I created some through Zune, but can't get to them for sounds other than ringtones.
 
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Any good 3rd party music apps for Mango?

Last FM works well also.

Whenever I try to fill out an app card it gives me an invalid address error. I tried using an alternate, but no luck. Anyone else have this?

Absolutely loving the titan so far.
 
I don't have a Titan, but just wanted to say I love the shit out of my Omnia 7!
 
Have you tried calling back, and just trying to speak with somebody different? Just be extra nice, don't let them know you've called before. I mean, you have the email from them that details your order. I don't see what the problem is.

If that doesn't work, what if you try to sell the phone outright? Craigslist or eBay, and use the money to buy the Focus S? In the end, you'll come very close to paying just a penny for it. Sorry you have to go through that :(

why shold be waste his time? If this is how they treat him now, what makes you think it will be any different in the future (points to previous experience dealing with ATT as reseller and to recent customer survey) It was almost 7 years ago that I dealth with them myself and it's nice to see that CS still sucks for ATT......
 
The bizarro world of my AT&T odyssey continues. I got a call from them a couple hours ago. The rep apologized strongly for the royal screw up. She said there was a big mistake on their part and my 1 cent order was indeed valid. She offered to honor the order, but I already dropped the phone at a UPS Store, earlier this afternoon. So, they're shipping a new Focus S and giving me 3 months credit on my service. Not a bad deal after all the trouble from yesterday. ;)

Don't worry they will still screw this up somehow..... I would not call this done until 3 months of free credited service go by
 
why shold be waste his time? If this is how they treat him now, what makes you think it will be any different in the future (points to previous experience dealing with ATT as reseller and to recent customer survey) It was almost 7 years ago that I dealth with them myself and it's nice to see that CS still sucks for ATT......

Because he wants the phone? Typically, once you get set up, you don't have to deal with CS again until you upgrade again. I guess he could have settled and went elsewhere for a phone he wasn't interested in.
 
Because he wants the phone? Typically, once you get set up, you don't have to deal with CS again until you upgrade again. I guess he could have settled and went elsewhere for a phone he wasn't interested in.

crappy service is NOT worth a phone..... ATT's history of bad CS is not worth the phone as you can get it unlocked and use it elsewhere
 
ATT general customer reps are over seas fools for the most part but if you dial the cancel your service number you always get a helpful person US based.
 
I got the GF a Samsung Focus Flash last night. Seems perfect for her, but I was disappointed with the camera. I hope the poor camera doesn't make her regret not going with an iPhone. She is a WebOS refugee like me.

It was $1.

Shit, I should say "fiance" as of Saturday. :D
 
I got the GF a Samsung Focus Flash last night. Seems perfect for her, but I was disappointed with the camera. I hope the poor camera doesn't make her regret not going with an iPhone. She is a WebOS refugee like me.

It was $1.

Shit, I should say "fiance" as of Saturday. :D

Congrats! And if she's a WebOS refugee, and has the same complaints you did, she'll probably live WP :D

I'm hoping to get my wife a Windows Phone come early summer. She's eligible for an upgrade and I want to get rid of her iPhone. When I came home with my WP7, she absolutely LOVED it. She knows how much I love it so I don't think that'll be a problem. Now maybe I could snatch her upgrade (who knows what's out by then), and she could take my Focus S. Might be too large for her though.
 
Well I have a question. How do I go about sharing OneNote notes with her? Basically, both editing the same note?
 
I haven't gotten that far with the Skydrive :( yet. Is there a public folder you can use?
 
Hmm, I suppose I'll have to play around with that tonight.

The checkbook app looks nice. Unfortunately I'm one of those that puts everything on a CC then just makes one payment a month or I'd give it a shot.
 
Hmm, I suppose I'll have to play around with that tonight.

The checkbook app looks nice. Unfortunately I'm one of those that puts everything on a CC then just makes one payment a month or I'd give it a shot.

