Negotiating with Rogers Wireless- Head to Head Battle!

In an earlier post this week, I wrote about a step by step guide on how to negotiate with the contract yielding wireless providers.  Today I’ll reveal the actual flow of the conversation I had when I called in for my sister.

Here’s the Scoop on my Conversation with Rogers recently:

My sister was paying about $31 a month including tax (from a previously negotiated contract by yours truly two years ago) for:

• 10 voicemail
• 200 day time minutes
• Rogers to Rogers
• Unlimited evening and weekends starting from 6pm

Being the young-un that she is, many of her friends text.  As you know, texting can add up!  She wanted text messaging included in herr next plan.  She was paying an extra $3-5 more a month just for text messages sent and received (texting on the very very low end hence restricting herself from unleashing the texting beast).  She had one more week left on her contract.

So I called in to the Retentions Department for her, spoke to Tristan (names have been changed) from the Retentions Department who said that if she added $5, then she can have 250 texts, AND she would have to recommit for another 2 years.  (In my head, I was thinking WTF- what kind of deal is that? Pay more??)  I firmly but nicely said that she didn’t want to pay any more, and that I am with Telus and I get all the above for LESS per month including 100 long distance minutes per month, web browsing, and 200 incoming and outgoing texts (which is true, by the way).

So then he told me to wait, and then came back after speaking to a supervisor, and said that they can offer her a cheaper package for $3 extra for 100 outgoing texts and unlimited incoming.

(inside voice: DUDE are deaf? Are you NOT listening to me??) But I kept my cool and I said she didn’t want to pay any more than what they are paying now, again. Nicely.

Then he spoke to his supervisor again (another 5 more minutes of waiting), and came back and said that they can offer a $5 credit for 2500 text messages and keep the price of the plan to $31 a month including taxes.  I asked him to repeat the above, to see if it included Rogers to Rogers, and he said yes.  He said he would note it on the computer.

Then I checked out my fave sites for seeing what other people are getting when they call Retention (Howard Forum aka “HoFo” and the Canadian bargain hunters galore website Red Flag Deals- both forums are great resources to see what other people are getting, but moreso Howard Forums because it is solely dedicated to wireless carriers and phones vs bargain hunting in general for Red Flag Deals) and saw that Rogers had recently eliminated the System Access Fee ($6.95) and now have a very low low priced Government Regulatory Fee (only $2.50 for British Columbia).

The guy I was speaking do didn’t tell me these specifics, so I called back in and spoke to someone else (and mentioned Tristan’s name) just to double check that my sister wasn’t being charged the SAF.  She wasn’t, but that other person quoted exactly what was noted on the contract offering, but didn’t mention Rogers to Rogers.  I told her that the guy I spoke with earlier said Rogers to Rogers would be carried over and included and that he would note it.

She said that they can’t add Rogers to Rogers for a plan like that, and said it was not possible.

I asked her to check the notes because the guy specifically told me Rogers to Rogers.  She checked. Nothing.

I asked her to speak to the manager because of the same reason, so the manager came on after another 5 minutes and said she couldn’t do anything because it was not noted.

After a bit more dialogue (and back and forth placing me on hold), the manager agreed to add Rogers to Rogers (usually costs another $5) because that was what my sister had in the first place.  So in the end, this is what she got:

• 200 day time minutes
• unlimited evening and weekends from 6pm
• call display
• voice mail 10
• 2500 outgoing messages and unlimited incoming
• Rogers to Rogers

All for $27 including tax… but she had to recommit for another 3 years, which she ended up going for.

So the gist of it is to be polite, ask nicely, take the time (I spent 3.5 hours on the phone!) and don’t be afraid to negotiate and ask to speak to the managers if they are trying to low ball you.  Play their game. =)

Hope that helps and good luck getting a better deal!

Have you had success with phoning in and negotiating? Please share!

If you stopped here via Four Pillars, welcome!  This thread was mentioned in Four Pillars’ post “Buying an iPhone from Rogers? Don’t Believe a Word They Say”

Tags: bell, contract, negotiation, rogers, telus

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