When I recently bought a new phone and had to return it, I returned to a corporate Cingular store to make the transaction. After waiting for about 45 minutes with nobody talking to me or acknowledging my presence, I left and decided to come back later. I came back an hour or two later to try again. This time I was taken care of promptly.

I was trying to figure out which phone would be best for me and the person who "helped" me was anything but helpful. I didn't want to deal with it so I simply returned the phone and left. I took my business to a 3rd party cingular store owned by Spring Communications. I got them to give me the same deal as the Cingular store, so I was happy.

Until this morning.

I received a call at exactly 10am from someone over at Spring. He was trying to sell me a data plan that costs twice as much as the one I already have ($40 as opposed to the more realistic $20). I politely declined. He then started explaining how the plan I was on wouldn't work on my phone and I wouldn't be able to receive email. Apparently these things have all been in my imagination for the past few weeks because everything works fine. I declined again.

He then started talking about how I would not be able to receive the rebate for $100 I was offered unless I got on the right plan. Whether or not the rebate will be denied is in question, but I am well within the fine print on the rebate form (I checked again to make sure). If I am denied it will be their fault for misrepresenting the offer, not mine.

I declined again.

He kept pushing. I told him that I don't care about the rebate. I'd rather save $100 over the next 5 months with the cheaper data plan than get the rebate that would take that long to arrive anyway.

He kept pushing, explaining why my logic was flawed. Finally I had had enough so I declined again, then gave him a detailed technical explanation of the difference between the two plans (which is not much, actually - and cingular doesn't even set people up to receive the benefits of the more expensive plan - they are left to figure it out themselves). I explained to him about external IP addresses, NAT addresses, circuit switched data, and how I could still use all the services I needed to. I also told him that he was misrepresenting the rebate and that he should check the fine print again, and he was trying to sell me something I didn't need. I declined once again.

He told me I was wrong and hung up, just like that. Don't people say goodbye anymore?

I'm a little disappointed Spring would send some guy after me to try to up-sell me on something I don't need. I'm more disappointed that the guy didn't give up after the first several times I declined his nonsensical offer. I am more disappointed that he was apparently angry with ME after wasting MY TIME for no reason. I am disappointed that someone from Cingular called and didn't know anything about what they were talking about, and that me (a customer) knew more both about the rebate offer and about how their data plans work.

Would it be that hard for Cingular to do a little training on these things? Rather than sending people out saying "tell customers they need this just because they do" maybe they could learn what it is they're talking about. Furthermore, maybe they could be trained to give up after the customer declines a few times. Maybe they can train their employees not to hang up on people.

I checked my plan a little later just to make sure he didn't change it out of spite. I'm considering returning the phone to Spring and going back to the corporate store. I don't need goons calling and hounding me out of their own ignorance.

Nice one Spring.