3 is the cheapest, but is it best

kronas

gromituk wrote: »

Oh, and in case you mention accents: I agree that it can be difficult to understand some of the agents' accents - I have trouble myself. But that is a problem of you understanding them, not them understanding you.

i spent over three hours on the phone to them via the indian call centre, never once did i swear or be racist although i did tell them their comprehension of words is by far the most poor i have ever experianced!

signal, service, customer service all poor, join them at your peril!

Danger_Fourpence

I find it bizarre that I could get a full signal down in the deepest south west while I was away for a few days last month and frankly naff all 25 miles north of London. Indeed at home all I get is 'Emergency Calls Only' currently. Very poor. . .thankfully I'm PAYG so I'm not stuck.

chris2020_2

gromituk wrote: »

Of course I read the sentence - and perhaps you protest too much? Your comical hyperboles do you no favours! As the obvious question has flown over your head, I'll spell it out:

What relevance does the fact that the the call centre is Indian have to the problem that has occurred?

What relevance?,the relevance is that the staff in the Indian call centre have extremley strong accents,this coupled with the fact that with 3's terrible crackly line means you have a lot of trouble just understanding whats been said,I'v had the misfortune to have spent a lot of time talking to this call centre,the staff as has been reported on this forum and others lots of times,can be incredibly rude,trying to disconnect from 3 is a nightmare.My last conversation ended after 45minutes with the Indian lady shouting and argueing with me after I had to insist on my PAC number.She then sent me a text giving me a url link to disconnect which google says is broken.As its a wet bank Monday holiday here I thought I'd try again today,guess what the 3 network system is down for maintenance...!

scootw1

kronas wrote: »

NEVER EVER in no uncertain or certain terms join 3 mobile EVER EVER EVER, YOU WILL regret it!

I've been with 3 mobile through 4 contracts and not had problems

gromituk

chris2020 wrote: »

What relevance?,the relevance is that the staff in the Indian call centre have extremley strong accents

Read carefully - I have already mentioned this, and have agreed that it can be a problem but it it is irrelevant for the case I was objecting to.

3's terrible crackly line

Eh? Just because the call centre is in India makes no difference whatsoever to how "crackly" the line is. I've never experienced "crackly lines" talking to Three. My worst experiences with call centre audio quality have been talking to Dell - in the UK.

In case you are finding this hard to grasp: I am not excusing Three's behaviour towards you, but you'll find that call centres are all operating at the lowest common denominator (you want your mobile phone for cheap, after all) and whatever company you're with, if you fall out with them it will be a pain. The grass always seems to be greener, because people haven't experienced the other companies and don't think through the possibility that they might all be as bad as each other.

gromituk

scootw1 wrote: »

I've been with 3 mobile through 4 contracts and not had problems

Yes - people don't seem to be able to grasp that their sample of one is statistically insignificant and can not be extrapolated to everyone.

I've had mixed results with Three. I recently wasted time with them over a PayG issue - had they known that there is an expiry date shown for the credit even before you make a chargeable call, but that date just keeps rolling forward until you make that call, then it would have saved me a lot of hassle. But in the past things have been fine. With a contract renewal coming up soon, things may or may not be. I shall wait and see.

Lordpickledonion

I've been with Three a couple of years and am very pleased. I leave in the East Sussex countryside & whilst reception is (understandably) poor, my phone simply switches to Orange which is very good............this includes their internet service. They way I look at it is that I pay less for Three & default to Orange at home & for less than I'd pay Orange directly!!!!

ellsnan

3 are dreadful, my daughter and partner both took out contracts but then found they could only get signals in random places. She could not contact her partner when her prem little boy stopped breathing and was frantic!!! She rang up last night to cancel contracts as 18 months is almost up and was onto Customer Services for 1hr 3minutes!!! there seem to be no records of previous calls of complaints and were trying to get her to upgrade handset, free gifts of Wii's etc, she eventually lost her patience and insisted the contract be cancelled after arguing profusley with operator who kept repeating themselves continually, they then asked her how she rated their customer services!!!!................. Diabolical, I told her to contact trading standards and watchdog

chrissyxx

Ive been with 3 pretty much since the start, and up to now have always been very happy with them. (Probably because I've not had to use Customer Services much until now!) They've always given me a decent retention deal and phone, and it's always been very smooth to upgrade. This year it's been a nightmare. First they didn't contact me at all when my contract ended at all, let alone offer me anything. I rang them to see what options I had, they said to go into a shop. Shop told me to ring Customer services! (should have heard first bells ringing!) Rang them again, and had a complicated conversation with a very polite man, but both of us were continually asking the other to repeat things. He said there were no loyalty discounts any more, but as I was such a valued customer he'd get me some sort of deal. Came back with an 'exclusive' offer of 1100 Mix and Match for £20-25, a saving of 25% as my loyalty discount. (Was on £14 pm loyalty discount on last contract) Great, I thought. Next day, I happened to look on their website, and there was the same deal for everyone. Not only that, the upgrade phone arrived and was a very cheap handset. Phoned them again and said I wasn't happy. After loads of wrangling, they offered me a rather insulting £2 off for 4 months! Returned handset and cancelled upgrade. Tried again (I know, silly me) several times but no decent offers. Went back to 3 store yesterday, chose a nice Nokia, but was told I had to go through customer services again. Spent 40 mins yesterday on phone to them, and ended up almost in tears. He insisted I should have a Sony, I wanted a Nokia. I wanted more texts, he agreed I used far more than my allowance but advised me to stay on same tariff (all the other operatives had said change!) He then offered me a Samsung Soul, but said it would cost me £80! I said no way, he then offered me it for £5. At this point, I'm spitting feathers and told him that it is a free phone on 3!!! He said he'd send it anyway, and I could send it back. Guess what, he did, and I am, lol....

lisabristol

Until I had to deal with Customer Service, I had no problems with the 3 network.

They have been bombarding me with calls and messages, after I e-mailed them to ask what date my contract ended, and have recently taken it upon themselves to go through my personal call numbers I have dialled in the last week and contact my friends at home for an alternative number for me! Not impressed with this invasion of privacy at all.

I complained, but they stated that the number which called my friends did not belong to them, but I checked the website and called the number back, and surprise, surprise, it was 3 Customer Services. And, my friend who answered the phone told me it was 3 Customer Services who called (about 5 mins after I had a missed call on my mobile).

I wanted them to cancel my contract 2 months early, with no additional charge, but they wouldn't do it.

It is definitely worth paying an extra couple of pounds per month for a decent company...