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Cingular doesn’t want iPhone ’switchers’ just yet

If you’re thinking about switching to Cingular before the iPhone is released in June – think again. What I discovered is that Cingular isn’t interested in your business…just yet. Read on (the short answer – wait until June).

I’m a long-time Apple user, since the Apple ][ in 1981, and I have tried a number of smartphones over the years from the Palm to the BlackBerry to Windows Mobile to the Sidekick. Nothing has really clicked with me, and I’ve always hoped that Apple would release its own smartphone. Many years of hope coupled with many years of frustration with existing phones meant that I was elated last week with the announcement of the Apple iPhone. I was down in San Francisco for business meetings, and made arrangements to be at the keynote this year. This was a great year to be at MacWorld (at least for the keynote).

After returning home from MacWorld a few days ago, I started planning a switch to Cingular. My rationale on moving to Cingular sooner than later was that the process of getting out of my T-Mobile contract might be more difficult in June when the majority of people were making the switch. By switching to Cingular now, I would be ready to go with the iPhone in advance of the public release, and possibly avoid any changes to my existing contract terms by T-Mobile, dealing with the loss of a large number of iPhone converts down the road.

The first step in switching was to call T-Mobile customer service. I explained that I intended to cancel my contract sometime before June and wanted to understand the various options to avoid paying an early termination free. With a family plan and three phone numbers with T-Mobile (self, spouse, and child), I was informed that I would need to pay $600 to terminate the three phone numbers ($200 per number), and pay the full balance of the two-year contract for each. If I were to walk away from T-Mobile right now, the amount due would be $2,800. Heh. Not an option. The T-Mobile customer service agent asked why I was interesting in canceling my account. I told her about my interest in the iPhone and she tried to convince me that the iPhone would work on the T-Mobile network. Nice try, but Apple intends to lock the iPhone using software to limit access to Cingular only. It’s not clear to me whether the agent was simply misinformed or if there was an internal stance from T-Mobile on customers calling about the iPhone.

I called back again and spoke to another T-Mobile agent, this time asking about how to transfer my contract. The second T-Mobile agent explained that I had three separate phone numbers, and even though all the phone numbers were part of a single family plan with one payment, I had to transfer all three phone numbers to get out of my contract. Not only that, contract transfers were not eligible for number portability, so I’d have to get new phone numbers with Cingular. What a pain.

I had my answer, even if I didn’t like it – it was time to promote my contracts on the Internet. I posted entries on the three main mobile phone switcher sites – Resellular, Cellswapper, and CelltradeUSA. I offered a $100 cash incentive for anyone taking over my three-number contract, and also posted to Craiglist, offering a T-Mobile BlackBerry Pearl as part of the deal. In less than a day, I had a good response from my Craigslist posting. I thought I might as well just switch to Cingular now, to free up the BlackBerry Pearl right away for a potential buyer. I’d buy my wife a replacement phone and move the unlocked phones for my son and myself to Cingular. In June, my wife and I would both purchase iPhones from the Apple Store. This sounded like the best plan under the circumstances.

This afternoon, I visited the Cingular retail store, but failed to notice the “authorized retailer” tag underneath the logo. A few minutes into an description of my switching plan, I could tell I had made a mistake. This wasn’t Cingular Corp I was speaking to, but a local merchant who had licensed the Cingular brand. Working through an authorized retailer on this switching plan might be a problem, and I left the store after thanking the employees for their time.

I then drove over to a Cingular corporate retail store. I explained the situation to an employee – I was a T-Mobile customer with a family plan and three phone numbers. I wanted to get a comparable plan, two SIM chips for my two existing, unlocked phones, and a new phone – totaling three phone numbers under one family plan bill. I wanted to do this in a way that would not limit my ability to purchase two iPhones in June under the two-year contract requirement. The employee explained to me that any plan I chose would require a one-year contract minimum, and that I might not be eligible for the iPhone at the $499/$599 price points in June due to the fact that I would only be under the first contract for five months. Providing me with the ‘discounted’ iPhone price in June would be at the discretion of the store manager, and the store was currently without a manager. She couldn’t help me. I was out of luck. I left the store frustrated with Cingular – I wanted to become a paying customer and the company was erecting barriers in front of me. I had no choice, though. The iPhone required service with Cingular.

I called the main Cingular phone number from the retail store’s parking lot. I explained the situation again to the sales agent on the phone. She suggested that I take this issue up with customer service instead. I was transferred, and after waiting on hold for a few minutes, the call was disconnected. I called back and explained the situation again to the customer service agent. She told me that I needed to speak with the ‘Review Team’ and supplied me a different 800 number. *sigh* I called the Review Team and explained my situation, yet again, to another employee of Cingular. The agent explained to me that yes, this way an issue that was at the discretion of the store manager. I explained to her that I did not plan to buy my iPhones directly form Cingular, but the online Apple Store. The Cingular store manager was unlikely to assist me if I wasn’t going to buy the phones from Cingular directly. I made it clear to the Review Team agent that what I was attempting to do was going to be a common request among a large number of future iPhone customers and asked her to escalate this issue to her managers for review.

What confuses me about this situation is that Cingular would penalize me for switching early. I tried to become a Cingular customer today, paying a total of at least $600 in monthly service fees between now and the release of the iPhone, and purchasing a new phone in the interim. Cingular really isn’t interested in having me as a customer right now. I have more buying power if I wait until June and become a new Cingular customer at that time, committing to a new, two-year contract. So now, my plans have changed. I will keep my T-Mobile accounts active until June and then look for someone to take them over when hundreds of thousands of other people are trying to do the same. Switching early isn’t going to happen, and I’ll be lucky to get out of my T-Mobile contract without problems.

UPDATE 01/14/07: I emailed Cingular CEO Stan Sigman yesterday and have already received two personal responses from representatives of “HQ – Office of the President” (over the weekend!). I have been informed that someone will be contacting me on Monday. I’m not asking for anything personally from Cingular – I just want them to make the process easier for iPhone fans that are willing to switch early.

