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Qwest Wireless

Qwest • Install & Repair • Billing & Credit • Qwest Wireless • Qwest Long Distance • Qwest DSL -- • Qwest To Exit Wireless Business In October • Qwest Pays Big Refunds in Arizona • Minnesota Fines Qwest $26 Million • States Sue Qwest • Feds OK Qwest for Long-Distance

Andre of Windsor CO (4/14/05):
We had billing mistakes every month and would have to call them to correct them. This required sometimes hours on the phone bumping from one individual to another, never the same staff, never any documentation of one call to another. The phone tactics were unbelievable as were the accounting practices.

They put us into collections after we paid our last bill. They sent us 5 final bills all of varying amounts.

Diana of Arizona City AZ (10/21/03): I have been with Qwest for about 3 years now. In July of 2002 they called offering me a wireless plan that would connect to my home phone. For the first six months everything was fine. Then we started receiving roaming charges, charges for other phones that were not ours, and charges for going over our minutes. And the service became terrible. Dropped calls, calls that would only ring over to my voice mail, receiving voice mails three days later.

Everytime I received my bill I had to call in and spend an hour to have it fixed. When our contract was up they offered us another year with new phones. I told them I didnt think so due to the service. However they assured me they would send me upgraded phones that would fix it all, and they would give us better service. But it only got worse. More trouble than ever with the service. Ten calls to finish one conversation. Being billed for everything possible. And our bill is all mixed up.

I called wanting to cancel my phones, because they did not hold up to their end of the agreement. They said that I had a contract and I was going to be charged $200.00 for each phone if I canceled the service. I was told if this kept happening I could cancel the service with no problem. That was a lie. I am still on the phone every month for corrections having to be made on my bill.

Mark of Tucson (10/15/03):
In May of 2003 I had one Qwest Cell phone and a Qwest land line. I was past my required contract date on the cell phone. I called to cancel the land line and upgrade to a shared cell phone package (2 cell phones share the minutes of one account). I was told that the land line account was closed and service was disconnected.

When the bills started to roll in the cost was shocking. I called every month to have the account checked on. Not until 5 months later did Qwest admit to me that the landland account was still open and instead of a single shared account on two cell phones, I was being charged for two individual cell phones. Billing personnel claimed to have rectified the situation and I was issued a small $60.00 credit. I have the bills and I have studied them but I believe the bills are too difficult to read and defy the attempts of a reasonable person to understand what has happeninig. I have no idea what is fair at this point.

Qwest West initiated a new contract on my upgrade account and I feel this was manipulative and unnecessary and that their policies do not require this. I believe it was done because sales people get a commission for new contracts. I believe it was done because the sales person got commission credit for two accounts when it should have been one. This month Qwest disconnected my cell phone service due to non-payment. I checked with my bank and payment was accepted by Qwest (the payment cleared the bank) on October 10th which was the due date. Qwest refused to acknowledge that they are behind in posting payments to their accounts, instead they claim I have not made a payment and today is October 15th. They give no credence to my bank's claims.

I canceled service today in exasperation and they are going to charge me a $200.00 fee for not fulfilling my contract. I counter claimed they they had not lived up to thier contract and verbal agreements and so the contract is nullify by them and I won't pay the fee.

Mark should complaint to the Arizona Attorney General and the Arizona Public Utility Commisison. He can find them both in our Consumer Resources Guide.

Gary of Yuma AZ (7/31/03):
I was talked into getting a cell phone and local service and found out that there was no service in my area and my first bill was $400. They had charged me my minutes at 39 cents a minute/75 cents roaming charges for my 1000 minutes!

I was extremely angry about the whole situation and I would discontinue my home phone service with the company if I could, but they are the only phone provider in my area. I was supposed to get a large credit off this bill and they are still charging me after the service was discontinued and they are trying to charge me for a phone I am returning.

Michael of Federal Way WA (8/29/02):
I have a couple of wireless phones. I just began reading some of the complaints regarding double billing, poor service. My sister and I are so fed up with Qwest but we cannot even begin to figure out how they do it. I have a post graduate degree in Education organization and how to deal with bureacracy is one of my workshops. I am baffled by the ineptness of this company. I cannot begin to describe it.

I have never been as irritated as I am with Qwest. I include being a Marine, licensed foster parent (DSHS) but this company has no idea what is going on and how they are treating loyal customers as hostages who are "stuck with the company." I cannot drop even two of my phones because somehow despite spending close to $2,000 the past sixteen months for a service that is supposed to be $89.95 a month, I would be hit with big penalty charges. I want to give up but hundreds of kids that are high risk and need sometimes to talk depend on the one number.

