Sprint PCS Blackberry?

[Lord Bricks]

anyone have it? the good, the bad about the unit?

[vermag]

I checked out a friends Sprint Blackberry. Its an excellent device if you want corporate email pushed out and your company has the Blackberry Enterprise Server installed. Even otherwise it has excellent RF (no analog roaming). Excellent earpiece. I did not go into the details of the screen (it is good, but not like the VM4050. I am sure phonescoop has the details on the screen). The PDA functionality is standard - phonebook, to do, calendar ..... all the regular stuff. The email client is the lynchpin of the BB. It offers the usual BB functionality - all solid, dependable and efficient (e.g. you can call a phone number in an email by clicking on it). The email and calendar push from the BES to the client works flawlessly every time. The email client can also pull POP email. The web browser was OK, seemed a little worse than the Treo's Blazer in speed.

Now the bad news - the regular Vision plans are not used to provision the Blackberry, at least for business customers. The "unlimited" Blackberry data plan I was offered was $30 afer corp discounts, and my corp Sprint PCS rep said he would remove my Vision plan so I would not be charged for Vision separately. However I have free unlimited Vision on both my lines which I would hate to lose, so I am passing up on the BB.

[MJ1]

anyone have it? the good, the bad about the unit?

On 11/24, I order a Blackberry from a National sales rep at Sprint. Charges my CC $549.99. Same day, my CC is charged for $549.99

On 12/3, I call Sprint to find out if/when the phone was shipped. I was told the order had been cancelled. The payment I made was applied against my phone account (which is paid for on automatic billing to my employer's CC, so that would have caused me significant headaches to straighted out).

I very politely asked if I could get the $549.99 refunded to me. I was told NO.
I asked if they can ship me a Blackberry - NO.
I asked if they would ever have contacted me to tell me the Blackberry sale was cancelled and they were keeping my money - NO.
I asked to speak to someone about whether I can get the Blackberry. I was told that the CSR's supervisor would e-mail a "Diana Wilcox" to tell her to call me. "She has something to do with Blackberries" I was told.

So now I am relying upon an agent to have her supervisor e-mail someone who may or may not call me back.

Needless to say, "Diana Wilcox" did not call me.

On 12/6, I called to request a refund of my payment. After waiting > 1 hour on the phone, they disconnected me. So I went to a Sprint store to ask them call on my behalf.

After a 55 minute wait (no kidding, I was still in the store 30 minutes after closing), someone on the phone finally said they would refund my money.

While everyone, including me, was very polite & civil, I am astounded by 1) the inabillity to actually get a phone announced on 11/16, and 2) astounded by the incredibly poor customer support. Their actions, in my mind, border on theft - they take your money, don't provide the product you are buying, and then make it nearly impossible to recover the money.

By the way - as of now, the credit has not come through on my CC. So I "disputed" the CC charge in order to protect myself as I have no confidence that Sprint will eventually refund that payment.

[IMSPRINT]

You need to go into a store and request that they send in a "Misapplied/Unapplied payment" form on your behalf. That will take care of it within 2-3 days

[dfwtxpatrick]

Keep on course as you are.

Disputing the charge is the only way to guarantee you don't get charged for it.

As a former SPCS Tech rep and floor supervisor. I've seen this happen many times.

Be prepared though, you WILL be contacted by SPCS as to why you denied the charges. You may even be threatened w/ who knows what since the call will be coming from a rep not monitored by SPCS very well if at all.

I've had many stories from customers that the person calling them for this reason was EXTREMELY rude, vulgar and cursing. Several customers even told me that they were threatened with criminal charges for CC theft. Even though the card belonged to that individual.

Keep us informed as I want to know the outcome to see if SPCS has changed in that department at all.

[macaddiict]

When I worked for AT&T Wireless I saw the same thing explained here happen to a few different customers. Rediculous as it sounds, I honestly don't even know of a department that could send payment back on a credit card when I worked there. Customers would pay for something they either never get or end up cancelling and the payment is in fact refunded to the account, another account, etc. but is nearly impossible to get sent back to the original method of payment.

If you do recieve threatening calls like DFWTX explained, realize you do not have to speak with them except once over the phone. Just explain to the caller that you do not owe the amount listed and that you refuse to speak with them over the phone again. Tell them that you do not want any communication except for required written notices of what is going on - I believe there is a federal law prohibiting them to call you back after you have told them this. A Google search would bring up more information.

Either way, very sorry to hear about the mess. I would have done the same thing in your situation!