UPDATE 01/14/07, #2: I submitted this blog entry to digg.com yesterday and am surprised to see that it (so far) has reached a digg level of 1,100+, is one of the top ten stories on digg, and has resulted in over 16,000 visitors to my blog. I am disappointed by some of the comments (see my digg comment log), especially those that are passing judgement on either my motivations or my intelligence. I posted this blog entry because I wanted to document the process of switching to Cingular. My hope was that others thinking about switching (prior to the release of the iPhone) would learn from my own experience and be better prepared. This will be a common issue for many future iPhone owners attempting to switch early. I want my experience with Cingular and Apple to be the best it can be. I will post any response I get from Cingular on Monday.

UPDATE 01/15/07: I just approved all of the comments on this post that were suck in the moderation queue. I had turned off auto-posting due to problems with SPAM awhile back. Similar to the comments on digg, the responses here range broadly from support to contempt.

UPDATE 01/16/07: I received a response from Cingular by email, but the information given to me (e.g. contract requirement, phone pricing, etc.) was mostly a rehash of the news from MacWorld last week. The Cingular rep gave me her phone number and I will plan to call on Wednesday for more information.

UPDATE 01/17/07: I wasn’t able to call the Cingular rep until late in the afternoon. I left her a voicemail and sent an email asking her to call me. Nothing new to report. All I am trying to accomplish at this point is to explain my experience over the weekend and see if Cingular might have some better path for customers that want to swtich early. I don’t expect much, and plan at this point to switch in June as a new customer.

UPDATE 01/18/07: The story is over. I received a call today from the Cingular customer representative that was assigned my case. She has read this blog entry and the advice given to me is to wait until June. The customer representative was polite, but it was clear that Cingular had a set of policies in place regarding a one-year contract minimum and didn’t see much value to the customer in creating any special offer for future iPhone owners wanting to switch early. Her point was that by waiting until June, iPhone customers will be eligible for the 30-day no-questions-asked money-back guarantee if the service or the phone is not to the customer’s liking. A fair point, if you buy the phone from Cingular. What if you buy from the Apple Store? I suspect that a considerable number of early adopters will opt to buy directly from Apple, and the return policy should, in all likelihood, resemble the return policy on an iPod or a Mac, which I believe is more restrictive. Anyway, we have an answer – Cingular doesn’t want iPhone ’switchers’ just yet, the title of this blog entry has been validated by Cingular directly. I’ll see you in June, AT&T Wireless Cingular AT&T.

UPDATE 01/20/07: One last note…I found someone to take over my son’s T-Mobile contract on Craigslist. I bought my son a cheap Cingular Go Phone with no contract yesterday. Reception at my home and work are both excellent on the Cingular network, which was one of my concerns. When June rolls around, I will now only have two contracts to worry about, instead of three. One of the two remaining contracts expires in November 2007, and other expires in June 2008. I found it easier to transfer a contract than expected, although the buyer and I were on the phone for over 30 minutes with T-Mobile dealing with various departments and all. If you are going to do this, make sure that you can be on the phone with the contract buyer during this proess, as there are issues for both parties to address.

That sounds like a bad business practice on Cingular’s part. Check out iPhoneTopsites.com so you’re ready when you do finally make the switch.

Interesting story, but you shouldn’t be too surprised or frustrated that you got the run around. You’re trying to negotiate a deal for a product that was just announced days ago and won’t actually be on sale for 5 months – and one that Cingular undoubtedly was not allowed to brief its reps on in advance. I’d be surprised if even now Cingular has provided more than very brief talking points to its store and phone personnel, in large part because I doubt the exact pricing and contract terms for iPhone have been finalized. I’d say if you’re happy with T-Mobile, stick with them at least until the iPhone is actually on sale. Then when it comes out you can either switch to Cingular or wait for someone to provide a hack so you can use it with T-Mobile – shouldn’t be more than a day or two.

Just say you want to sign up as COAM – Customer Owned And Maintained. This will let you sign up for month to month service on your unlocked phones. Just ask to speak to a manager at a corp store, and drop the COAM term. They’ll let you on.

Hey, I am in the same situation as you. With t-mobile and all. If you happen to get a response from them, and what they suggest doing would you mind dropping me an e.mail at rmmeyer@mac.com?

Thanks so much

- Ryan Meyer

Hey, Apple geek…
I watched the keynote, too. I’ve been waiting for the iPhone for two years, now. Now that the prototype’s been shown, I don’t think I’m ready to drink Steve’s Kool Aid yet. There’s some crucial REAL WORLD issues that need to be addressed. The first is battery life, second is that touch-screen’s sensitivity, and third, the most important one…what’s the reception going to be like on that shiny piece of tech?! People thought the RAZR would be a nice phone to have, but the reception’s crap with those. Bottom line, if you can’t use the phone function, its nothing more than an overpriced ARCHOS.

Switch early? You aren’t that smart if you think this will put you at an advantage, you are only asking for pain. If you want to switch to Cingular for a specific phone, wait until the phone comes out, it’s just that simple. There is no advantage to switching early, and contrary to what you might think, there aren’t going to be millions of people trying to switch to Cingular the day it comes out. So just relax, take a deep breath, and wait until it comes out and save us all the headache of having to listen to you whine about Cingular for your own stupidity.

Totally unbelievable. T-Mobile can’t force you to pay the termination fee and the remainder of the contract. That is totally against the law of contracts and why the early termination fee is there in the first place. Also, the number portability act is federal and T-Mobile can’t force you to get new numbers. Hell, you just apply for transfer of the number and T-Mobile has no say.

I’m watching with interest! I’m going to try to ditch Verizon, hopefully without a termination fee because they just raised the txt message rates. Good luck and keep us informed!

Oh boy, this isn’t good news. I am currently trying to get out of my Verizon contract (without an ETF due to their text message rate increase) which is not going very good so far. I wanted to switch over early too but now I have this to worry about. I really want that iPhone but I am starting to wonder if it’s really worth it.

All this for a phone? Hope it lives up to the hype.

