Let me tell you what happened to me on Sunday. Something told me there would later be a problem. I signed up for new cable and cell phone service. I won’t name company names just yet but here’s the story.

It’s a recession and as we all know, there are some major deals to be had. Companies are competing for all of our business and we’re in the driver’s seat. I went to a certain store and told them that I was interested in learning about their new service. I had read about it already so I had a pretty good idea. I had done my research.

Long history short, I was offered a $200 credit after having the service for 30 days, a $75 manager’s special, and $20 off for the first 6 months on top of a 10% discount for being a school teacher. I thought this deal was too good to be true but I signed up that day. The money back would pay for some of the fees I would pay at my old cable and cell phone provider for getting out of the contract.

Sure enough, I got my first bill in the mail this past week. Problems! First, a $36.00 activation fee was on my bill that wasn’t on the estimated bill. Next, I received mail about the $200 so that isn’t a problem but there was nothing on the bill about the $75 or the $20 per month. So I went in on Sunday.

I was lucky enough to find the original salesperson. He told me he told me about the $36 activation fee. Once I explained to him that he had not but regardless, it wasn’t on the estimated bill, that was credited.

As for the $75, he said that he had to speak to his manager about that but would get it started for me. I decided not to ask why I had to come back in to get it.

Next, the fun started. The $20 for 6 months. I asked him where it was on the bill and he told me that it had been deducted from the price of the service. I told him that it was an itemized bill so I found it hard to believe that that was the case. He assured me that it was. Knowing that he was wrong, I asked him how much the normal service was.   He said to me, “a lot more than that.” I went to the other end of the store and showed him the price list that showed the service was exactly what was listed on my bill.

After that, he changed his story and said that because I had the $75 service, he remembered telling me that I couldn’t have both. I told him that I found it odd that he was now changing his story and with the assistant manager standing there, I turned to the asst. manager and said, since your associate isn’t sure which story he wants to use, what are we going to do about this? The asst. manager said, “we can cancel your service.” These were the first 5 words that he had said.

After that, he said that he wasn’t authorized to provide such a large refund to me and that he would speak to the store manager tomorrow and call me by noon.

I can’t wait to see what happens tomorrow but here are the two lessons. First, study your bills and if it’s not written down, don’t take their word for it. Second, present the facts and stay calm. I made sure to be friendly at the beginning but as more and more questionable statements were made, I was friendly but firm. Try to stick to the facts and don’t let them confuse you. Last, if you are in business, own up to your mistakes. I would have been happy to come to a compromise if they would have said, “we’re sorry, we can’t combine those deals. We made a mistake. Can you work with us?” Aren’t you more than happy to work with somebody whom you know is truthful?

I’ll let everybody know how this turns out.