Let me know what you find...If you can share, I'd be curious how you are able to access those documents on the phone. Would show up as another tile in the hub?
I need to get my arse in gear and start migrating my stuff from dropbox to Skydrive. I forgot about Windows Live Mesh, that does basically what Dropbox does for syncing.

Thanks! You know, you could track what you spend in the app, instead of having a 'holy shit!' moment when you see how much you really spent. :D
 
Since this thread is everything WP, I'm going to make a shameless post and pimp my app. Just submitted to the marketplace last night. Check it out!

http://checkbookmetro.com/

When it goes into the store, I'll buy it. I hope to get a few of mine out in sometime, unfortunately real life and laziness take their tool.

Good luck with the submission process!:D
 
When it goes into the store, I'll buy it. I hope to get a few of mine out in sometime, unfortunately real life and laziness take their tool.

Good luck with the submission process!:D

Whoa, cool! :D

What do you have that you're working on? I agree, time is very rare. Motivation is key. I'm a SharePoint/ASP.NET developer by day, so learning Silverlight, MVVM, and LinqtoSql was an uphill battle. But I had enough time one day to sit down and get a simple idea of how it all went together, and just kept pushing from there. It took me about 1.5-2 months to get it about 80% of the way, and the last 1.5 months was testing, tweaking website/marketing things, etc. It's really tough to stop. My best work comes between 10-2 am. No distractions of any kind.

I was fortunate enough to get in contact with our local WP Evangelist to hook me up with a developer phone for testing. I had my brother and a friend both take the dev phone and test for a few days each. That REALLY helped me out. Finding bugs and usability things I wouldn't have thought of. I've spent quite a few hours working in the evening, weekends, and even late into the night during the week.

My brother has pitched 2-3 ideas of his own after finding out about this (nobody knew except the wife until Thanksgiving). Neat ideas, but finding time to make my own enhancements will be tough enough. I'd love to work for myself doing this. Who wouldn't?!
 
Whoa, cool! :D

What do you have that you're working on? I agree, time is very rare. Motivation is key. I'm a SharePoint/ASP.NET developer by day, so learning Silverlight, MVVM, and LinqtoSql was an uphill battle. But I had enough time one day to sit down and get a simple idea of how it all went together, and just kept pushing from there. It took me about 1.5-2 months to get it about 80% of the way, and the last 1.5 months was testing, tweaking website/marketing things, etc. It's really tough to stop. My best work comes between 10-2 am. No distractions of any kind.

I was fortunate enough to get in contact with our local WP Evangelist to hook me up with a developer phone for testing. I had my brother and a friend both take the dev phone and test for a few days each. That REALLY helped me out. Finding bugs and usability things I wouldn't have thought of. I've spent quite a few hours working in the evening, weekends, and even late into the night during the week.

My brother has pitched 2-3 ideas of his own after finding out about this (nobody knew except the wife until Thanksgiving). Neat ideas, but finding time to make my own enhancements will be tough enough. I'd love to work for myself doing this. Who wouldn't?!

My main app is kind of a narrow appeal, it's a PC gaming performance utility, does a couple of cool things, there's one thing I'm still trying to hammer out, just need to sit down and work through it, probably will try to do that during my vacation at the end of the year.

Having been a .NET developer for a decade now, most of of Silverlight is pretty straightforward for me, getting into XAML has been lot of work, I've simply not used it enough but getting there, especially with Windows 8 on the way, something any Metro app developer should know as C# still have some advantages over JavaScript in Windows 8.
 
The wife and I have had our Focus S'es for about two weeks now. I'm loving WP7. It's so fast and intuitive to use that I find myself using it instead of the PC for certain tasks (quick internet browsing, facebook, etc.).
 
Yup! I was lucky enough to have a great CS experience in store on their penny sale day. Brought in my receipt from the 8th ($200), and got a price match credited to my account.
 
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