Sprint customer service at the bottom of list at latest Consumer Reports

The January 2009 issue of Consumer Reports had the results of customer service satisfaction from the 5 major cell phone services providers.  Verizon was the top choice followed by Alltel, T-Mobile, AT&T and Sprint -- at the very bottom.  Out of the seven categories surveyed, Sprint was the worst in these categories:

Issue resolved
Staff courtesy
Staff knowledge
Calling ease

It was also below average on its web site and just plain average on email promptness and quality.

In rating cell phones per company, the Samsung Instinct came at the bottom for Sprint, but that was not enough reason for Consumer Reports not to recommend it.

You see, I truly didn't get it either.  My partner and I never had any problems with Sprint's customer service.  In fact, our experience has truly been the opposite: the best.

Didn't Sprint just get #1 by J.D. Power a month or so ago? I think Consumer Reports hasn't been doing their homework. The Instinct has some serious issues, and Sprint has screwed up a bit as far as that goes. But lately, their customer service at all levels has been from good to fantastic. Between followup calls, and limited hassels at the stores, I have been very impressed at Sprints turnouround in CS.

I had a client of mine I had to call AT&T for, I was on hold for 56 minutes before I got some Indian who could barely speak intelligble English. Verizon ping pongs you between 15 different depts on every call and can't even answer basic questions half the time. Sprint is not perfect, but CS wise is much better than Verizon or especially AT&T.

A tad OT, but regarding that issue of CR, well, the silver lining is that they selected the Instinct as one of the phones to get through Sprint.