Can't Access Bill Online, Again....

[thefrustratedone]

This is a long story.

I switched to Naked DSL about a month ago (of course, never having made one call from the landline I was forced to pay for, and all of the rate increases so that I'm paying exactly what I was 2 years ago, doesn't make that feel like much of a bargain, more like being stolen from).

But, I digress.

When I was switched to Naked DSL, my old account number was killed (quick thinking tying account #'s to phone numbers, by the way).  After some pain and frustration trying to get things to tie together I finally realized that I had to create a new account using the 13 digits in front of the words "account number:" on my bill, not the 14 that are actually there.  But I got that done, tied the bills to my account and managed to pay you last month.

So, today I go to login and pay my bill and the account has no billing information.  I checked to see if I'd paid it under another account using one of the available tools (typed in the 10 digit account number) and I had the correct one, probably.  I played around some more with the tools and found something which said "We found more than one user ID for the information you entered." Please contact us.  But, rather than pointing me to exactly where I need to go, I get sent to online help. 

So, I went there, tried to chat.  The person (which I suspect isn't)  wanted to reset the password on my email account, which I presume was done, because I'm getting a password error while trying to send email, this however is an improvement over earlier in the day when it was just dying (it worked fine yesterday and I haven't changed a thing on my PC).

Anyways, when I reexplained my problem, typing very slowly "access bill online" I get back "you must login first".  Things didn't go uphill from there. 

So, I called.  After entering my information, and having a pleasant conversation with an automated machine, I wind up somewhere, maybe the right place, but I doubt, where I'm told there are high volumes of phone calls, please wait (the cheapest music we could buy, incoming).  No estimate of the hold time, nothing.  And I'm probalby in the wrong place so I'll get routed elsewhere, where I'll have to repeat the information I gave to the machine, and had to regive to the person who routed me to possibly the right person.

The last part is conjecture on my part as I hung up.  I'm sure I'll have to call again and repeat all of that, however.

And, no, I still can't access my bill online, don't know who to call (Comcast sounds like a good bet though) and still can't send email (but that's a different problem).

[thefrustratedone]

13 Minutes and counting waiting on hold.

[thefrustratedone]

54 minutes, but, I'm talking to someone.

She's awesome!  She asked me the same question over and over.

I have created a new account.  Linked it.  Nothing shows up.  I try to access it and she tells me to link it.  That gives me an error message that the account is already linked.  She then tells me to click on billing.  It tells me no accounts are linked to this account (terminology mght be tweaked there).

I'm positive this an account linkage problem in the database.  Who knows how many account I have now?  And I'm sure one is stomping on me. 

Oh, 1 hour, 13 minutes and counting.

[thefrustratedone]

1 hour and 15 minutes, call dropped.

[thefrustratedone]

And, guys, THIS IS TO PAY YOU!!!!!!!!

[thefrustratedone]

Finally spoke to someone who could help.  She gave me a reduced rate. However, the best she could do was give the phone numbers of the people I already spoke to. 

And still no outgoing email.  I'm fairly certain part of that is caused by a password reset during this whole mess.  12:00 and counting on the call to fix my password.  The password reset asked me to answer question 1, which is great, except for one small detail, the question is blank.

Still not online billing access.

[thefrustratedone]

I see no response from AT&T.  Surely you guys can give me a phone number to call where I can wait on hold for 15 minutes, again.  Or, point me to an automated system that hangs up on me when it's done?

Here's some images, maybe this will help with the process.

When I first login

After I enter all of the information I get this.

Finally, my account tells me this.

I believe all of that is telling me that some other account is authorized to use the account I entered. 

When I check the account number, to see which ID, it's tied to, using your systems, I get the following:

Forgive my frustration but this is ATT's answer to everything, call someone, sit on hold, wait for 15 minutes, then try to explain this.  Of course, the wonderful thing about this answer is that when you click on that link, it doesn't take you to a specific phone number.  You get sent to a bunch of options (most of which are the "please don't call us options") so you dial the wrong phone number, after waiting 15 minutes, and get sent to the back of the line, for another 15 minutes, at the next number.

The only people in the world who could get away with this, is the government, and a monopoly.

[ATTJulieCS]

Hi thefrustratedone, I'm sorry you're having trouble accessing your online account. Can you please send me a Private Message with your account number, full name and the best phone number to reach you at? I will engage a manager to assist. 

Thank you,

ATTJulieCS

AT&T Community Specialist

[thefrustratedone]

Julie,

I've actually cleared it up, finally.  It still took 3 calls, the first to do it, the second to verify it, and the third to verify that I had, in fact, gone to nakedDSL, but you guys made them this time so I felt better about that.

Go ahead and close this.