Sign up first, or cancel first, or call Retention?

[spiffy]

Hi everyone,

I am a brand new Sprint customer, barely on the 2nd day of my 30 day trial... I thought I needed all the perks that Simply Everything offers, so I went to a Sprint store and signed up for SE 450 and got a Touch. But after trying out the phone for a few hours, I realized that I really didn't need all the extra stuff -- I mainly wanted truly unlimited data and a healthy amount of minutes so I don't have to worry about going over. I thought about it and decided that SERO 500 will probably suit my needs just fine, and I'd save about 40 bucks a month (GPS would be nice, but it's not implemented on the Touch yet; and Sprint TV has not worked on my phone at all -- but those are entirely different topics.)

So what do I do? I posted this question on a different forum, and got all sorts of different answers. Some say cancel Simply Everything, wait a few days, then sign up for SERO. Some say go ahead and sign up for SERO online now, then cancel SE later (but as I understand, I can't do that as an existing Sprint customer, because SE customers can only add more SE lines?); and some even say just call Retention and ask them to convert my SE into a SERO, that way I don't have to go through the hassle of returning the phone and canceling the contract.

(It wasn't until I visited sprintuser.com that I noticed someone mentioning signing up a second time would result in a second credit check. I don't think my credit is bad, but I certainly am not crazy about two credit checks within such a short period of time either.)

I've already gone back to the Sprint store, attempting to cancel my contract (I told them the signal inside my house was not good, which unfortunately is true); but the store's computer system hasn't even been updated with my account info, so they can't do anything until they can find me. I'm going to try again today; but I am now wondering if I should try to sign up online anyway or call Retention? Is there a best plan of action for this? This is not even a guarantee that I will get to have SERO, because when I tried the sprintemi address, I got in fine but haven't placed an order yet -- now I am reading all these discussions about email validations, and it's giving me more doubts than ever if they'd let me have SERO at all...

Any help will be greatly appreciated -- thanks in advance, and sorry for the rambling!

[YankeeFan01]

I heard that email doesn't work, best to use a legit employee. I know a few people that used it recently and the system kicked it back and gave them the basic 29.99 plan.

I would defintately say dont call retention. It doesnt seem like they'd be very helpful, BUT, you made very good points about credit checks, and not bieng able to cancel your plan because its not updated yet, etc etc. With that info, I'd say call ret, bieng as you have a valid reason for not bieng able to cancel and switch to SERO. They may be more helpful that way, and if nothing else they'll probably be able to guide you in the right direction. G'Luck!

[bcaroo]

Do you know if you have a spending limit on your account? If you do not, you could do the whole thing this way.

Sign up for SERO with a legitimate Sprint employee email - do a search on the forum and you will find emails other than the generic one which does not work. You will now have two phones and two lines. Once you have the SERO one established, go to the store and cancel the SE line & contract.

If you have a spending limit, you may have to cancel the SE line first and then establish SERO. I think since they did a credit check once already within 30 days, they can use the same one. Your account will already be in the system.

You could also call *2 and say cancel to talk to retentions aka account services. You can tell them that the 450 SE plan you signed up for is overkill, too much money and that you are going to cancel and then sign up for SERO since it will meet your needs better. They may try to get you to change your plan - if they can give you a plan similar to SERO with the same features - unlimited data, texting, roaming, ld, n&w7pm, etc, I would take it - particularly if you have a NVP from where you work. SERo is not supposed to be discounted anymore than it is, (others have gotten discounts but Sprint is supposed to be cracking down on this) but other plans can still get a discount.

If they say okay, we'll miss you, tell them you will go to the store to cancel and return the equipment. It is better to return equipment to the store than to send it back to Sprint. It takes them too long to get the credits on the account for returned equipment when you send it back. Good luck.

[spiffy]

@YankeeFan01 & @bcaroo

Thanks for the tips. I definitely will use a legit Sprint address when I sign up for SERO.

@bcaroo

When I signed up for SE, I was never told anything about a spending limit. I thought Simply Everything customers are not allow to purchase non-SE lines though? The fine print for SE said additional lines must be SE also, that I'd just get a $5 discount per line... That was why I thought I would need to cancel my SE, wait for my name to drop off of Sprint's system, then sign up for SERO as a brand new customer? (And unfortunately, I don't have any corporate discounts through my work.)

The Sprint store I bought the SE plan from was going to cancel and let me return the phone; but they claimed their computer system was so backlogged that my name wasn't even in it yet. I doubt they're very enthusiastic about processing my request though -- I left them my phone number to call me when I am in the system, but I've yet to hear from anybody.

[SFx]

My understanding about Simply Everything and Sero is that they are the same in that you cannot SHARE minutes on those plans, meaning if you want additional lines you're going to have to purchase another full plan. Don't recall if it's a promo or not, but Simply Everything does give you a small price break based on how many additional plans you sign up for.

