iPhone 4 and its problems:

Well, I am going to write a summary post about the outrageous things done by the call center of a telecom company whose name I would rather not mention, because I have friends who work there and the poor things are not to blame.

Right, about two months ago I called my mobile provider in question, a blue one… to see whether they could offer me a lower monthly bill (iPhone, iPad) voice + data, and give me the new iPhone 4. Their answer: ma’am, you do not meet the requirements.

OK, I call another company, the orange one, to sign up as a new customer so they will give me the new handset and a huge discount on the bill. First: in the call menu there was no option to sign up as a new customer—good grief… In the end I go to their website, fill out the form three times and all three times it errors out. I thought: oh! of course, it must be because I am filling it out on a Mac and in Safari (as if it were Opera—honestly, what difference does it make). OK, I switch to a PC; there it worked with Explorer, but the last field just hung…

After several searches on forums, I find the complaint phone numbers (I had already provided too much data to risk it just to see whether I was a customer or not). Finally, they answer the phone, and they give me the incident number and the activation reference.

-Meanwhile, the red one was the same, and well, I will also leave out the yoi… I do not know what… because the call center staff did not even know what a micro-SIM was; it was like micro-what?¿¿¿–

Two days later the blue ones call me and say: we have received the porting request… blah blah blah… and we want to offer you the possibility of staying… a ridiculous offer, without what I wanted (which they did not even ask me), and in the end they tell me the same thing: I am sorry ma’am, but you do not meet the requirements…

OK, I reply, no problem, go ahead with the porting process.

The next day I receive an SMS that says: “we are offering you, for 4 hours, a deal to get a latest-generation handset and your bill at 50%…” OK, I call, and I tell them what I want: iPhone 4 32GB and 50% off the bill.

I receive an SMS confirmation, I go to two distributors and to the big blue store in Madrid. Right—after a massive queue, they do not have the 32GB iPhone 4. Well then… now that is bad luck, honestly!

Well, I go to another distributor: 1 person for 6 customers. The family being served wanted to change their 5 mobiles and the 5 plans, but each one a different one… in short, a show, and in the end I decide to leave.

Two days later, on Monday, I go back to distributor number 2. They do the change, they do not tell me that contacts are lost with the change, but being cautious, I ask just in case, and they tell me it is better to move them to the phone memory and from there download them to your Mac/PC—whatever you have.

Right, I have had the iPhone 4 for a week and a half now and what a piece of junk!!! The bill is going to be outrageous!!!!

The average number of dropped calls is 3 or 4. You call or they call you and it disconnects; that means calling again—i.e., call setup again *3 or *4, plus the resulting frustration. And considering I use the phone for work, think of the image in front of the client who gets cut off while telling you an idea, a problem, or some news. Anyway…

I called 4 times a day for 3 days, from another phone obviously, I am not into telephone Russian roulette… Right, I manage to speak to a person—wooooow!!!! There is life beyond the recordings. The trick is to say line incident; I generally use it, but in this case it was true :). And well, they check the data and settings about five times (it must be incredible to take as long as they do), and finally I get them to tell me the following:

Ma’am, there are 3 options: 1) turn it off and turn it back on (= a dumb customer solution)

2) swap the SIM with another phone (= dumb staff, iPhone 4 uses a micro-SIM, but anyway)

3) take it to a distributor and do a cross-test (=they give you another iPhone 4, you swap the micro-SIM and see whether it works or not).

4) call Apple and they give you a crappy replacement phone.

My option will be 3), but if it does not work, since there is a month to try it under the after-sales conditions, we will just leave it as it is.

A failed phone, terrible service, and yes, they handle the complaint as if my name were…

This weekend, to get rid of my animosity towards Apple and the blue ones, I will go for a walk around the Apple Store in Xanadú, to see whether we can calm down!