What I don’t understand is after all that you *still* want to give them your patronage. I know the iPhone is great and all that but if Apple is being a dick about locking the phone and Cingular are also being difficult shouldn’t you make a stand and refuse to be loyal to the people who have clearly sold your loyal patronage out. Why continue to be friends with someone who treats you badly?

Thanks for paving the way for the avalanche of initial switchers that will bombard Cingular’s (AT&T’s) doors and phones. You’d think that Cingular would get a clue… NOW! Huh? Keep us posted. Thanks!

Cingular is so awful.

i use to work for tmbile and as far as i know u only pay the early termination fee for the phones and the bill for the month.the customer service lady didnt want u to leave so she gave u some bullshit that u have to pay the rest of the contract monthly fees.best thing to do is wait till june comes around like u said.

Cingular does have timelines for when they allow you to upgrade your device and still get whatever discounted deal they have going on. I think the term is 12 or 18 months – not sure which. But if you go into a store and ask for an “exception upgrade,” you can get one after 6 months of service.

If you go to a retailer, AKA NOT a corporate store, they’re likely to help you out a bit more as they are paid on commission. They will do what they can to get you an exception upgrade, because they’ll get a kickback for doing it.

The timing works in your favor too. Get the Cingular phone now, wait until a month after the iphone comes out for all the excitement to die down, and you’ll be able to go in and get one of the iphones from their second shipment.

I’m looking to do the same and have wasted much time in the process. It seems that wireless carriers are no longer interested in gaining new business, just following strange unsensible policies. Whatever happened to making exceptions? It is obviously in their best interest to gain new business.

Hopefully you have turned some heads and we will see some good response from HQ. Keep us updated.

First-
Be patient!! Early adopters always get screwed anyways!

Second-
You really have a lack of understanding for the way wireless companies work. I am a former Cingular employee and current T-mobile employee.. so I’ll give you the rundown. First off, you contract wont cost $2800 to cancel. whoever told you that is full of crap. You just pay your cancellation fees ($200 each) and you’ll get your final bill since billing is delayed by 1 month. Next.. Cingular wants your business, believe me… but what you are asking of them is just not going to happen. New customer price is offered ONLY at the time of a sign-up or after your contract has been completed. In T-mobile’s case, the new customer price can be offered within 14 days of new activation. The reason for this is the way commissions trickle to the store. We sell our phones UNDER cost.. WAY UNDER cost. Our profits are made on the contracts we issue. If you were to sign up with the expectation that you wanted a new phone in 6 months, then they cannot discount the handset purchase in June because the commission was already paid out to the store at the time of signup, and Cingular has made it clear that the iPhone will be sold ONLY with new contracts. If you are on contract for 2 years, wait out 6 months, and expect that telling Cingular you are willing to renew for 2 more years, they are only getting an extra 6 months of service out of the deal, since contracts are not cumulative- they start from the day that they are initiated, they just wont do it. An extra 6 months of service is not NEARLY enough to warrant a handset subsidy.

Also BTW- the iPhone WILL work on T-mobile. It is a GSM phone and will be unlocked in no time. since it is OSX (unix) based it will be a matter of days after it comes out before it is useable on other networks.

I think with all the rumors flying around its hard to determine what is fact. I don’t think you will have to wait until June, but hopefully in a few months things will become more clear.

A few things that might be pertinent:

If you visit Thinksecret, you will see they are rumoring that the iPhone MIGHT only be exclusive to AT&T/Cingular for 6 months and/or Apple might release other phones for other carriers.

Apple has prevented Cingular from subsidizing the price of the phone in order to keep the perception of the phone as a premium product. Considering that Apple will not allow discounting (see link above) it would imply (but not necessarily) that the price will be the same with and without a contract from Apple.

Finally in terms of the phone being locked, its the manufacturer (not the carrier) that has the unlock code. The carrier has to request the code from the manufacturer. This implies that Apple could give people unlock codes for their iPhone to use elsewhere.

Have you considered a pay-as-you go phone?
http://itsmeusvita.blogspot.com/2006/12/prepaid-cell-phones.html

There’s really no reason to switch early, and you would exceed the Cingular 30-day cancellation policy. Let the Apple store profit from the line activations so they can re-invest it towards new products.

What part of you will need a two year contract in june do you not understand… If you really want to go with cingular now then go prepaid or stop your bitching. There is ABSOLUTELY no reason to switch until June.

Wow, while I do understand your frustration I do not understand your motivation other than being a good consumer. You’re planning on spending $1000-$1200 dollars on two iPhones and the privlege of being stuck with Cingular. Why?

While being a loyal Apple customer is one thing, blindly jumping into the iPhone as an early adopter I consider foolish unless you have a compulsion to be abused by Cingular and waste money. For one, being stuck with Cingular because of a phone is like selling a guy a car at a discount because you like his personality. You may get warm and fuzzies but it screws your finances. For two, early adopters will get bitten especially considering the likelihood that this thing will eat batteries. There’s a good chance that within the next 18 months we will be seeing higher quality batteries dropping in price due to ramped up production which means early adopters will get the 5 hour version, those who wait get the 13 hour version.

Finally, look at what happened to Apple’s stock. Anyone in the market should have bought into Apple after their stock dropped due to the options scandal then sold the morning after Jobs’ keynote. The idiots flocked to the stock during the keynote and make the early buyers around 12.5% on their money in 5 days. Of course those that flocked to Apple’s stock because of the hype will end up losing money because Apple is just about to feel the backlash from the SEC shortly. Those that sat back and watched and waited then pounced made alot of money, those that followed the crowd when the crowd moved lost money.

So tell me this, why do you want one?

well done. if cingular was smart they would have already had a “switch early” plan all set up. thru your efforts, hopefully, they’ll get their heads out of their arses. thanks for paving the way!

Okay, I’m an Apple fan too, but…

a) How much damn money do you have to waste?
b) Why the hell couldn’t you just wait until the iPhone officially came out?

Seriously, you brought these problems on yourself by not being patient, and you clearly have way too much disposable income.