Denise of Broomfield CO (8/21/02):
I just received my phone bill for the month of August and I am amazed at how high the bill is. After reviewing my statement I found I am being charged a fee of $4.95 a month for a service that I did not initiate and have never used. I called Qwest wireless and was told the service is called voice browsing. Apparently you can acess the internet through your phone. I have no desire to use this service. I was also informed that I have been charged $4.95 a month for this service since November of 2000. That is a total of $108.90 for a service I did not ask for or use. Needless to say I am upset.

I understand that I should have checked my statements more carefully however I am a very busy person and my statement is 9 pages long full of charges and fees. I expected the bill to be higher because I changed at that time from a plan for one cell phone to a shared minutes plan between two cell phones and I ordered accesories at that time.

Economical damage of $108.90. I feel that I have been cheated and taken advantage of. I have given Qwest all of my business. Home phone, two cell phones, Internet, and DSL services. As a result of this charge I have cancelled my DSL through them I will be looking for a new Internet provider and a new wireless company. They will not be getting any more of my money than necessary from now on!

Stacy of Stillwater MN (8/12/02):
I was solicited over the phone to sign up for Qwest Wireless family plan. I was told once I got my phones to call and consolidate all my phones onto the plan. I did this and I recieved my first bill for $1,000 because Qwest had failed to consolidate my plan. I spent 1 1/2 hours on the phone correcting the problem and asked for a new bill. I paid the first bill which they credited to my home phone only and was deactivated because of lack of payment and charged $1200. I called and spent another hour on the phone and was told my account would be credited $844, the amount of the deactivation charges. In order to reactivate my account I just needed to pay 43.00.

I paid that amount and my phones were reactivated. On July 3 I received a call from their billing department that I owed 43.00 or they would disconnect me. I called the customer line and was first told that there was no way I would have received that call. They had applied my payment of 43.00 only to my home phone once again. I was then told that I would receive no disruption in service and that the matter was taken care of. I was concerned because my children were traveling and wanted them to have access to their cell phones in case of an emergency. On july 4 my phones were deactivated.

I called on July 5 and again was told that there was no way that should have happened and it had been a mistake. My phones were again reactivated. I asked at that time if I would be able to pay my bill correctly and if my home phone and wireless account were joined. On July 15 I received a call from Qwest to pay my bill of 93.00. On July 16 I was permanantly disconnected. My check cleared on the 26 of July and the next bill I recieved was for 800.00. I cannot believe that a company is allowed to participate in this kind of fraud. They have not provided me with their contractual obligations, have misled and lied to me and have no consequences. I, on the other hand am stuck with an $800 phone bill.

Also, I was told I would receive three $50 credit cards after I paid for the three phones and I only received two. When I received the first bill, the residential line was not included in the wireless plan and Qwest had a $193.22 equipment charge (first of several equipment charges). I called and complained and was told the mistake was mine and they couldn’t change anything. After several phone calls and complaints, and nothing being done (they did give us a one time rebate of $150), I canceled my wireless plan in May and was charged a $200 per phone fee for canceling my wireless plan. For the time I had the wireless plan, and if the agreement I agreed to had been honored, the total cost should have been $638.99; Qwest has charged us $1808.45.

Marlene of Bellevue WA (5/20/02):
I have had a cell phone with Qwest for a while, and I got overbilled and charged for roaming charges while calling in my own home and they used to fix it when I called them so it was OK. I decided to get a shared minutes plan to include my son and a friend, the first two months the service was fine and we never exeeded our 600 minutes for during the week. But then last month we exceeded them and I noticed that there are some calls that nobody could have made.

I called Qwest and they told me that the machine that counts the minutes does not make mistakes and refused to fixe it, I also complained about roaming charges and they refused to fix them as well arguing that I call every month to complain and that its my fault to be calling while my phone is on roaming, but sometimes sitting in my apartment I'm already in a call when the roaming starts and I don't notice until later, what am I supposed to do?

Rhonda of Tempe AZ (5/16/02):
Had a layover in SF, the airport security put my fanny pack and phone thru the scanner twice. Walked away and after about 10 minutes realized the phone was not there. Went back to security checkpoint, they denied it was there. Called Qwest on the way to the gate to report lost phone. Had no way of writing anything down and now they say they have no record of when that call was placed.

