Today as I was driving home from a short vacation in Galena, Illinois I was trying to make a few calls, using my At& T phone and realized that my treo 680 was not allowing me to press the buttons to make an outgoing call. I was constantly resetting the phone trying to figure out what the problem was, getting more frustrated as more time passed. Luckily my husband was driving, since I was not a happy camper.
When we arrived home, I had to go pick up my dog from the dogsitter, but needed to go to the A T & T store to find out the problem with my phone. Not only were my buttons not working on my Treo, but when I dialed my phone from another phone, I received a busy signal. My anxiety level was just getting higher, not knowing the problem of my broken phone. When I walked in the store, I saw a friend of mine and he immediately asked me if my phone was working. I said no- he said that he just found out that the network was down and the guy behind the counter reinforced this news by announcing that the network was not working on a good percentage of people's phones.
I soon found out that I was not alone with my frustrations. Many people kept coming in the store with the same problem. People were beginning to act a little crazy and I think it would have been amusing to video tape the people screaming at the youn boy behind the counter.
What do you mean the network is not working? , one customer asked.
The guy behind the counter responded- the network is not working.
When will it work.? the people were screaming
I don't know anything, the guy behind the counter said. The guy behind the counter had just actually found out that it was a network problem after he spent hours analyzing a broken phone an hour before. A T & T never emailed or notified the employee of the problem.
One angry customer said, well what are you going to do about it?
I felt so sorry for this 18 year old boy behind the counter. What did they think he was going to do?
One girl in the store was crying since she needed to call someone long distance and didn't have a phone that worked. Since I had brought my husbands Sprint phone with me, I told her that she could make the call on his phone. She said it was long distance, and I said don't worry about it.
The store was getting more and more crowded and people were behaving a little crazy. I just wanted to stay and watch the show. Unfortunately I had to leave to retrieve my dog but I had a feeling the boy behind the counter just couldn't wait until 5:00 to close the doors of the store.
Around 7:00 my cell phone started working, the buttons were not stuck and I as well as many more people breathed a sigh of relief. After listening to the news, A T& tTexplained the mishap as a power outage.
I and most of the people affected by this outage would have expected better communication from At & t such as an email or an announcement on their web page.
All the items are purchased from Original Bagel and Bialy located in Buffalo Grove.