You are a moron

This should be a good sign of what service with Cingular will be like – is it really worth it? Wait until iPhone is released – someone will figure out how to unlock in in the first week. After reading the CEO’s comments in this article, I have zero interest in doing business with a company like this:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,2082059,00.asp

“If you want an iPhone, you are going to get the luxury of being on the Cingular network” – is it just me, or does this statement make anyone else wretch…and I don’t even know what the Cingular network is like.

While the Cingular logo will not appear on the body of the iPhone, the word “Cingular” will appear on the screen at all times. – ditto for this one…

While “there are bad guys out there that unlock phones,” Lurie said, Apple and Cingular are taking unspecified steps to make the phone more difficult to unlock and use on other GSM carriers in the US.

- rephrase…customers always come first…when we’re dishing out the anal rods…

” His comment addressed in part a criticism that the iPhone doesn’t use Cingular’s new high-speed HSDPA network.” – woot – it’s crippled too!

This article clearly explains so many of the reasons I will never switch from T-Mobile to Cingular, and I want an iPhone in the worst way.

Hey Rinzai – you’re on Digg!

Anyway – I would also recommend keeping Mr. Jobs in the loop. Seriously – I’ve read multiple accounts of folks fed up with they way their Apple issues were handled and mailed Jobs out of desperation. It sounds like some people got responses either from Jobs personally, or his office. Needless to say, issues went away and the customer was happy.

I predict many horror stories regarding activation woes when the time comes. Since the phone doesn’t have a chip that user accessible, the standard operating procedure (swap chips) at Cingular retail locations will not apply. Reps will need to learn a new procedure *gulp*

I hope Apple has customer service SLA’s in place with Cingular. I’m not holding my breath, though. I’ve been to their stores to get issues with my BBerry addressed. Nothing but problems and this on a device they’ve been selling for years.

To be fair: while I can see your point in getting this all out of the way now, you can’t really expect Cingular to be prepared (yet) – certainly not in the retail stores.

Possibe ray of hope: Read an article in the NYT yesterday that said support will be handled jointly. They mentioned “warm transfers” between Apple and Cingular support lines. Maybe if Cingular reps get a call from the Apple “bat phone” they’ll handle it better than the calls they get on the regular support number.

Bookmarked this page. Keep us posted

one point of correction. while it is true they will ship locked, it won’t be a difficult prospect to unlock the phone and use it on the t-mobile network. in fact, if you pay the full price ($1k) you will get the phone unlocked and you can then use it on the t-mobile network.

You might want to call AT&T since they are taking over operations again…..

Penalize you? Surprises you? I’m sure they would have no problem if you paid full price up-front for one of your new Cingular phones, then you would not have a contract…Basically, you’re just begging them to eat the cost of the first phone they are practically giving away anyway. Why should Cingular engage in “Welfare for future iPhone Customers”?

That’s a great little bit of information to consider, keep us updated?

why would you expect any sort of reasonable response especially with unlocked phones?
all of the cell companies in the US are pure evil.

i would certainly at least wait until the iPhone exists as a consumer product before you switch all your service from T-mobile.

The iPhone is pretty promising, but it seems a bit premature to reengineer your wireless now.
Just wait til the phone actually comes out.

You are such a whiner. The iPhone at the advertised price is being subsidized so you’ll get a plan. If you’re not going to sign a contract when they sell you the phone, then why would they offer you the subsidized pricing?

It’s like you’re asking for a discount after a sale has ended, and then whining that they don’t want you to buy their goods.

Thanks for going to all this trouble and especially for looking out for the rest of us possible switchers. I too have a T-Mobile contract, and I’m perfectly happy with T-Mobile except for the lack of the iPhone option. I’ll bet there are tons of other people in this boat with you who are looking forward to the June release date, but worried about the cell phone contract cancellation, number portability, etc.

Good luck, and thanks again for posting.

Sorry to be rude, but it seems you don’t have a clear understanding of how things work in the cellular industry. Might I suggest please go to Cingular, please…. have their customer service reps shit all over you like any other customer, and we’ll see just how happy you are there. I will personally promise you that Cingular will let you down in just about every way.

Secondly, TMo. I’m on them. I love them. But you wouldnt owe them $2800. You’d owe $600. $200 per line x3. Thats it. That being said, I’d whole heartedly sugguest that you wait to buy an iphone from Apple’s store until they’ve figured out how to unlock it for Tmo. I guantee you that that will be the most satisfying option. Look, it’ll cost you less in the long run, and the only thing y ou’re missing is RAV (random access voicemail)

I left Cingy because their customer service was just horrible. They keep bragging about their no dropped calls network.. please. Just wait till you have a problem,.

And let me enlighten you on something. Not ONE of the reps in ANY store has ANY fracking clue as to what they’re doing. They’re just sales people and they spout off what they’re told to spout off. They’re not tech experts. I hope you know that.

Sorry to bust your bubble.

Bishop

All those contracts, blah blah blah, that’s why I do all my business on a $20 tracphone.

Your a !@#$ing [edited by RZ] idiot this is how all major US carriers work. Why should they bend rules and give you hundreds of dollars in pref treatment to help bring you over? If I worked for Cingular I wouldnt want you as my customer. Can anyone imagine MS, Apple, Cox or Nintendo doing something like this…

your a dumb ass…of course you’d want to wait until june…you’ll get the best deal…once they have you as a customer they don’t give a rats ass your locked in for a year(hence no goody fone prices unless your a NEW customer)..as for t-mobile blocking your # portability…thats !@#$ed [edited by RZ] up all numbers are to portable by mandate of the LNP decision….wierd…and your requests are not typical…its kinda off actually…and the questions you asked are you mentally challenged

Thanks for going through the trouble! Please keep us informed of your progress.

The iphone is available at a subsidised price when purchased with a 2 year contract. This is because the phone company are able to offset the price of the phone based on the revenue they expect to make out of your usage over the course of 2 years. You need to wait until the iphone is released before signing a contract with Cingular. If you switch now you will need to sign another contract when the iphone is released in order to get the phone at a reduced price.

Its not rocket science: wait until the iphone is released, then sign a new 2 year contract with Cingular and you will get the phone at a reduced price. There is nothing to gain by switching now.

