Wavered on whether to pre-order a new iPhone 6, or just wait, but in the end I thought I would pre-order. When I got to the AT&T site, they were still reporting delivery dates of “on or around” September 19 for the iPhone 6, though only for the 128GB model. I went ahead and ordered one and thought everything was set.
Then, early this morning (around 3am PDT), I saw a tweet telling me how to check my order status, so I did. Much to my surprise, rather than the September 19 estimated delivery date I had seen when I clicked the order button, the AT&T site was saying October 13 – October 31. That’s almost a whole month later than they promised. Had they said that on their site when I ordered it, I would have ordered it from Apple (who even today are saying the first week of October), and I would probably have stuck with the 64GB which was my first choice.
No problem, I thought, since it is 4-6 weeks out I can just cancel the order and either try my luck at a store on Friday or order from Apple. So I called the number on the web page, waited 25 minutes to speak to somebody, only to be told she couldn’t cancel the order. I asked for a supervisor, and waited another 5-10 minutes. When he came on the line, he said it was impossible to cancel the order because it was at the warehouse being packed. Really? What do they do to these people to make them believe it takes 4-6 weeks to pack a phone in a box? Of course it is not at the warehouse being packed. It is still an electronic order awaiting devices to arrive to be fulfilled. And they don’t expect those for several weeks. So canceling the order is not impossible at all.
Twitter Support
The normally responsive Twitter support team also seem to be totally ignoring me this morning. I have tweeted to them and even sent them direct messages, but still not a peep back. Amusingly, Verizon responded faster than AT&T!
Perhaps it is time to just take my business to a carrier that does care. It seems clear that AT&T don’t care, and neither can they operate an online business. Bad enough that they advertise one delivery date, and then shift it by a month after the order is placed, but to not have a way to easily cancel a pre-order is ridiculous. Perhaps I should call American Express and dispute the charge for the taxes on the phone – I suspect they’d be able to cancel the order then.
Canceled Orders
Then I started seeing replies to other people on Twitter with iPhone 6 order issues, and to be honest it looks like AT&T were totally unprepared for people to order this phone. Was it really a surprise to them that lots of people would be pre-ordering it? Haven’t they done this before?
Some Examples From Twitter
(At least they received a reply from AT&T – I have had no response at all. Apparently I am on some kind of no response list.)
Not to mention that the $299 phone doesn’t really exist. I ordered it and was then informed that my bill was going up $25 over the term of the 2yr contract. That’s $600 plus the $299. Another bait and switch.
Michelle, I will try to write it up, but I did an analysis of all the different ways you can get an iPhone on AT&T (with a family plan since that’s what we have), and they all end up costing the same over a 2 year term. It has always been the case that there are not really free phones or even subsidized phones – one way or another you are going to pay the full price for that handset by the time your contract is up!
I ordered I phone 6 plus 128 on October 22, 2014 and received text message stating that it was preparing to ship. Several weeks went by and no order received, so I have called AT & T and chatted online with reps and to my dismay what I have been told is to go to order status page, which I did and lo and behold in fine print it said estimated order 12-2-2014 to 12-11-2014. I felt like my face got beet red. Pissed off, if I would have been told that there were no phones available, I would not have ordered one this way. By, the way, they took $129.00 from my account right away, knowing there were no phones available. I check every day the order status and have talked to reps via email and in person. Same B.S. line check your order online. on 11/29/2014 I read a post, yes, there are many that are experiencing this same issue, and it gave a different phone number to call. I called and spoke to a Rep who apologized and said that she would send my information to a Manager at AT&T, so that I would receive my phone expedited. To give Manager 24 to 48 hours to respond to my complaint. Another BS story. So, after all is said and done, I have reported this issued to 7 on your side and BBB, to let them check this crap out. Bait and switch is illegal and should not be tolerated by anyone. I will not stand for it. There were other post that stated they were also going to follow through with investigation against AT&T business practices.