AT&T – Apple iPhone Customers Still Mad Even After Explanation

It seems the hired gun that At&T is using is may not able to sooth the ill feelings that Apple iPhone owners have against AT&T. When Seth Bloom posted his blog entry that Apple was to blame for the iPhone problems, not many folks were buying it. In fact it seems that more customers are angered for what they see as a lack of service they are not receiving for their $140 monthly fee from AT&T.

According to the DSL Broadband article it states:

To accompany AT&T’s announcement, the carrier posted a new YouTube video featuring Bloom that insists the carrier is listening to your complaints, with Bloom repeating the company’s now familiar statement that they’re busy upgrading both backhaul and tower capacity. Judging from the YouTube comments, people aren’t exactly buying the “apology:”

The iPhone has been out for more than two years now, and I STILL can’t tether my iPhone. If I bought a Blackberry today, I can use AT&T to send MMS and tether it to my computer, so why am I penalized for buying the iPhone. If AT&T can’t keep up with the traffic, then you should let Apple market the iPhone to other carriers who can. What’s the point of upgrading your network for future customers if when that time comes you don’t have any customers left?

Says another annoyed user:

AT&T has gained millions of new customers since the introduction of the iPhone, saved billions of advertising and marketing dollars because Apple does their own iPhone ads an promotions, and AT&T has failed to use those profits to provide their customers with services available to every other customer not using an iPhone. You can’t use SlingPlayer (available on Blackberry and Windows Mobile phones), Skype, or Google Voice on their network because of their failures.

Says a somewhat less elegant commenter:

Hey AT&T, $#@! YOU, I’m not paying you over $140/month to hear your bullshit excuses for not upgrading your shitty network!

AT&T could have done what most organizations or individuals who don’t like criticism do: disable comments or remain mute. Other than that, there’s only a few things AT&T can do to mitigate what’s becoming an increasingly large PR stink: get the network upgraded as quickly as possible (which they say they’re doing), and allow users to start tethering (which they say is coming, though they refuse to say when). Customers clearly understand that upgrading a network is both hard and expensive, but with the kind of quarterly data and SMS revenues AT&T generates, that excuse was always a little thin.

Last week when I wrote about the problems AT&T customers were having when using their Apple iPhone, I received this comment:

“This is another prime example of corporate greed running amok in America.” Your kidding right? You realize they have employees that make salaries, right?. You know, when you go in business in the US, one of the key issues is making money and a profit.

How about something original?

I guess my opinion of corporate America is somewhat different. Ask the people in Detroit who lost their jobs because GM and Chrysler mismanaged the company. Or the big banks who almost drove this country and the world into a depression because of their greedy ways. We also have the Madoffs of the world who will screw anyone and anybody to make a buck.

So when I see AT&T dropping the ball when it comes to network access for those iPhone users, I don’t believe anything the company says. After all, as the reader above commented, they are just out to make a buck.

Comments welcome.

DSL Broadband Source

Reader Comment quote