Sounds to me like simply typically Cingular BS policy for any phone or customer than specific iPhone policy and potential customers. I’ve been with Cingular for at least 5 years and have run into similar problems with them not wanting to take my money.

In spring 06′ I had to beg them to sign me up to a new one year contract with my already purchased unlock phone. It is hard to find companies that resist someone giving them money and signing a contract to do it on a monthly basis. Cingular seems to be that way.

[...] Update: Cingular seems to be already giving some problems with people wanting to switch over to Cingular early to get the iPhone. Read this. [...]

hey,

I’m not sure you understand how the system works. If your asking for “cheap” phones now, and then want a “cheap” iphone in less than 6 months, you ARE asking Cingular for a lot. More than any customer would be able to get. You COULD possibly pay full price for a phone now, and possibly get your discount on the iphone BUT the automated system that Cingular uses to potentially offer customers a discount uses variables like months remaining in contract/months with company/location to come up with the price availability for you.

As an example, there are some markets that change but that are offered NO discounts on upgrades for a time to test out if people are willing to pay full price for devices. No matter what amount of tenure you had with the company. Believe me, this is not fun to explain to a customer without giving away too much info. But its true that even those “cheap” phones that are advertised for even 49.99 usually have a retail price of about 150-200 dollars or more.

Yes customers get the shaft, but this is business as usual and you won’t find any company out there that is different.

So, what about getting out of your T-Mobile contract? It sounds like you’re still going to be stuck with huge fees. I’m in a similar position; I want the IPhone but I recently extended my 2-line contract with T-Mobile. I have a $600 Nokia N80 becasue all of T-Mobile’s phones are garbage. I don’t like Cingular or their price plans but would be willing to switch for the iphone. I probably wont. If Cingular would pay my contract termination fees though…

LOL cingular doesnt want us yet? wow great business model there huh?

I’m not certain that T-Mobile is allowed to not let you switch your phone numbers. I could have sworn there was a federal law that made all mobile numbers transferable.

Well to the horrible world of Cingular. I am currently a Cingular customer and I have been waiting for the iPhone with huge anticipation. I doubt seriously I will get it now because of the tie to Cingular. They are a nightmare to deal with. Very customer unfriendly and the network is a joke. They are a cobbled together mess from all teh different companies they have bought and taken over. The internet is so slow it is almost unusable.

I honestly think if Apple cannot find a way out of this Cingular exclusive int eh next 5 months the iPhone is dead on arrival and will be remembers in Steve Jobs bio as Lisa part two.

I thought Congress just passed legislation that said cellphone companies had to make their phones unlockable, ie anyone is allowed to unlock any phone.

This is exactly the kind of stories I hear that make me weary of Cingular. I want the iphone in all it’s touch screen glory, but not if I have to deal with support like that.

I will be dumping my cell phone contract when the i phone comes out but I will be using Celltradeusa.com
I used celltrade last year to get into my Verizon Wireless Contract and now I`ll be using them to get out … I am a celltrade fan for life. It worked for when I used it to get into Verizon Wireless. I guess the person like you got proactive because I learned of the contract being offered on njville.com it’s just like craigslist here in New Jersey.

Hey Can you email me at xxmarccohenxx@yahoo.com with the email address you have for Stan Sigman

My 2 Cents

great post! thank you for the time you took to write it and research the information. please keep us updated because I’m planning on doing the same thing!

to cancel your account with t-mobile you only need to pay the 200/line within contract -how did u come up with 2,800 for 3 line? I get 600 only

You are a Idiot.

You are really making it much harder than it needs to be. Just wait until June, walk into the Cingular (or Apple) store, buy the iPhone, tell them you want to port your numbers over and sign the contract. It’s that easy. You will have to pay the $200 fee to get out of T-mobile but you DO NOT have to pay the dollar value of the contract. (that is the entire point of the early termination fees) And by law they HAVE to release your phone number. Besides, when you sign up with Cingular and give them the phone numbers, they will do it anyway.

I made the switch in September in anticipation of the iPhone (and because Verizon is a steaming turd I loathe) and have swapped the same phone number from Sprint to Verizon and now to Cingular.
I really wish T-mobile had a better network (and got the Apple exclusive) because I’ve heard such good things about their service and I am not to happy about crawling into bed with AT&T.

They have the upgrade policy there to protect themselves. You are typically only able to upgrade a phone near the end of your contract. Otherwise, you could upgrade your phone 10 times in a month, then pay the $200 termination fee and sell all of the phones on ebay for a hefty profit.

They lose money when they sell you the phone at a contract discount. Limiting how often you can purchase a new phone at a discounted rate ensures that your account remains profitable for them.

what a pain… I can’t believe how inefficient the whole cellular business is in our country. If I want to switch services here in Beijing, I go and buy a new sim card (of course we’ve got like two choices, but still), and that’s that. Be interesting to see what happens with the iPhone out here… wouldn’t be surprised if Americans started ordering unlocked iPhones from HK and Taiwan.

Hey Raven – nice post and would love to know more about what you find out and the response you get. If you have a chance, can you drop me a line as to what you learn (I’m in the same situation as you with T-Mobile family plan, et al.)

Thanks!

Matt

As a former Cingular reseller agent I can say you need to find the right agent. Cingular sells SIM card plans, I even check with the local Cingular owned store a few block from where I work now. The ONLY reason to sign a contract is if you are buying a phone at a discount. If you buy any phone from Cingular at full price you are not locked into a contract, period. We did this MANY times for customers with GSM phones or, like you, simply did not want to be under contract.

Basically you need to buy a phone outright, set it up on a Family plan or switch later and then add the two additional numbers. Although I went under contract, my phone was setup on Family talk even though I never had a need for it.

The catch is the ESN of the phone, the EMEI. If its not in Cingular’s database the phone may not activate. In short, you would have to find a couple Cingular phone’s, activate them and then swap the SIMs to the two older phones you have now.

You will make a lot more progress at a independent dealer than a corporate store, just try to find a Cingular ONLY agent. Independent dealers can also find and set you up on extinct rates plans that may be better than offered now.

