Yesterday, in an article on BetaNews, we were told that Sprint cellular service is attempting to rid itself of problem customers. 

After digesting that little piece of lunacy, I thought back to the time spent as a Radio Shack manager. During my tenure, Radio Shack sold both Verizon and Sprint phones. I remembered all the times we were told how much we needed to talk up the benefits of Sprint. You know…the usual talking points…better signal quality, fewer dropped calls, more minutes for less money, better customer service. This was 1999, and most people did not know any better.

I was the top salesman in our district [San Bernardino area - any RS employees–0847] and since my living depended on my knowledge, as well as my honesty, I would tell potential customers about the positive and negative aspects of service with Sprint. In the time with Radio Shack, I saw all of the positives go away, with the exception of one. If you wanted a great looking phone, Sprint was your service! If, however, you wanted to use it for a specific purpose, like, making phone calls…well, with Sprint you were in for a series of disappointments. Those who were in this latter group almost always got a Verizon phone.

Now it appears that Sprint, having merged with Nextel, has enough money to selectively remove customers from their service. In this day where the vying for customers is so aggressive, why would Sprint want to rid themselves of customers? The noted article states that these problem customers were identified as ‘wasting the customer service representative’s time’ with problems.  This is hilarious to anyone who has had even the most rudimentary sales training. The first thing anyone in sales is taught is that your purpose in life is serving the customer [or prospective customer].

It so happens I can see why they would want to do this, because with Sprint, it’s all about the cash. Profits are king, and nobody should get in the way.

I’m sure the Sprint outsourced customer service representatives are tired of having to tell the same old lies about why the service doesn’t work, why the calls are dropped, and why the billing statement is wrong.

As a Sprint customer, if you only wish to use your phone in a metropolitan setting, never use the phone while moving in a car, and never question your billing, because you have so much money that it is of no consequence when your bill is incorrect, you are the ideal. You can rest assured that Sprint will never want to drop you. On the other hand, if you get snippy at some time because the company replaced your fully-insured, lost phone with an inferior model, watch out.

I wonder whose better idea this is. Surely this policy will fail, and it will be entertaining to see which comes first…a change in policy or the name change to Nextel [no longer part of Sprint].

Tags: sprint, customer service, radio shack, verizon, nextel