u/ElectronicAd7812

Anyone have any luck getting a call back from the President's Office? I received an email almost 2 weeks ago with a contact to reach out to. Her phone number and email gave availability M-F 8-5pm. I have left 3 emails with no response and probably 15 voicemails. I have called probably 50 times. I looked the woman up on linkedin and the profile is very very sparse, 4 connections only. Only experience is working at at&t for 24 years. Is this a real person? Is this another way to bypass?

The whole saga started last Wednesday. My elderly father went to the AT&T store to try to cancel my mother’s cell phone plan which was under her name. He had been trying for years to change his name to be the account holder as my mother was suffering from Alzheimer's. He was unsure of her passcode and she had no ability to remember at the time. At some point in 2024 he was able to stop her number, but not move the family plan into his name. Fast forward to last Wednesday. He forgot that he had canceled her phone number and the only numbers left on the account were mine and his. He brought the death certificate in to close the account. He had forgotten that her number was removed, and thought that my number was hers (he never memorized my phone number, only the letter equivalent so he did not recognize it). Wednesday afternoon I see that my signal turns to SOS. I figure there is a local outage, maybe because we are close to a world cup stadium, but I don't think too much of this and look online to turn on and off airplane mode, turn on and off the phone, nothing really works and I figure I'll take care of it in the morning. I called AT&T using my husband's phone. They said I need to go into the store to reactivate my phone. I wait until the afternoon. I get into the store and they tell me that my phone is, “dead.” My phone number of 20+ years is gone, and my phone essentially is “blacklisted” as “dead.” Because the phone was not paid off, it is MIA. 

Fast forward 3 hours in the store, I opened up my own account, I got a new temporary number, they said I can still use my cellphone, it's been taken off the blacklist and I can try to get my number back in 59 days. 

I had issues transferring the new account to my phone, so over an hour later on the phone service, they told me to go back to the store for a QR code. I thought this would be the end of my problems but it was only just the beginning.

I decided to call on Monday to try to speak to somebody that could help with my situation, find another solution to get my phone number back before the 59 day period. I was on hold for a very long time, I was given the option for the agent to call me back at a set time. They were to call me at 1:00 EST. I am sitting and waiting for the call and its 1:30, so I try to call them back. While I am on hold, I get disconnected. I tried chatting with the website chat service and they gave me a different number to call. This new number also gets a recorded message that my network service has been blocked. I try calling my husband, and again the message occurs. The chat service told me I need to go back to the store. 

I went back to the store that evening. They said if I get the number to my mother’s death certificate and her driver’s license that they can open her old account and I can get my number back and pay my phone off in full. I go back the next morning and wait for 45 minutes until the manager is available. I wait for him to try using the numbers and he sees that he can not make these adjustments because the account was made in california with fiber optics and they don't have that in new jersey. I immediately call the support number to try to rectify with an agent on the support line. I finally got transferred to a fiber optics team member, they worked on this for a while, then they say since this was a bundled account they need to send me to the mobilization team. From there I am repeating the same story, getting more and more agitated with the amount of time I have been working on the phone and repeating my situation over and over again. From there they send me to an escalation team where I promptly loose my S%*&. I apologize to the agent, but I tell the whole situation and 5 minutes later he asks me if my mom is next to me so I could get her information. I screamed that she had died a month ago. And he says, “How was I supposed to know?” I told him, “I literally just told you this 10 minutes ago,” and his reply was, “We were not on the phone for even 10 minutes.” I looked at my phone, I had been on the support line for over 3 and a half hours speaking to 4 different agents. He keeps me on the phone while he's googling and looking for answers and can't find any. He sent me to his manager who is just as rude. I request to speak to his manager, and obviously she's “busy” and can't get back to me for 48-72 hours. Great. Lovely.

I can’t let this go. I'm at the 4.5 hour mark. I call again and speak to a nice woman, but the more I ask her to try to find a solution, she gets more and more agitated, “We can’t do a credit check on a dead person” seems to be the halting point. I beg her one more time. I can’t access my banking and other information because of the 2 point verification that is getting sent to my old number. My kids are in school, how do I get called if there is an emergency? What if I am driving and lose service and connection on my gps? Who am I supposed to call? The 611 number doesn't even work. She finally asks a manager on her team, and he says my dad can go in, bring the death certificate and licences and take care of it in the store, in California.

Meanwhile, my phone shuts off again. I go in at the opening the next day. They try to work on the case again, open my phone back up again, and explain that this is going to keep happening till I pay off my phone. I am willing and ready to do it right away. They have to send a bill to the billing address in California. This will take 2 weeks. They said I can buy a new phone in the meantime and transfer my new number and account to the new phone.

Unfortunately, my father has not been able to get to the store, he has his own issues with ATT and his home internet services and is taking care of everything else from my mother’s death a month ago. Lucky me, my connection was severed again this afternoon. I am actually at my breaking point. The amount of time and agitation, the multiple stories and different accounts, the policy, everything is driving me out of my mind. I can't keep having my service canceled randomly, the customer service and retention centers have been less than useful. I just can't believe this is how they treat a loyalty customer of over 20 years with no payment issues whatsoever.