Not willing to retain long time customers!

I spoke to the Retention Dept. We have TV and internet. They are more worried about forcing Direct TV on us than actually trying to reach a rate we can afford with just Uverse services. It seems this is what is taking place since they merged with them. They are no longer interested in their old job to retain you as a customer and work out a reasonable rate, but rather trying to upsell satellite to you. If you decline the deal with Direct TV, won't accept the much higher rate promo with their own brand, and walk then so be it. 

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@nikki9922 wrote:

So after years of service with your company you are willing to let us walk because you are not willing to work with us on a price we can afford after our promotion expires. This is unacceptable! Trying to upsell and strong arm us into changing our service to Direct to get a good deal when we are not interested in doing so and since we want to stay with just AT&T UVerse you are attempting to offer us an unattractive deal. I am so dissapointed in this as we are customers who have been with your company for years and pay ON TIME EVERY month! What a complete shame that your company has become this! I guess we will go to the other provider who is offering us a much better rate! 

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In response to the highlighted portion above, let's take a step back and recall what "this" the company "has become": it is charging you regular price for the services you requested. Nothing more, nothing less. Any lower pricing you received in the past was a discount off of the regular prices. 

That said, it seems like AT&T is trying to offer you additional promotions. It has many discounts available on upgraded packages, for example, getting u300 for u200 pricing for a period of time. If you prefer this promotion to what you have now (more service for the same price), then great. If not, then you have lost nothing. 

Similiarly, AT&T is definitely preferring customers to switch to DirectTV, which appears to be more profitable. Customers who switch receive new customer promotions. Note, these are usually 1 year promotions which require a 2 year contract. If you want a discount off of regular prices, then that's a great switch to make (at least in the short term). 

If you don't like any of those offers, I understand. However, I'm not sure what more you want AT&T to do. 

I've played the promotions game for several years.  I'm now subscribing to the fastest internet available in my area and U450 tv service.  Each year I've upgraded my tv service and/or internet service and kept my subscription fees rather constant.  Being retired on a fixed income the amount of my subscription is at the limit of my budget.  For this year my promotional discounts total just over $76.  Those will be going away and I don't want to degrade my service to the extent that I would need to get a fee within my budget.  Certain channels like the Pac-12 channels aren't available with Directv, so that isn't appealing.  I definitely will talk to retentions in a couple of months when the promotions end, but regretfully I will most likely be leaving AT&T Uverse.  AT&T has clearly decided that it isn't in their best interests to give constant discounts to those willing to sign up for a year.  I have no problems with AT&T doing that, but I have to stay within my budget.  If I was still working I would make the best deal I could and stay with Uverse.

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@my thoughts wrote:

An employee (RETENTIONS) can only perform the job within the guidelines established by higher ups. The offers are what they are.

 

 

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Again in AT&T's defense they are doing what almost every other internet and televison service provider is doing...increasing the average cost of services and offering less value as time goes by.....I'm surprised how many people still foot the bill for "pay TV" (aka cable TV) because the quality of the content has declined preciptiously during the past decade, and the amount of each programs run time dedicated to commercials is almost 50% in many cases.

I won't pay for "pay TV" because most of what is offered on those 200 channels is junk, and what good there is isn't worth the high prices charged.  I don't care if it is with Charter, Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, TimeWarner, ect.....not paying for a wasteland of programming.

I remember back in 2011 when my contract was up with DirecTV and called to cancel, the retentions thug was relentless in his asking me what it would take to stay with them....I told him a figure, which was the promo rate for new customers, and then he tells me "the market rate" is much higher than that.....I replied "well the market on the phone with you says it is certainly NOT...please cancel my service NOW!....

AT&T's full price for U-Verse TV and Internet is sort of like the full price of college tuition or the sticker price for a new car. No one is expected to actually pay it, or at least no one was expected to pay it prior to the DirectTV acquisition. The Original Poster is exactly right in that AT&T is not interested in preserving U-Verse TV relationships. 

Your best bet is to send a PM to the AT&T reps on this message board. Unlike the retentions department, the Social Media folks are both empowered and interested in preserving the relationship, at least for this year, or so was the case when I tried this a month or so ago. 

