Cam I Am

I decided to try something different yesterday..  I thought I’d try the “customer retention/relations game”..  One of my friends seems to do this periododically and it usually works out for him..

I have had a cell phone with Rogers for about 8 years straight, but 15 years on and off.  In that time, I’ve paid my bills on time and have not even really complained about the service..

A few years ago, I switched my service to Fido, and gave my wife the Rogers cell phone plan, while retaining the number and the billing in my name.  She doesn’t use it much (something around 250-300 (mostly daytime) minutes a month), so we’ve tried to find a plan that works..  Back in January, I tried to find the most optimal plan that works with her usage, and was offered by Rogers a plan that should work.  

So we watched the next 3 months of bills come in. That plan worked out to be about $75 a month.  I looked over at my unlimited City Fido plan, with the bells and whistles that I have added on..  $85 a month for 1500-2000 minutes a month..

There is hardly a comparison there!

Now, I know that my “I Will Die With This Cell Phone Plan” with City Fido was an amazing offer that will probably not be repeated ever again, but $75 for 300 minutes with Rogers?   That just doesn’t seem like a good deal to me. 

I don’t usually complain about things to companies.  I usually put up with far more than I should..  So the phone call that I made to Rogers yesterday was certainly out of character for me.  I called to see what other plans that they had.  The (rude) woman on the phone said that was “the best that she could do”, so I said that I wanted to cancel.  She advised me of the contract termination fee of $240 to which I said, ‘That’s fine.  I’ll make it up with the plan that I can get at Telus.  She said that she would start to cancel the line.

This isn’t going quite according to my plan, at this point.   If I did switch to (evil) Telus, I wanted the same number that I have had all this time.  I advised the lady that I wanted to port it so my next call would be to Telus. 

This is when she said that she put me through to “Customer Relations”. 

Ahh!  This is what I was looking for! 

I get a very happy sounding employee who, in the end, was able to give me a better plan, including voicemail and call display, with 250 minutes, free weekends and evenings for…..$39…

Much better!  I can live with that! 

So, I signed for another 3 years, which wasn’t so bad since I was already one year into a three year contract anyways.  Maybe it wasn’t the best possible deal out there, but it is one that I could live with..

Now I have the taste for this little game.  Now who else can I try it on?!  I can’t with my cable/internet/home phone and I think I do pretty good with Fido already…

Maybe I should threaten the Gas or Hydro company! 

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