After several hours on the phone and several rude people later I managed to get a high level billing manager, she is manager of the supervisors and her name is Natalia, after hearing the story she said to fax in the itenerary to show that the plane was in the air when the calls started being placed in SF. They said there were roaming charges in San Diego ... a place I have never even been. I can prove I was in Phoenix when these calls were made. She assured me she would look into this and that the phone would not be automatically turned off due to nonpayment since an investigation is ongoing.

The phone was shut off, no one knows who Natalia is, and I am now stuck with bills that I am not responsible for. Their only reply is that they dont have any record of the call that was placed from SF so I am responsible for the charges. I am a longtime customer and have always paid my bills. I did what I was told to do and am still being held accountable for chargers that I did not incur. They would rather lose a longtime customer and potentially thousands of dollars from an honest customer than to admit that their system did not work properly. Unfortunately I don't have that refernce number but I have reference number for another call that they have no record of. But of course their system is infallible.

Jeff of Boise ID (4/29/02):
14 months of trying to deal with Qwest on one of their 2 in one phones. It has gotten completely out of hand where they will not talk with me and have disconnected all my services. I have filed complaints with the Idaho PUC and the Idaho State Attorney General. This is all their falt due to extremely poor customer service reps. and extremely poor record keeping.

Shirlene of Murray UT (9/6/02):
I thought it would be a wonderful idea of having my home phone and cell phone on the same bill. So I ordered. I'm telling you I had to go over my bill every month with a "fine tooth comb" after spending some time on trying to figure out the bill, I'd spend even more time on the phone. By doing this I'd have a credit from anywhere from $2.00 to $30.00 dollars every dam month. I'm so damn frustrated!

I then received a customer service call about adding a second phone and going with a different payment plan for only, "$57.00 a month". And that I would be able to talk between, cell to cell, and cell to home, for free! They told me yes! So like a fool I went ahead and ordered this deal! Set aside the cost of the phone and the one-time charges, I never saw that amount -- never!! They straight out lied to me about this! So in the months to follow, I would go over and over my bills still finding overcharges! So, I'd call cust. service, "again" they'd change my plan to better serv my needs (or so they said) and again next month, it would start all over again. I'd watch my minutes, I'd keep track of what time of day I'd use my phone. To get to my point.

I never got what they told me! I've asked twice now for a investagation on my charges, from my bills I have, they are taking away the minutes that I've used between cell to cell, and cell to home. Which in turn would cause my bills to be so high!

Wendy of Berthoud CO writes (4/15/01):
I suffered and am still suffering from the extremely poor service. In October of 1999 I received my cellular phones and was told I would get 10 percent off because I purchased two (at times I did not receive my promised 10 percent). Then in the year 2000 after arguing and them rendering my phones unusable they over charged me $700.00 and finally reimbursed it (after a Channel 7 news story).

They continue to overcharge me and I have WASTED about 10 to 12 hours each month on the phone explaining to them what they did wrong. I am so tired of this. I think someone needs to turn them in because I hear several people are experiencing this problem but have paid the bill or they charge a $300.00 reinstallment charge if you don't pay the bill or argue and do not get it resolved. So for instance if your bill is say $200.00 and you miss one day or do not make arrangements then they shut your phone off and you have to pay $300.00 plus your $200.00 bill in full to have your phones turned back on. They don't clarify when or if you get your money back but, they sit on it and draw interest until I think you disconnect your service.

How fair is that when they are over charging the person anyway and that money should never go to them? They shut my phones off because I sent back the two new phones I ordered because they did not have the software updated. I received the new phone and sent the old ones back, they shut my phones off and hindered my business because they forgot to release the RMA packet and the phone were in their possesion at the time.

I believe there is a lot they owe me for loss of clients in 1999 and 2000 that have been lost or money I would have made via technical support call I would have received if they did not overcharge me $700.00 and then shut our phones off that I use for business. They really hurt my business and my time I could have been spending with a client.

David of Alabama (3/4/01):
Qwest double billed me for my cell phone this month. While the account person was coridal and immediately fixed the account when I called ot complain, I was distrubed to hear her say that "everybody got double billed, oops." I wonder how many senior citizens and less vigilant consumers have paid their double bill from Qwest this month?

No damage reulted to me. I am concerned, however, about the thousands or even millions of extra dollars Quest is collecting this month if, indeed, "everybody" got double billed. Will Qwest voluntarily refund the overpay without to everybody without being asked? Why do I doubt that?

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