Worst Shopping Experience!

Oh, man, I thought AT&T was the worst too...........until Comcast came along. WORST-COMPANY-EVER. (Yes, I meant to yell that, lol!).

DirecTV. We had them for years then they switched out our box when we moved (we were told we had to by the service guy). They said we agreed to 2 yr extension on our contract when we did that (we didn't). Then the stupid box kept breaking, so we got new ones. Since we didn't know they kept adding 2 yrs to our contract, it kept going up. I asked to see where I signed for that, they said it was a verbal agreement. Great, let me hear it. They couldn't do that and THEY COULDN'T GIVE ME MY AGREEMENT IN WRITING per company protocol. Not even an email. Which was convenient b/c every rep was telling me something different and "I'll put a note on your account." A lot of good that did. I finally got a rep that said to cancel would be $35. I took it and ran. Ran far away and never looked back. Oh, I think my blood pressure went up telling that story!

For the most part I prefer doing things (pay bills, banking etc.) online, but for purchasing high dollar items, I want to speak or see a person, get their name, employee I.D. etc. As for your Apple incident, I would contact Apple Headquarters in Cupertino/San Jose, CA....they don't like it when their employees mistreat their customers....I'll bet they make it right.

Let us hear from you.

Blessings.....

I've used Apple customer service many times and have always had a great experience. The worst customer service I ever had was for one of my credit cards, First Financial Bank. I had to call them because they raised the interest rate on the card. I talked to someone in India (I asked) and he couldn't explain it. So I ask for his supervisor. He puts me on hold for 15 minutes. Finally get the supervisor. He can't explain it. I ask for his supervisor. He says he can't do that. I tell him to give me a number for his supervisor and I'll call when he's there. All of a sudden he'll get me someone. Puts me on hold for 20 minutes. Finally gets me transferred to someone in America. She is wonderful, explains and fixes the problem, and has me off the phone in 5 minutes. I dread calling them and avoid it like the plague. Now I mostly deal in email with them.

Comcast. They once cashed my check then posted it to some other account, then the rep told me she didn't believe me and that I would just have to pay the bill again. I took it to a supervisor but the company would not back down on this. In the end, since I paid electronically good old Wamu (I miss them...) took the loss and repaid the bill.

Do you mean itunes gift cards? If you do, they sell them at the grocery stores, cvs, convenient stores... i am in PA though so it may be different near you.

Verizon. After moving out of their coverage area they tried to charge us a ton to get out of our contract, and took money from our account they were not authorized to take. We did get most of it back. They no longer have a military clause for when we get moved or deployed, so they now charge us a ton for situations we have no control over. I will never use them again. I have had nothing but good things to say about AT&T thus far.

I think customer service as a whole has gone way down hill. When I worked in customer service (and retail) I busted my butt and bent over backwards to make sure people were happy. I don't see much of that these days, and I'm not sure why. Unsatisfied employees I guess.

I feel sort of guilty even saying this, but I ordered itunes gift cards for all my nieces and nephews, sending them to two different states, without a hitch. I guess I got lucky.

Worst customer service has to be Atmos Energy. They cut off our gas one year because we hadn't paid a bill. Turns out we hadn't, but they hadn't sent us a bill in months. When we finally figured that out on the phone with the customer service rep, she had the nerve to tell us, "Well, I would think as responsible customers, you would have noticed you hadn't received a bill from us." Sure, with all the other bills we pay, that one is right at the top of our list, lady. Anyway, that was when I lost it, and literally yelled at her. Asked her why they bother sending bills if everyone is supposed to just pay because they remember it, and should we just send in random amounts of money, or was there actually some purpose for Atmos to send bills, as in telling customers how much they owe? She condescendingly said she was only trying to help, and I asked her if I called the public utilities commission and quoted her comment about responsible customers not needing a bill to pay their utilities and then turning off their service, would the PUC think she was helpful or just rude? My baby was crying and unable to sleep because it was cold in the house, and instead of telling us how to fix it, she was lecturing me? Because they hadn't bothered to send us a bill? Funny how mentioning the PUC changed her attitude. They sent someone out that night to turn the gas back on.

I bought the Target black Friday special where you could get $25 iTunes cards for $20. You could get 2 per person, so I got 2, and each of my 2 daughters got 2. When we put the codes in the iPods, it said the codes were invalid. Now I have to get together all the receipts and take them back. I talked to a woman who worked at Target who said that a lot of people had that problem with the Black Friday special. I don't know if it's Target's fault or iTunes fault, but I would definitely say that buying iTunes cards at a store is not the answer! And if we didn't have our receipts, we'd be screwed. :-{

SafeLite - had to come back MANY times to get DH's van's window fixed and they did it wrong so when we had something repaired in the dash a year or two later, the window cracked. I hated them. I would wait and wait and not even be on their schedule.

Comcast - they're all monopolies, or almost so, but I was so angry with Comcast. Their own email server using their own web interface would regularly not work and I used that address for my freelance contact. They could never tell me what was going on, channels would drop, and heaven help you in storm. We lost power for 3 days and 1.5 days in, lost everything, down to the landline. HATED them.

@ Jen C - Verison does still have a military clause. My husband is currently deployed and they have suspended his line until further notice (and he keeps the number) and they even credited our account because we called them on it in the middle of a billing period. We have been with them for 9 years now and they have always dealt with the BS the military throws at us in a helpful and professionak manner.

I hate comcast!!! They are worthless on all fronts and overcharge to boot. Yuck!!!

Comcast by far.

About a year ago I noticed I hadn't received a bill from Comcast (they are cable/internet/phone providers) and called the customer service department to figure out what was going on. I talked with a customer service rep and he said my bill was paid in full for the upcoming month (we'd done some changes on our account so it was possible) and I asked him several times to make sure he was reading it correctly. He assured me I was all set for the month and not to worry about it.

Well - you guessed it - the next month they "auto debited" my account but instead of the normal $130 it was for $300 - apparently the customer service rep was WRONG (or just being a douche) and they charged me a bunch of late fee's on top of it.

Grr...I hate them so much but htey are really teh only provider out here and we're stuck.

Apple, Really...I've never heard or had anything but a great experience with them. Just recently I had a bad experience with Verizon and that has by far been my worst CS experience. I try to stay pleasant, because you never know what kind of day they may be having as well. But, I agree with your other response that CS as a whole has gone way downhill! Sorry you had a bad experience!

I have a Mac and have had nothing but stellar customer service. And when you go into their Apple stores, it's even better. amazing.