DeuceTech

I had expected to get an iPhone yesterday, just like so many other people, but it just wasn’t in the stars. One of my roles at the university where I work is that of “primary data-enabled wireless handheld device tech” AKA “BlackBerry Guru” or “the guy that knows how to set up email on any device even if you just went out and bought it without checking with us first to make sure we can support it.” We have a large number of wireless users, several hundred, mostly consisting of university management, department heads, other (sometimes self-declared) VIPs, and most of the technical staff who need to be reachable 24/7. Since I am kind of the “go-to guy” for these things, I always carry a couple of different types of these devices and I change them often so that I know how to support all of the VIPs who just want and need them to work. Even our wireless account person has trouble keeping up with all of my device and phone number changes.

Her’s is often an overworked and thankless position and personally, I think she should get paid a lot more for what she does. Whenever there is a new model of BlackBerry, wireless Internet card, or something completely new like the iPhone, she is invariably inundated with new orders and requests for service changes or upgrades which all just get piled on top of the existing multi-carrier, multi-department billing nightmare she has to plow through daily. She relayed to me early in the week that she expected to be standing in line either at an Apple store or an AT&T storefront to acquire several iPhones when they became available on Friday. Fortunately for her, prior to her going and wasting a day in line, she learned that the iPhone is not available to business & government account customers, so she avoided what was sure to be an unpleasant experience, at best.

Many others were not so fortunate. It seems that many, many others went and either waited in line for hours or walked in during the post-rush/pre-sellout window enabling them to leave the Apple store or AT&T store with a couple of iPhones in hand, or more correctly, in the cute little iPhone bag. Most got them home or took them to work right away, tore into the packaging, and began the activation process via iTunes on their Macintosh or Windows PC. At some point in this process, all became painfully aware that they could not activate their new toys on their business accounts. Some opted to either convert their existing business line of service to a personal line or opted to open a second, completely new personal line just to be able to begin the activation waiting game that many iPhone buyers are still going through even the day after . Still, some frustated business purchasers decided to just return the shiny $600 brick to the store and get their money back rather than be held over the coals by AT&T. Well, it seems that they will happily accept all returns for a nominal 10% restocking fee, so imposed because the outer packaging is no longer intact. Some took the hit right away and accepted the partial refund, but others decided to wait until Monday morning so they can contact their account representatives and scream about their disatisfaction over the whole ordeal. There is even talk by some about a class-action suit to fight the $50 or $60 “penalty” for being a business customer who did not know that they were not invited to the iPhone party.

I don’t know what the reason is behind this alienation of their business customers, perhaps it is a logistics issue that they will resolve a some later point, but who knows? Some of the businesses they have pushed away now only spend a few hundred dollars per month, but others, like my organization, spend anywhere from a few thousand to tens of thousands of dollars each month on these devices and services. I don’t have an MBA, but it doesn’t seem clear to me where the logic is in disappointing this class of customer, especially when there are already numerous problems being reported as a result of the Cingular-AT&T metamorphosis. There are already many complaints about Apple’s decision to go with Cingular/AT&T for their iPhone service which still does not seem wise due to the inherently slower speeds of their EDGE data network and relatively poor voice-call sound quality in existing devices such as the BlackBerry line on their network. Time will tell how all of this plays out, but I am glad that I’m not an AT&T employee manning the phones on Monday morning.