Hacker News Reader

Hacker News

Comment by burnte | Hacker News Reader

Full thread

burnte

I've been a T-Mobile customer for 14 years, very happy customer, but I never, ever believed that "promise".

View on HN

Doesn't matter if you believe it, they still advertised it and should be punished for breaking a promise like that.

I didn't mean to sound like I was defending it, I apologize for that.

That's a silly comment...

The whole point of things like this is to be believable. How can you guarantee anything from warrenties to insurance if you don't believe advertised promises?

Advertised promises come from people with the ethics of P.T. Barnum. Why believe them?

On an individual level, sure, be wary, but on a societal level, that's widely considered to be a bad thing, and something we should punish for. We shouldn't just say, "I expected them to lie", but also hope for that to change

Yeah I have no objection to punishing them, they clearly glossed over the details in their marketing, but they're hardly the first to do it. I'm not surprised that "we'll never raise prices" didn't turn out to be true, that's all I'm saying.

Warranties and insurance don't guarantee anything. Companies that offer those things make their money by denying claims. Insurance companies deny claims when they think they can get away with it all the time.

tldr; there is no such thing as an absolute guarantee

The only thing you can probably get out of a “guarantee” is a piece of paper you can submit as evidence in a court of law. How much you value that depends a lot on what it says and who gave it to you.

I didn't mean to sound like I was defending it, I apologize for that.

What would you say to the customers who did?

Live and learn. There's always a catch, or an out. Read the fine print.

Do you have a link to the fine print? I'd like to skim the agreement for a such a clause.

No. But I've lived long enough to know that it's there.

Is it?

FTA >T-Mobile contradicted that clear promise on a separate FAQ page, which said the only real guarantee was that T-Mobile would pay your final month's bill if the company raised the price and you decided to cancel

Same way that credit card companies and websites change their terms every now and then. It's not what you agreed to when you opened the account, but they just do it. Don't like it? Then cancel. They know that canceling credit cards is a pain, you have to go change all your recurring charges and automatic payments, and also closing and opening credit card accounts can ding your credit rating a bit. So most people just bend over and take it.

I didn't mean to sound like I was defending it, I apologize for that.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com