The Consumerist has a couple step-by-step scripts for getting out of your Cingular or Verizon contracts without paying an early-termination fee, based on the former’s new arbitration clause and the latter’s recent raise in basic text-messaging rates. It looks tedious and a lot of work, but it doesn’t look nearly as difficult as my attempt to cancel Cingular service when my actual contract had already expired (in the end, I had to mail a copy of my 1-year contract to Cingular to prove it wasn’t a 2-year agreement, because they apparently don’t keep contracts on file, just database records).
We’d be remiss in our duty if we didn’t point out that attempts to follow these scripts have been hit-and-miss (a number of folks have posted interesting comments, and it seems like it really is the luck of the draw as to whether you get a CSR who will go along with what you’re trying to do), but it’s still worth a shot and you gotta love the ingenuity here.
Now, all we need are Sprint and T-Mobile scripts (well, except people don’t seem to loathe those two the way they do Cingular and Verizon). Anyone have experience here?
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