I cancelled my new Sprint PCS service tonight. I'd had it for less than two weeks, and over the course of the evening decided I don't want to be their customer. Here's the timeline.

January 9 - We order new phones from Sprint January 11 - We receive the phones. I test it out, and the microSD card doesn't work right. January 12 - I take it to a Sprint store. They send me to a place near the beach that repairs Motorola phones. The Motorola place tells me it needs to be sent back. We try to take it to the Sprint company store on Kings Highway. They tell us since we ordered it on the web we can't return it via them. January 13 - I call to order a replacement phone. January 17 - 20 Every day, I think that will be the day I get the phone January 22 - I get tired of waiting so I call for a status on the replacment

8:45 PM - I start the call by dialing *2 from the phone in question 9:00 PM - I talk to my first person. They ask for my cell number and password. They tell me something I never quite got about how the order for a replacement was cancelled until I pay. Since the initial order was covered with a credit card, I never understand this. This person transfers me to another person. They ask for my cell number and password. I go through about the same thing again. This person transfers me to another person. They ask for my cell number and password. I still don't know where my phone is, what the status is, or what it is I'm supposed to owe. 9:17 PM - My cell phone drops the call. Around this time, we decide this is way too much trouble to try to be some company's customer when they don't seem to want my business 9:20 PM - I call back from the landline, straight to the Sprint Online Return line 9:35 PM - I talk to my first person of the second call. They ask for my cell number and password. I explain that the phone was defective out of the box and I want to invoke my 30 day guarantee. This person promises to send me a return label via email and transfers me to account services. 9:45 PM - I am connected to a guy with a Texas drawl. He asks for my cell number and password. He is the only person in both calls whose accent is easily understandable to me. I don't want to sound ethnocentric, but at this point I'm relieved that I'm at least talking to someone on the same continent as myself. He asks why I want to cancel, and I give him about the same story I've typed up here. He asks what they can do to keep us with Sprint. I say that at 8:45 PM they had a shot but in the subsequent hour they've set about systematically making sure I don't want the phone or their service anymore. This guy also promises to send us a return kit.

I had high hopes for both the Motorola RAZR and for Sprint. Now I have zero desire to have anything to do with the company. We'll stick with Cingular a little while longer and possibly upgrade to new phone models later. Nice job Sprint, in under two weeks you turned me from an excited new customer to a sworn enemy of your company. The cell phone industry is an amazing place, populated by choices that are the least sucky. No one is ever delighted, we are all just trying to minimize our frustration and dissatisfaction. I am now staying with a provider that for calls made from our house over 20 minutes in duration drops 75% of them. Talk about damning with faint praise.