I don’t see your point in switching early. In order to get the iPhone at $499/$599, you have to sign a 2-year contract. If you switch now and sign a new contract (for one year or two), you won’t be able to get an iPhone at $499/$599 until 12 or 24 months from now! So what was your logic in trying to join Cingular before the iPhone comes out?

My 2 year Cingular contract ends in July, and I’m eligible for an upgrade in March. So I’ll be renewing my contract and purchasing an iPhone at $499

Can any of this be a surprise? If Cingular gave you a deal on a new phone now, they are doing it to lock you in for a year (or two). What you are saying is you want a deal now and another deal in a few months…at which time should they take back the phone they gave you (or discounted for you)?

Frankly, I don’t see what else Cingular should or could do. The problem is Apple pre-announced a product you want now and can’t have. Blame Apple, not Cingular.

Why would you want to switch to Cingular if you’re already getting the run-around like this? They are notorious for terrible customer service, and you seemed to have lived the experience.

Are you for real??? WAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!! If you had any sense you would understand that you get discounted pricing for phones by signing a CONTRACT for service. The same CONTRACT that you signed with T-Mobile. By leaving T-Mobile before you have completed the terms of your contract you are breaking the CONTRACT (which is why you have to pay 600 bucks). Plus cingular and t-mobile both run GSM systems so once you got the iphone unlocked you could use it for T-Mobile.
I hate it when people who don’t know anything act like they are brilliant. jackass.

the phone will be released for Cingular, but I have no doubt it will be unlocked very quickly. No phone is worth switching to Cingular. Cingular has some of the worst customer service ever. Good luck though.

Well, wonder how much better this will be when they change the name to AT&T this monday
and totally screw up the Brand Name that has brought so many people to them “CINGULAR”

You clearly have no idea how Cellular phone companies work; this is not just Cingular and I would be amazed if they gave you any special treatment.

Hi, I work for RadioShack and and I sell Cingular services just like a corporate cingular store.

The issue you’ve come across is that, in order to get the price of $499 for the iPhone, you need a 2 year contract.

In order to have a cingular service, you need to sign a contact, minimum 1 year.

Like the cingular rep. said, you wouldn’t be eligible for the $499 iPhone price since you’re already on contract.

My suggestion, just wait until June.

Why are you wanting to do it now, anyway? What advantage will it possibly get you?

If you plan on switching make sure your contract is up with tmobile you can transfer your numbers via a port in process with cingular you just need your account number and password if available through tmobile. Or you can just port them in automatically the port in process is done via cingular and you will end up paying an from T-Mobile when you receive your last bill when the port in is complete on when you switch to at&t (should already be at&t) by June 1, 2007. We can definitely support the load of people that wish to switch over its all in the supply of iPhones that Apple will supply at&t/cingular through the supply chains and COR stores, but the demand of switching over should be no problem the problem is seen as where your contract ends with tmobile and when you want to begin with at&t/cingular. Don’t move over to cingular yet if you do plan on doing it now because once you have equipment you are unable to revert or be eligible at a discounted price because you already accepted a 2 year contract and are susceptible to the $175.00 ETF that you will now have if you move over now wait till June when we have the actual product if you plan on getting the iPhone it doesn’t hurt to switch now to get it later at the full retail premium if you plan on doing that at the later time.

Very interesting! I am lucky to already be a Cingular customer but I am also wondering how painful it will be to just “upgrade” since I already have a Treo 650 with data plan ah!

Not too sure about the whole pricing thing as of yet though because I am not sure if you can buy this stuff it hasn’t come down the pipe on pricing other that was shown on the keynotes but moving over to cingular shouldn’t be a big deal just wait till when its available and hopefully there is an ample supply available from at&t/cingular in June its usually done in a 1st come 1st serve basis.

I am a cingular corp rep and have been with the company for over 5 years. When you went to the local store in your area you weren’t given 100% true information. If you are unlocking phones and bringing them over to Cingular and not taking a contract benifit on the numbers then in June you would be eligable for the contract pricing on the iphone when it launches and the local stores have them in stock. Since our prices on the devices are subsided when you do a contract we are not loosing any money by you bringing in your own phones. I work in a retail store and have been under several managers who would honor this option with you. Another thing, if you do the 1 year pricing lets say tomorrow, then in 6 months you would be eligable for a new contract pricing with this. There are tons of managers who would approve an exception upgrade if we are only talking approx. 1 month.
Just something to consider.

[...] This is a great story of an iPhone fan that wants to get ahead of the game and switch from T-Mobile to Cingular now.  What do you know, Cingular can’t get out of their own way. [...]

My partner and I recently switched from T-Mobile to Cingular (pre iPhone) and did NOT have to change our numbers. You really don’t need to contact T-Mobile at all — we just went to the Cingular website, put in all of the information, and THEY handled the switch. Yes, there may be a penalty, and I’ll need to look at that further, but the numbers weren’t a problem.

This wasted 5 minutes of my life. Virtual sludge.

You might be overestimating the furor to switch to Cingular (isn’t it expected to be AT&T again by then?) to get an iPhone. The iPhone is sufficiently expensive that I don’t think you’ll be waiting in lines to switch. And really, none of this is exactly new or anything. Phone companies get limited exclusives on the next hot phone all the time, so the ordeal you face to switch early seems likely to be old hat to many.

Like you, I’m excited about the iPhone. Unforunately I’m going to forewarn you that overall, I have been disappointed with the customer service that I’ve received from Cingular. While I’ve been with Cingular for about five years, I have to say that over the past two years, my experiences with trying to get resolutions to customer service issues (billing, warrenty phone replacements, etc) have progressively gotten more disappointing.

My girlfriend and I were recently discussing switching our cell phone providers when I join her in Boston, MA (I’m currently in Wilmington, NC) and right now the iPhone is the only reason I’m hesitant to do so.

If it becomes possible to use the iPhone on another carrier within a relatively short period of time after its launch I, for one, plan on switching away from Cingular.