Unless AT&T reverses course, UVerse TV will be a footnote in cable history 5 years from now since it is dramatically more expensive than any comparable DirectTV package. Honestly, this reminds me of VHS vs. Beta VCR formats. Beta was superior in most ways, but VHS won anyway. So it will probably be with DirectTV. 

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@marcindublin wrote:

 

Unless AT&T reverses course, UVerse TV will be a footnote in cable history 5 years from now since it is dramatically more expensive than any comparable DirectTV package. Honestly, this reminds me of VHS vs. Beta VCR formats. Beta was superior in most ways, but VHS won anyway. So it will probably be with DirectTV. 

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It won't be entirely a footnote because many potential and current U Verse TV customers cannot have the proper LoS to actually receive the DirecTV satellite signal, so they are still offering

IPTV (U Verse) to those customers without resistance. 

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@marcindublin wrote:

AT&T's full price for U-Verse TV and Internet is sort of like the full price of college tuition or the sticker price for a new car. No one is expected to actually pay it, or at least no one was expected to pay it prior to the DirectTV acquisition. The Original Poster is exactly right in that AT&T is not interested in preserving U-Verse TV relationships. 

 

Your best bet is to send a PM to the AT&T reps on this message board. Unlike the retentions department, the Social Media folks are both empowered and interested in preserving the relationship, at least for this year, or so was the case when I tried this a month or so ago. 

 

Unless AT&T reverses course, UVerse TV will be a footnote in cable history 5 years from now since it is dramatically more expensive than any comparable DirectTV package. Honestly, this reminds me of VHS vs. Beta VCR formats. Beta was superior in most ways, but VHS won anyway. So it will probably be with DirectTV. 

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Guess what?  ATT Customer Care took off where Retentions left off before their DirecTV blitz.  Just offer upgrades then discount that, but not as low as current services.  No discounts on current services.  Most users say no thanks.

Will have to add ATT figured out all these discounts were costing too much money and stopped it to most extents.

I think ATT is gonna roll Uverse into DirecTV Now, John Stankey as actually said as much in this report:

http://www.multichannel.com/news/content/stankey-directv-now-won-t-be-skinny/403010

😉

Chris
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Please NO SD stretch-o-vision or 480 SD HD Channels
Need Help? PM ATT Uverse Care (all service problems)
ATT Customer Care(billing and all other problems)
Your Results May Vary, In My Humble Opinion
I Call It Like I See It, Simply a U-verse user, nothing more

A few months ago I called because my $10/month discount for one year on U-verse internet was about up.  The retention department rep told me he could only give me $5/month off as they were no longer authorized to go above and beyond to add additional discounts like they had in the past, including supervisors being forbidden from doing so.  They had set discounts and that was it, if anything.  He advised me to call back in a few months to see if a larger discount could be given, and it's about time for me to check it out but I'm not holding my breath on that one.  It's a decision by management to be stricter with discounts, and that may send me to Buckeye Cablesystem where I've seen advertisements for a speed of 50 for $50 in my area, NW Ohio (my speed with AT&T is 18 for about the same price).  I don't like changing services, and AT&T has had quality internet service, but the time to make the switch may be coming soon, especially if I get hit with a $10 fee for going over my data allowance for having internet only.

AT&T, please value your customers by providing better rates and by scrapping the data limit plans for internet only customers.  If a customer has U-verse tv you aren't capping their data on internet service, so your practice is discriminatory against internet only subscribers.  Do you really want to lose OhioJB as a customer after years of my loyal patronage?  Well, do you?

And btw, I will never use Direct TV, so I also suggest you pay attention to your U-verse customers so you don't lose us. 

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@marcindublin wrote:

AT&T's full price for U-Verse TV and Internet is sort of like the full price of college tuition or the sticker price for a new car. No one is expected to actually pay it, or at least no one was expected to pay it prior to the DirectTV acquisition.

That's not correct. The vast majority of Uverse customers pay regular prices for their service and that is certainly what AT&T expects. Discounted rates have always been the exception, rather than the rule.