AT&T – Overcharging and Poor Services

My family has AT&T for our cell phone service, not that we started out with them, we had Sprint, but then of course Sprint was bought out and we ended up with them anyway.  I think it’s a shame that all of the cell phone companies use their contracts to insure financial income for their businesses and that the services which they offer leave a lot to be desired.  Some cell phone companies offer for free features that other companies charge for.  I find this irritating.  For example, Sprint offers an unlimited phone package for $89 a month, unlimited calls, texting, finding your family service and even data.  This sounded like a really good deal to me.  The exception is that you cannot get a second or third line at $9.99 which is what AT&T charges for it’s extra cell phone lines.  My daughter bought one of these packages and got a Blackberry style phone which she really likes, but only three or four days after getting it, the Internet portion of it stopped working.  Hey, she even has push to talk, which at AT&T costs extra.  I mean, what feature doesn’t cost extra with AT&T?  A few weeks ago we traveled down to Nashville, Tennessee and it was there that my husband was able to send mms messages with an image from his Blackberry.  Yet back here in Kentucky he is unable to do this.  After speaking with AT&T he was told that some places have more service than others and this is indicated on the cell phone.  We never knew this but knowing it does not make the fact that he can’t send a message with an image in it any easier to swallow.  I called AT&T because after having installed two ‘free’ programs onto my Iphone, I was subsequently signed up for a subscription package costing $9.99 each.  These subscriptions were to chat and singles clubs, and I told the AT&T representative that I was married, didn’t like to chat and certainly wasn’t looking for a romance.  Geeze.  They removed these subscriptions and refunded my money, then told me to go to the Apple site and make a complaint, which I did.  But I had asked then for a block on the downloads and they emailed me a pin to use, only they forgot to block the downloads.  Instead they locked my Iphone so that anytime I turn it off, in order to use it once it’s turned back on, I have to enter a pin number.  Let me emphasize that I was very angry when I discovered this.  I emailed AT&T to remove that sim block only to have one of their representatives write me back and say that they were unable to do so.  I responded that they had put it on there and they could take it off.  That kind of thing really aggravates me.  But at least I usually get to talk to an American when I call their representatives, someone I can understand and not someone in India.