AT&T customers need to read this so they don't become the victim of a similar scam
An AT&T customer is scammed and pays cash to a rep for a service that is supposed to be free.
An AT&T customer just got scammed by a rep at an AT&T Store. This is something that could happen to almost anybody not intricately familiar with what an eSIM is and what services they should not be charged for at a carrier store. Here is what happened. The eSIM on a Redditor's iPhone stopped working so he decided to head down to the AT&T Store for help. Now, to be honest, he doesn't say whether he went to a corporate-owned location or a third-party authorized reseller. It really doesn't change the gist of this story nor should it reduce the importance of the lesson that you will take away from it.
When the AT&T customer gets to the store, he is told by the rep that it will cost him $30 to have his eSIM reset. But before anything else is said or done, the rep goes on to say that the credit card reader is down and as a result, the charge must be paid for in cash. So the customer hands over $30 to the rep who does the work he needs to do to reset the eSIM on the customer's iPhone.
A few hours later, the customer is well away from the store, his iPhone is working but there is a thought gnawing away at his brain. He starts to wonder whether the story he was given by the AT&T rep about the about the credit card reader being down was a bunch of crap and that by collecting $30 in cash from him, he paid the salesman for a service that wasn't supposed to cost him anything. If true, the $30 in cash that the customer handed over to the store employee ended up going right into the enterprising rep's pocket.
Inside of an AT&T Store in Salem, Mass. | Image credit-AT&T
Other Redditors quickly called what happened "a scam" with one suggesting that the rep be reported. Some pointed out that if the salesman worked at an AT&T corporate store, this would be "a pretty severe code of business conduct violation."
As it turned out, the customer did leave what he called "a harsh Google review calling out the employee by name, and plans on speaking to the store manager on Monday. One problem we can see on the horizon, the customer has no proof that he paid the $30 cash. In fact, the receipt that was emailed to him by the rep shows that he was charged $0. Here's something I really don't get. Why would a rep risk his job over $30 unless he has the support of management to pull these scams and knows that he won't be fired.
For the record, resetting an eSIM at an AT&T Store, whether corporate or authorized reseller, is free to the customer. So if you are an AT&T customer and need to reset an eSIM on your handset, it shouldn't cost you anything.
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