Author Topic: Epic Badassity Fail  (Read 5470 times)

SimpleCycle

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Epic Badassity Fail
« on: February 20, 2017, 01:10:42 PM »
First I'll start with a confession: I have an iPhone on Verizon Wireless.  So yes, the most expensive smartphone on the most expensive carrier.

We've been looking at switching for a while, but my wife told me I'd have to pry the iPhone out of her cold, dead hands.  So I looked into who I could bring an unlocked Verizon iPhone to that would cost less.  I found that Boost Mobile had a reasonably good deal, and convinced her to switch.

Minor problem - Boost Mobile requires you to go to a physical store to port an iPhone, or at least claims as much on their website.  We live in Chicago, and most of the stores near us were in fairly rough areas.  But I convince my wife that we should go as a family to the one near where I volunteer on Friday evening, and then take the kiddo out for dinner afterwards at a (very inexpensive) soul food restaurant.  So all three of us head over to Boost Mobile on the west side.

We arrive, and the sales associate begins the process of porting our phones and numbers over.  My phone and number both transfer no problem, but there is a problem transferring my wife's phone to Boost.  They ask us a million times if we're SURE it's paid off, are we SURE it's unlocked, etc.  We assure them everything is on the up and up, and it should transfer.  By now we've been in the store for about 15 minutes and probably 12 "customers" have come and gone, and all but one handed cash over the counter and got a black plastic bag in return.  So yeah, I'm in a sketchy part of town with my wife and toddler (and as a side note, I am also 8 months pregnant), my phone is already transferred to Boost Mobile, and it's extremely clear that we are standing in the middle of ongoing drug dealing.  I begin to panic because I have no exit plan.  A second associate helpfully tells us he "knows a guy" who would trade us a phone that will work on Boost for my wife's iPhone.  I'm like "uh, I think maybe we won't do this right now" and have him cancel everything.  In the hurry to flee, it escapes my attention that Verizon has sent me a text telling me my phone number has been successfully ported off their network.  Which means my phone number now lives at Boost, but I have no account with Boost since I never set it up.

At dinner I realize what has happened and that my phone number is now in total limbo.  I try calling Boost to get the account number to port back, and they won't give it to me because I have a "balance due on my account".  I'm like "I don't even have an account!"  This goes on for...a while.  I am stuck in an infinite loop where Boost insists I must pay for service to be eligible to port my number out.  There is no way I am going to pay them, and I end up talking to 8 or 9 different people in an attempt to get to a manager who had decision making abilities.  Finally they agree that I do have to pay, but they will refund my money as soon as I cancel service as long as I haven't actually used the service.  I agree, pay the $35, and get the info I need to port back to Verizon.

But here's the punchline: I call Verizon to port back and they're like "we're so excited you're coming back to us, you are eligible for a $200 credit for switching back!"  So we'll get a couple months of service free, at which point I will switch my phone to something less expensive.  I've lost all credibility with the wife, so I suspect she'll be keeping her ridiculous face punch worthy phone plan.

TLDR: I tried to switch my phone plan, ended up in the middle of a series of drug deals, Boost Mobile stole my phone number and held it for ransom, and in the end Verizon gave me $200.

Face punches gladly accepted for multiple aspects of this story.

Syonyk

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #1 on: February 20, 2017, 03:25:37 PM »
Well, you got a good story out of it!

I'm riding out an AT&T iPhone contract for another year because even though they bumped my rates, there's nothing else they offer I can switch to that's an improvement over the old iPhone Unlimited plan.  I could pay the same for radically less data?  Yeah, no.  I'll keep streaming Pandora, then switch to Fi in another year.

Optimiser

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #2 on: February 20, 2017, 03:45:28 PM »
Sounds like a terrible experience, but not something you deserve a face punch for. At least you got $200 for your trouble.

SimpleCycle

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #3 on: February 20, 2017, 04:16:06 PM »
Sounds like a terrible experience, but not something you deserve a face punch for. At least you got $200 for your trouble.

Well no specific mustachian face punch (although in the end I'm still paying Verizon prices), but maybe a general life face punch for thinking ANYTHING about this was a good idea. :)

Dicey

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #4 on: February 20, 2017, 06:01:45 PM »
Wow!

SwordGuy

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #5 on: February 20, 2017, 06:59:48 PM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.   

Dicey

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #6 on: February 21, 2017, 02:14:43 AM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.
That was my first thought.

My second one is that they probably have all of her contact and account information...

This is a tough one.

lchu

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #7 on: February 21, 2017, 06:16:13 AM »
Oh no! I am happy that you were able to get out of there safely and that you didn't end up losing your phone number!  What a story, though!

I'm laughing a little bit, though, because your story sounds very similar to my conversations with my wife about switching to Project Fi.  More than once, I was told that unless I could replace her beloved 5" iPhone that fit perfectly into her pockets for free, me and my ideas could take a hike.  I scoured the internet trying to figure out where we could take it, but ugh. Once you have that Verizon iPhone, you are pretty well trapped at Verizon. Most of the other options were not available or had notably bad coverage in our area, or appeared to have some significant customer service issues.

Eventually, after 6 months of negotiating (I'd like to think it was seeing the comparison between her Verizon bill and my Project Fi bill and realizing that the difference between the two would have already paid for another phone, but really, it was a coworker telling her that she sounded like an old drive through speaker when she made phone calls), she caved and agreed that if we were going to replace her phone, she would get a Nexus and move over to Project Fi with me.

