5 Companies That Excel at Screwing Over Customers [View all]

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http://www.alternet.org/economy/5-companies-excel-screwing-over-customers




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1. Sprint

How do customers hate thee? Let us count the ways. Over at the Consumer Affairs website, you can actually read 2,366 accounts of rage, frustration and bewilderment with issues ranging from dropped calls to confusing plans to unexpected charges. Here’s a typical cri de coeur from a customer who attempted to deal with a simple issue of moving abroad and needing to cancel plans:

“I spent 7 hours on the phone to solve the problem. 7 crazy hours!” — Petro, Arlington, VA, March 15, 2014

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2. Spirit Airlines

Spirit wins the prize for most customer complaints of any airline, and it has dedicated extraordinary effort to the project of bamboozling customers with outrageous fees. Spirit has mastered the art of charging what appear to be low prices and then extracting money through various sneaky practices. Its business model depends on customers not knowing where and how they’re going to get hit. Spirit makes 41 percent of its revenues in fees.

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3. Time Warner Cable

Pity the customer of Time Warner Cable. Service frequently goes on the fritz, and should you dare to call customer service, you will be treated to an experience that would challenge the imagination of George Orwell.

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4. Walmart

As Time magazine recently reported, Walmart gets abysmal marks on customer satisfaction among retail stores:

“No retailer had a worse ACSI [American Customer Satisfaction Index] score than Wal-Mart’s 71 for customer satisfaction. Not only did the company have the lowest score of any department or discount store, but it also scored just 72 when graded as a supermarket — the lowest in that sector as well.”