In short, I really wish that Apple would have released the iPhone as an unlocked handset as many rumors had suggested. It seems that the only feature that is really network dependent is the “Visual Voicemail” feature.

Thanks for doing this, maybe Cingular can update their procedures for all of us!

Thank you for putting forth the effort and make my life easier.

-p

I went through this yesterday also at a cingular store and was greatly dissapointed. I without a contract right now and wanted to get with cingular now instead of waiting till June.

[...] I could not believe how bad a company of this size treated it’s customers! Well that is the past and after that day I vowed never to deal with Cingular again. I think a lot of Apple supporters are going to have a very frustrating experience when they attempt a switch. Just read the below link to get a taste of what I think will be a common theme over the next few months. rinzai » Blog Archive » Cingular doesn’t want iPhone ’switchers’ just yet [...]

[...] read more | digg story [...]

I wonder how Verizon will handle this…..

Good luck.

Have you or anyone else considered submitting this (or similar) experiences to Apple? I have had the worst experience with Cingular, and it seems Apple is forcing people into a bad service agreement. I am extremely excited about the iPhone and want nothing else but to get one at release time, however, I WILL NOT use Cingular as a carrier. For this consumer a better choice for Apple would have been to give me (us the end consumer) a choice… It would make the sale of an iPhone a done deal for me.

Are you listening Mr. Jobs? Cingular sucks.

t-mobile does not have you do contract cancellation fees and pay off the remainder of your contract term as well. it’s either you stay with t-mobile for the 2 year contract or you pay the cancellation fee. i don’t know where you got the “pay the remainder of the contract” thing from.

when you want to take your number with you, you take your phone number and account number to the mobile provider’s store. buy a phone, choose your rate plan, and tell them u want to port your number. their system will send a request to t-mobile’s system. once the port finishes, your number will be cancelled at t-mobile, and, if your contract wasn’t fulfilled, you’ll have a cancellation fee. this is on a per line basis. you can take 1, 2, or 3 of your numbers with you and there will be 200 early cancellation fee for each line.

phone companies that have you sign a contract do so b/c they are subsidizing a phone for you. whether you decide to buy a phone from them or not doesn’t matter. the contract is there to ensure the company recoups the money they spent subsidizing the phone. so, you get a discount on the phone when you first buy it. then you get another discount at a later time determined by the carrier. this is a very common practice. it is not that they don’t want you. it is that, in accordance with their usual business practices, it is not beneficial for you to move to cingular at this time.

This is great in site on a very real problem with cell phone companies. I currently have verizon. Which I have been happy with coverage, no dropped calls ever. Yet I will have the same problems. Early termination charges. Verizon does not have sim cards. My boyfriend had cingular, and had nothing but problems with coverage. Dropped calls and no coverage areas all over. I really want to get the i phone, but am nervous to get stuck into a 2 year contract with a company that doesn’t offer good service. I will keep reading your updates definitely.

You are a stupid consumer. I love that you believe any of this stuff. You have so many options, but your not smart enough to exercise those options. IT’S PROBABLY BECAUSE YOUR A MAC/ APPLE FAN.

And, do you really think writing the CEO is the best way to be taken care of. Do you think your issue really matters to the CEO? Hope you appreciate your generic response from one of his many secretaries come Monday. I swear Apple people are just out there.

I would just like to point out that it was made obvious that the iphone is going to require i new contract. Other wise nice write up and good luck.

Well while I hope it all works out for you, I also hope this will help you too keep it in your mind when doing a big change like that …go to CORP

I used to work for an AT&T store, and this is normal behavior for any cell company. Peopel don’t realize that the $499/$599 price you are paying is really a discounted price. The full retail price of that phone, without a contract would be a lot more expensive. So once a year Cingular will let you renew your contract and give you an option to buy a new phone at a discounted price. People take this for granted, and it annoys me. You can sign up for service with Cingular now, buy a Pearl for the discounted price, and then buy the iPhone at full price (since you only get a discount once a year), or you could perhaps buy the Pearl at full price and then renew your contract in June and use your ‘1 discounted phone per year’ ticket on the iPhone. You’d have to check with customer care and make sure they put a note in your account (I don’t know how Cingular does their stuff) and see what happens. Or you could wait till June and stop complaining.

I can’t wait too.
I have verizon and tmobile for my girl. I sure wish t-mobile would support the apple phone. T-moble seems too be the cheapest. I hate att
Will have iphone skins here http://www.viperskins.com

I am an expert in the area of technology, and I have carefully read your blog and concluded that you have way too much time on your hands which you choose to use in an obsession with cell phones. Get over yourself, Mr. Cellphone Early Adopter Lady! Be a man, like me – not a dweeb.

Love, Horseonovich

I agree wholeheartedly with Frank, above. And YES, this needs to be fwd to Apple!!

I’ve had to deal with Cingular for business and I can give them a one word summation: SUCK.

Cingular is the master of nickel/diming you to death. They also force you to sign contracts and charge you huge fees to either change it or [heaven forbid] break it. Cingular has the absolute worst network ever – here in Atlanta anyway. Many times I’ve tried to call my boss and gotten “all circuits are busy. try your call later.” WTF is that about? And calls drop about 50% of the time. And just TRY getting customer “service”! HA! Cingular SUCKS. Soon Cingular will be eaten by ATT, which is even more bad news for anyone who wants to get an iPhone.

I’d love to have an iPhone, but I WILL NOT deal with Cingular or ATT. Been there, done that. For the casual user like me, I suggest VirginMobile pay as you go or one of their other plans. I’ve had a VirginMobile account for about 4 years now and my average phone bill is $10-15/mo with NO monthly fees at all. I *am* a casual user, however, so my minutes are very low.

In any case, I’d never sign a contract with a cell phone company unless I used the phone for my primary communications. It’s just to pricey and you get stuck with whatever the company wants to do to you. Cingular is horrible. If I had to sign a contract, I’d probably go with Sprint (same network as VirginMobile). Metro is fine if you stay local, but they are not so great if you travel.

Be very wary of Cingular. They lie and the network is really not very good. I truly hope that Apple wises up and moves away from Cingular/ATT quickly after they launch iPhone. I think having it tied to Cingular is a very bad idea.

