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Chris Anderson Gets Screwed by AT&T and the World Learns About It

As a Canadian living abroad (with a Canadian cell phone) I can sympathize with how it feels to get screwed by your service provider. I was feeling especially annoyed, until I read Chris Anderson’s post about his very costly trip abroad with the iPhone:

I’ve just got back from ten days abroad (from Amsterdam to Israel to several cities in China) and while I was in China AT&T cut off my phone service. Why? Because I’d apparently run up a $2,100 bill.

Five years ago, the editor of Wired would have this hair-raising story to tell to the office on his return, but now, thanks to “The Long Tail” 10,000 readers or more know how AT&T mismanaged his account to the tune of $2100.

What’s the lesson here? A negative (or positive) customer service story gets amplified on the web from a one-to-one relationship to one-to-many. Instead of just telling his colleagues, Chris Anderson is telling an audience of 10,000 or more.

Tags: at&t, chris anderson, customer service