That said, you're not signing up for an additional line, you are getting a separate account. Neither Sero or Simply Everything are suppose to exist with other types of plans as far as I know, so that is your only option. Again, Sprint reps are never on the same page with some things. I was told it was fraud to have two accounts assigned to the same social, yet I was able to sign up with Sero (as a new and separate account) get everything up & running and cancel the original with no problems. And, I did this on the suggestion of a knowledgeable Sero rep.

Call the numbers on the Sero page if you have any advance questions. The CS # is the same for everyone once you get the account established. I found out everything I wanted to know ahead of time from a Sero rep, processed the order online like it was a brand new day and received my phone the following business day.

[spiffy]

That said, you're not signing up for an additional line, you are getting a separate account. Neither Sero or Simply Everything are suppose to exist with other types of plans as far as I know, so that is your only option. Again, Sprint reps are never on the same page with some things. I was told it was fraud to have two accounts assigned to the same social, yet I was able to sign up with Sero (as a new and separate account) get everything up & running and cancel the original with no problems. And, I did this on the suggestion of a knowledgeable Sero rep.

That has been my confusion all along -- if it's fraudulent to have two separate accounts with the same social, how can I sign up for SERO first before canceling Simply Everything?

So I went ahead and returned the phone and canceled my SE contract on 4/14; the sales rep in the Sprint store told me everything was done, but gave me an 800 number to call if I want to verify that my line was deactivated and account closed. I called today, only to be told that the line wasn't deactivated at all... Had to be transferred to account services to get that taken cared of, and she was nice enough to backdate to the day I returned the phone. But then I was told I would be receiving a small bill for the 3 days I had the account, which won't be sent out until after 5/13!

So do I have to wait until I pay that bill, close the current account before I can sign up for SERO? That's cutting it pretty close to 5/31... :scare:

[SFx]

New to this forum, so I guess I timed out an edit. :o

Spiffy, let me correct my post. The fraud thing was a non-Sero rep giving me a hard time. I followed the advice of that rep and also saw this on the website:

Adding to an Existing Sprint Account

The SERO program is open to current Sprint customers that are activating a new line of service. Please note that due to the exclusive plans and discounts involved, Sprint is only able to add a SERO purchase to an existing SERO account. If you have an existing non-SERO Sprint account, a new Sprint account will be created for this discounted SERO line of service. We apologize for the inconvenience this may cause, but hope you will appreciate the deep monthly discounts this allows us to provide to you.

[hans2vt]

New to this forum, so I guess I timed out an edit. :o

Spiffy, let me correct my post. The fraud thing was a non-Sero rep giving me a hard time. I followed the advice of that rep and also saw this on the website:

Adding to an Existing Sprint Account

The SERO program is open to current Sprint customers that are activating a new line of service. Please note that due to the exclusive plans and discounts involved, Sprint is only able to add a SERO purchase to an existing SERO account. If you have an existing non-SERO Sprint account, a new Sprint account will be created for this discounted SERO line of service. We apologize for the inconvenience this may cause, but hope you will appreciate the deep monthly discounts this allows us to provide to you.

I'm going to cancel my existing phones June 17th. Then here in May I'm going to get 2 new SERO phones. Is there any reason I would want them on the same account? I was going to do the new SERO phones in my wife's name to avoid confusion... the existing account with the 2 phones I want to cancel is in my name. So I though it was cleaner keeping the ones I wanted to cancel separate from the new SERO phones.

[FromThisSoil]

New to this forum, so I guess I timed out an edit. :o

Spiffy, let me correct my post. The fraud thing was a non-Sero rep giving me a hard time. I followed the advice of that rep and also saw this on the website:

Adding to an Existing Sprint Account

The SERO program is open to current Sprint customers that are activating a new line of service. Please note that due to the exclusive plans and discounts involved, Sprint is only able to add a SERO purchase to an existing SERO account. If you have an existing non-SERO Sprint account, a new Sprint account will be created for this discounted SERO line of service. We apologize for the inconvenience this may cause, but hope you will appreciate the deep monthly discounts this allows us to provide to you.


Apparently this rule is not set in stone though. If you ***** enough, and/or get the right rep, they'll change your plan over to SERO. I was told the same thing: "You'll need a new line...", "You have to get a new number..."

Eventually they gave in and changed my expired 200 minute plan to a 500 minute SERO plan.

[SFx]

The original poster had a line and was wondering how he could have two simultaneously. I was simple pointing out how I (and others) went about having two lines until our SERO plans were up and running and then canceling the non-SERO line of service.

Anything is possible with Sprint. Many of us tried and were not successful getting a conversion or keeping numbers. I don't think the 30-day new customer window gives you much bargaining power. My SO, on the other hand, has been with them since '98 and pretty much calls up & gets anything added to the account.

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