Anyway, I hope my input is helpful in some way. Good luck with your phone adventure. Please post again when you get everything worked out! I’d love to hear how it goes.

I’m really concerned that Apple has made a mistake choosing a provider like this. You pick up an iPod–it works. You pick up a iPhone and–it doesn’t matter how well it works or looks–the bad service from Cingular/ATT will trump all that.

Thanks for posting this, I hope someone/somewhere will listen, but I doubt it.

[...]  Found at: Rinzai.com [...]

[...] Raven Zachary is on T-Mobile and wanted to switch early to avoid all the drama of billions thousands of users switching at the same time in June and it seems it’s not going to be that easy to do so… [...]

First of all, if you are at T-mobile, you have the best customer service from all carriers. That’s not a company line but four years in a row of JD powers and associates awards. Not from some unnamed “private research company” that Cingular advertises. And they do not have the least dropped calls from all networks that is completely a lie. In the one day that this tiny independent research company tested the networks, Cingular had the least dropped calls in the area where they had the most cell towers. Go figure. Plus T-mobile is the largest worldwide cellular carrier under the corporation Deutsch Telekom. All this to say that you can surely leave T-mobile for the 200 per line ETF and can port the numbers over if you like. But you will have a great device with terrible service and less coverage than with T-mobile. Not to insult your intelligence because you are clearly not an idiot, but that is a pretty dumb decision. Not the brightest in the world but if you really have to keep up with the Jones’s that much then have at it. You will hate the next two years of your life with a passion.

And most networks will allow you to port numbers with the exception of new Nextel accounts. They have port protection and will not give out the account numbers for the port.

I work for an Authorized Agent for Cingular, the largest in the Washington Baltimore Market. You do have an way to get your cake and eat it to. THe COR employee was right about the discount price being in contract you would not be able to get taht price in JUNE. Now here is where he wrong. I noticed you said that you have unlocked phones (2 right) What you can do is sign up for Non-Commitment service now. That means there is no contract length. The downside, you cannot take advantage of any promotions rebate etc. Here is where it would effect you on billing though. The price of the plan is the same. The only thing is you will not get Mobile to Mobile Calling free since you are on non-commitment plan. If you need it it is 19.99 a month as a group feature attachment. Come June you can upgrade to iPhone, swithc to free mobile to mobile and be set.

Be smart and wait for the second revision of the iPhone, by which time it will have more memory, 3G data, and be unlocked (by Apple or otherwise.) Remember, it will be sold overseas–no Cingular/ATT network to lock it to there.

I work for a major phone company and if you want to port your number over just get the contract with cingualr and tell them you are porintg from t-mobile. the porting dept just getts it all done for you and you dont have to cancel all your lines at once either. you were just getting wrong info. (trust me it happens to about half of my customers) the thing with the iphone is they are not selling it at a flat rate just with a contract so only new cust or ones who can do upgrades can get the cheap price. it will be avail to buy at regualr price…just not at the beggining

I appreciate your efforts and those who are making stupid comments, several cingular and apple execs have noted that the model for this phone (pricing, distribution) is different than the norm. There has been conflicting info. I myself have looked into it and have not gotten good info. Keep it up!

Three things aren’t clear. (1) Why leave the franchise store before they could respond? Their contract may give them the option to grant special exemptions. You didn’t give them a chance to respond. (2) You found a corporate store, that did not have a manager. Why not go to another corporate store? (3) Why buy the phone from Apple directly? It sounds like Cingular/AT&T will work with you if you buy from them. Why not? Not buying the phone from them means they make less profit. Less profit means less reasons to work with you. Besides, the more Apple products purchased outside of Apple directly means more retailers will be willing to sell Apple products. Then in turn, more retailers selling Apple products means more market share for Apple.

Thanks for doing this and please keep us updated. I hope you can get Cingular to stop being stupid.

I have a new theory. If you buy the phone from Apple, you will obviously have to activate the phone. Maybe when you call to do that you have to add a special iPhone plan, which in order to do so, agree to a 2 year contract.

I HIGHLY doubt Apple would be selling the phone for an unsub price, I don’t think there is one. Apple has set the price.

I don’t know, just a thought. I need a Blackberry now so I was hoping to switch too. And people, stop saying this guy is stupid.

YOUR DUMB AS !@#$ [edited by RZ]! GET T-MOBILE AND GET THE iPhone UNLOCKED!!!! DURR

That sucks….. I got all happy that the iPhone will come out , but I didnt get so happy I want to cancel my contract which I have 11 moths left. I thought you made a bad move to begin with by switching, 5 months early to be exact. What I am going to do is wait until my contract is done and by the time my contract is done they would have the popular iPhone in stock that way I do not have to paying extra for cancellation fees and I dont have to worry about glitches and the phone not being in stock…. but than again thats just me

I went through very similar experiences in my recent encounters with Cingular. But I just might have a happy ending here only because my current contract allows me to upgrade two of my phones in June 2007, around the time the iPhone is likely to come out. If I do buy one it would be the first Apple product I ever owned (not counting the iPod my daughter got from “Santa” for Christmas!). I think the features are impressive although I was a little bummed by the fact that the screen is not a 16:9 aspect ratio.

All these angry posters – are they Cingular employees or Windows-lovers? My favorite of these how-dare-you-love-Apple (or how-dare-you-try-to-switch) posters is from the gramatically challenged Tony Stark. “You are a Idiot.”

It looks like Cingular/AT&T Mobile has changed their mind, AP just reported that Cingular will let you extend your contract by 2 years if you want to get an iPhone.

“The phone’s $499 price for a 4GB version and $599 for the 8GB version are with a two-year contract. Existing Cingular subscribers would have to extend their contract by two years to get the phone, Lurie said, without revealing whether the prices are subsidized by the carrier. “

[...] Raven Zachary is on T-Mobile and wanted to switch early to avoid all the drama of billions thousands of users switching at the same time in June and it seems it’s not going to be that easy to do so… [...]

Retards

[...] read more | digg story [...]