topic Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint. in Rebuilding Your Credit

T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

SLR72689 — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 23:45:50 GMT

I had a T-Mobile account that I opened in 2009 with 3 phone lines: mine, my mother's and my fathers. My father paid me monthly for their lines.

Fast forward to 2011: Long story short - I was 22, working two part time jobs living on my own, paying my own bills, car payment and rent while trying to take care of my mother financially while my father was living permanently in a rehabilitation center doing chemo, radiation and psychical therapy for his newly diagnosed cancer. In August, my father passed away. This begins my first late payment for T-Mobile. September brought even more financial problems and I couldn't catch up and missed a second payment. At this point, T-Mobile shuts our phones off and won't turn them on till our account is PIF. I went to Sprint and opened a new account (luckily, nothing was on my CR yet) and got two phone lines, one for me and my mother. October comes around and my mother has a heart attack and passes away. "Third missed payment" (even though the phones are shut off) from T-Mobile. I called T-Mobile and explained my situation and they said all I could do was pay $300/line to cancel and pay my charges for the previous months. WHAT? I can't do that. I called Sprint to talk to them about the second line and explained my situation and they cancelled my mother's line and waived the cancellation fee, NO QUESTIONS ASKED. At that point, I let T-Mobile go because I had more important things that HAD to be paid and taken care of (funeral expenses, rent, car payments etc) and didn't think twice about it.

Back to the present - 2013: I'm trying to clean up my credit because at the current moment I am fortunate enough to not have to pay rent and want to pay off all my debt. I'm not trying to get out of this debt by telling my sob story. I just don't think this shows my credit worthiness - this was beyond my control and I did the best I could do. Now my T-Mobile account is in collections with Midland , of all collection agencies. I called T-Mobile again and tried to work something out with them to pay off the debt and the customer service rep told me that isn't not possible blah blah blah. That pisses me off like no other considering the customer service Sprint had for me after only being a customer for ONE month. I've considered paying off Midland and then GWing them to death because they absolutely refuse PFD. I know the debt is mine and I want it paid off. I decided ONE last route before I commit to a payment plan with Midland: file a complaint with the BBB against T-Mobile.

I basically explained my story of what happened and how I expected a lot more from T-Mobile's customer service and my consumers desired resolution was for T-Mobile to pull the account from the CA (I have no idea if this is possible/legal what have you but I figured it was worth a try), waive the fees for TWO of the lines (I also mentioned I have death certificates proving the dates of their passing which is the same time the payments were late) and then work something out with me to pay off the rest.

Like I said, I am by no means trying to "get out of this". I will pay what is owed.

I have no idea if this will do anything for me, but I figured it's worth a try! *crossing my fingers*

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

DaBears — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 23:57:45 GMT

@SLR72689 wrote:

I had a T-Mobile account that I opened in 2009 with 3 phone lines: mine, my mother's and my fathers. My father paid me monthly for their lines.

Fast forward to 2011: Long story short - I was 22, working two part time jobs living on my own, paying my own bills, car payment and rent while trying to take care of my mother financially while my father was living permanently in a rehabilitation center doing chemo, radiation and psychical therapy for his newly diagnosed cancer. In August, my father passed away. This begins my first late payment for T-Mobile. September brought even more financial problems and I couldn't catch up and missed a second payment. At this point, T-Mobile shuts our phones off and won't turn them on till our account is PIF. I went to Sprint and opened a new account (luckily, nothing was on my CR yet) and got two phone lines, one for me and my mother. October comes around and my mother has a heart attack and passes away. "Third missed payment" (even though the phones are shut off) from T-Mobile. I called T-Mobile and explained my situation and they said all I could do was pay $300/line to cancel and pay my charges for the previous months. WHAT? I can't do that. I called Sprint to talk to them about the second line and explained my situation and they cancelled my mother's line and waived the cancellation fee, NO QUESTIONS ASKED. At that point, I let T-Mobile go because I had more important things that HAD to be paid and taken care of (funeral expenses, rent, car payments etc) and didn't think twice about it.

Back to the present - 2013: I'm trying to clean up my credit because at the current moment I am fortunate enough to not have to pay rent and want to pay off all my debt. I'm not trying to get out of this debt by telling my sob story. I just don't think this shows my credit worthiness - this was beyond my control and I did the best I could do. Now my T-Mobile account is in collections with Midland , of all collection agencies. I called T-Mobile again and tried to work something out with them to pay off the debt and the customer service rep told me that isn't not possible blah blah blah. That pisses me off like no other considering the customer service Sprint had for me after only being a customer for ONE month. I've considered paying off Midland and then GWing them to death because they absolutely refuse PFD. I know the debt is mine and I want it paid off. I decided ONE last route before I commit to a payment plan with Midland: file a complaint with the BBB against T-Mobile.

I basically explained my story of what happened and how I expected a lot more from T-Mobile's customer service and my consumers desired resolution was for T-Mobile to pull the account from the CA (I have no idea if this is possible/legal what have you but I figured it was worth a try), waive the fees for TWO of the lines (I also mentioned I have death certificates proving the dates of their passing which is the same time the payments were late) and then work something out with me to pay off the rest. Does T-Mobile still own the account? If not they can no longer accept payment.

Like I said, I am by no means trying to "get out of this". I will pay what is owed. I'm confused as to why you filed a complaint with the BBB on a valid collection? IL has a SOL of 5 yrs. You are within the SOL..You better pray they don't turn around and slap you with a lawsuit.