Anyway, thank you for sharing your story! We also sometimes do fail-worthy things on the road to cutting expenses. Not everything works for everybody every time.  Hopefully down the road, when it comes time to replace her phone, you can convince her to choose a phone on another carrier. And maybe do some advance location scouting too... ;-)



Livingthedream55

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #8 on: February 21, 2017, 08:41:24 AM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.
That was my first thought.

My second one is that they probably have all of her contact and account information...

This is a tough one.

Is there an anonymous Tip Line for Chicago police? Most major US cities have one.

ChpBstrd

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #9 on: February 21, 2017, 10:49:24 AM »
No facepunches are deserved for trying. My wife doesn't understand why I shop for insurance every 2 years and go through all the hassle. Yet it works every time. Savings are always about $300/yr.

DW also didn't see the point of dropping our $160/mo Verizon bill and going to Cricket at $70/mo. Seemed like a lot of trouble at the time, for only 90×12=$1080 per year in savings (now entering year 3). I'm even considering a dumbphone or wifi only plan if I can find something cheaper than $30/mo.

Car Jack

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #10 on: February 21, 2017, 11:34:12 AM »
Cricket stores are just as sketchy.

We switched from AT&T to Cricket (literally half the price for better plan, extra phone and more data) but do all of our business either online or at one of the local Gamestop stores which are in the high end malls, so no sketchyness needs to be accepted.  My 5 year old iPhone 4S worked no problem whatsoever.  4 phones for $100 with all fees/taxes included and 3 gigs per phone.  Same exact AT&T network.

Chris @ Saturday Financial

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #11 on: February 21, 2017, 11:47:28 AM »
If you want to stay on the Verizon network with an iPhone, check out Page Plus wireless. I'm with them right now and pay $30 per month for a plan with 1GB of data. I did all of the porting in my living room after buying a chip that they shipped to me. It's not the cheapest option out there, but it's a happy middle ground for me.

TomTX

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #12 on: February 24, 2017, 05:40:47 AM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.

Drug addiction is a public health issue. Offering treatment instead of taking the Crime and Punishment approach has better outcomes AND costs less money.

Syonyk

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #13 on: February 24, 2017, 07:30:29 PM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.

Drug addiction is a public health issue. Offering treatment instead of taking the Crime and Punishment approach has better outcomes AND costs less money.

Which has absolutely nothing to do with what looks for all the world like drugs being sold at a cheap cell phone shop.

TomTX

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #14 on: February 24, 2017, 08:06:19 PM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.

Drug addiction is a public health issue. Offering treatment instead of taking the Crime and Punishment approach has better outcomes AND costs less money.

Which has absolutely nothing to do with what looks for all the world like drugs being sold at a cheap cell phone shop.

Sure it does. It says the suggested White Knight "call the cops!" responses are unlikely to benefit anyone. Busting low level users and distributors does nothing other than add to the profits of prison owners.

a-scho

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #15 on: February 24, 2017, 08:59:57 PM »
Call the police and tell them about the drug dealing.

Drug addiction is a public health issue. Offering treatment instead of taking the Crime and Punishment approach has better outcomes AND costs less money.

Which has absolutely nothing to do with what looks for all the world like drugs being sold at a cheap cell phone shop.

Sure it does. It says the suggested White Knight "call the cops!" responses are unlikely to benefit anyone. Busting low level users and distributors does nothing other than add to the profits of prison owners.

word. it also lines the pockets of law enforcement and the judicial system. It costs tax payers way less to let people smoke what they want.

Dicey

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #16 on: February 25, 2017, 01:52:52 AM »
It costs tax payers way less to let people smoke what they want.
Citation, please?

TomTX

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #17 on: February 25, 2017, 08:43:42 AM »
It costs tax payers way less to let people smoke what they want.
Citation, please?

It's pretty well established, and has been for years. Here' s a random reference I googled up

https://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/ndny_costeff.pdf

Syonyk

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #18 on: February 25, 2017, 09:36:45 AM »
word. it also lines the pockets of law enforcement and the judicial system. It costs tax payers way less to let people smoke what they want.

Then fix the laws.  What does it cost a society when people start ignoring laws they don't like?

Optimiser

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #19 on: February 25, 2017, 09:49:23 AM »
word. it also lines the pockets of law enforcement and the judicial system. It costs tax payers way less to let people smoke what they want.

Then fix the laws.  What does it cost a society when people start ignoring laws they don't like?

Many laws do need to be fixed. However, people ignoring laws they don't like is nothing new. Take speed limits for example. Virtually no one drives exactly the posted speed, but I don't think this has caused society to stop following other laws that make sense.

TomTX

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Re: Epic Badassity Fail
« Reply #20 on: February 25, 2017, 05:19:26 PM »
word. it also lines the pockets of law enforcement and the judicial system. It costs tax payers way less to let people smoke what they want.

Then fix the laws.  What does it cost a society when people start ignoring laws they don't like?

I've had a one-on-one meeting with my legislator and asked for it.

This is exactly the same as alcohol prohibition. Enforcing the drug laws sets up exactly the same scenario as prohibition - same murders, same loss to society. Instead of Al Capone you have drug cartels.

How did it get fixed with Prohibition? A big part was Jury Nullification. Basically, citizens refusing to enforce unjust laws. Refusing to enforce unjust laws is actually a key part of society. It's been upheld in the Supreme Court.