I have no idea if this will do anything for me, but I figured it's worth a try! *crossing my fingers*

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

SLR72689 — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 00:03:21 GMT

@DaBears wrote:
@SLR72689 wrote:

I had a T-Mobile account that I opened in 2009 with 3 phone lines: mine, my mother's and my fathers. My father paid me monthly for their lines.

Fast forward to 2011: Long story short - I was 22, working two part time jobs living on my own, paying my own bills, car payment and rent while trying to take care of my mother financially while my father was living permanently in a rehabilitation center doing chemo, radiation and psychical therapy for his newly diagnosed cancer. In August, my father passed away. This begins my first late payment for T-Mobile. September brought even more financial problems and I couldn't catch up and missed a second payment. At this point, T-Mobile shuts our phones off and won't turn them on till our account is PIF. I went to Sprint and opened a new account (luckily, nothing was on my CR yet) and got two phone lines, one for me and my mother. October comes around and my mother has a heart attack and passes away. "Third missed payment" (even though the phones are shut off) from T-Mobile. I called T-Mobile and explained my situation and they said all I could do was pay $300/line to cancel and pay my charges for the previous months. WHAT? I can't do that. I called Sprint to talk to them about the second line and explained my situation and they cancelled my mother's line and waived the cancellation fee, NO QUESTIONS ASKED. At that point, I let T-Mobile go because I had more important things that HAD to be paid and taken care of (funeral expenses, rent, car payments etc) and didn't think twice about it.

Back to the present - 2013: I'm trying to clean up my credit because at the current moment I am fortunate enough to not have to pay rent and want to pay off all my debt. I'm not trying to get out of this debt by telling my sob story. I just don't think this shows my credit worthiness - this was beyond my control and I did the best I could do. Now my T-Mobile account is in collections with Midland , of all collection agencies. I called T-Mobile again and tried to work something out with them to pay off the debt and the customer service rep told me that isn't not possible blah blah blah. That pisses me off like no other considering the customer service Sprint had for me after only being a customer for ONE month. I've considered paying off Midland and then GWing them to death because they absolutely refuse PFD. I know the debt is mine and I want it paid off. I decided ONE last route before I commit to a payment plan with Midland: file a complaint with the BBB against T-Mobile.

I basically explained my story of what happened and how I expected a lot more from T-Mobile's customer service and my consumers desired resolution was for T-Mobile to pull the account from the CA (I have no idea if this is possible/legal what have you but I figured it was worth a try), waive the fees for TWO of the lines (I also mentioned I have death certificates proving the dates of their passing which is the same time the payments were late) and then work something out with me to pay off the rest. Does T-Mobile still own the account? If not they can no longer accept payment.

Like I said, I am by no means trying to "get out of this". I will pay what is owed. I'm confused as to why you filed a complaint with the BBB on a valid collection? IL has a SOL of 5 yrs. You are within the SOL..You better pray they don't turn around and slap you with a lawsuit.

I have no idea if this will do anything for me, but I figured it's worth a try! *crossing my fingers*

The complaint was moreso aimed at T-Mobiles customer service and how they absolutely refused to help me. Maybe I should have worded it differently. I wasn't trying to dispute the money owed.

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 00:03:54 GMT

i gotta go with Dabears on this one.

the BBB wont do anything about 'extenuating circumstances', only improper/unlawful business practices. any corrections to the account via circumstances such as those would have to be made through the debt holder (OC or CA)... and even then its basically a GW situation, they dont technically have to.

that being said, im sorry to hear about that situation. rough spot to be in.

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

SLR72689 — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 00:03:55 GMT

Oh well, what's done is done!

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 00:07:07 GMT

my personal advice (take it with a grain of salt)...

while still within SOL, id keep communicating with the debt holder. tell em exactly what you meant by the complaint. theyre still people...theyre more likely to understand that way than getting hit by a nasty-gram from the BBB without talking to you. theyd prob assume the worst...thats just the way people think...you know how it is.

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

DaBears — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 00:07:48 GMT

Becareful on this one. I'm not being negative at all towards you, looking out for you cause I've seen what you been through and what I have helped you with. I don't want to see this come back and bite you in the butt... Keep me posted on this one please.

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 00:46:39 GMT

SLR, first and foremost, I'm REALLY sorry to hear all that! That being said-if T-Mobile still owns the debt, try looking here to contact an executive~http://onyoursi.de/wiki/telecommunications/t-mobile/. If Midland does, try writing to one of these execs~http://www.encorecapital.com/about/management-team

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

SLR72689 — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 19:00:05 GMT

Heard from T-Mobile today! Quick reponse, I didn't expect it to be so fast.

The President of Executive Customer Relations called and e-mailed me. I'm at work so we played phone tag and basically communicated via voice mails but he said he was unable to locate the account and it has been sold to Midland so they 'unfortunately' cannot remove the account from collections or remove any fees and anything further (complaints, disputes) would have to go directly to Midland.

Was worth a try! I wish I had known about this forum at the time this all happened... but whats done is done!

Re: T-Mobile BBB Complaint.

DaBears — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 20:30:42 GMT

@SLR72689 wrote:
Heard from T-Mobile today! Quick reponse, I didn't expect it to be so fast.

The President of Executive Customer Relations called and e-mailed me. I'm at work so we played phone tag and basically communicated via voice mails but he said he was unable to locate the account and it has been sold to Midland so they 'unfortunately' cannot remove the account from collections or remove any fees and anything further (complaints, disputes) would have to go directly to Midland.

Was worth a try! I wish I had known about this forum at the time this all happened... but whats done is done!

Unfortunately, T-Mobile can not accept payment, if you have CSR's telling you they can they are wrong. Once the account is sold they can't do anything in regards to the account. I'll p'm you in a moment!!!