KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Patricia Elliot’s mom was 92 when she passed away. Among the many tasks that followed her mother’s death was cancelling the cell phone she had bought for her just a year earlier.
Mrs. Elliott said she just assumed she’d have no problem when she called T-Mobile to tell them of her mother’s death, and ask to have her mother’s phone removed from the account.
But that’s not what happened.
“They told me, no, they were sorry for my loss, but unfortunately I would have to continue paying until my contract was up,” said Mrs. Elliott.
There were 13 months left on the two-year contract for her mother’s flip phone. Mrs. Elliott said she was shocked by T-Mobile’s response. Did they expect her mother was still somehow using the phone? Mrs. Elliott asked to speak to a supervisor. But the supervisor only confirmed she was out of luck.
“At that time I told them I have been with you people more than 10 years and I will go with another company when this contract is up,” Mrs. Elliott said.
For the next 13 months she dutifully paid the additional $25 charge on her bill for her mother’s cell phone, but the day the contract ended she cancelled T-Mobile and switched to a different carrier.
While that T-Mobile bill is behind her, the frustration isn’t. That’s why she called FOX 4 Problem Solvers.
We agreed that it was ridiculous for T-Mobile to continue charging her for a phone that her mother can obviously no longer use. So we contacted T-Mobile and discovered that what Mrs. Elliott said she had been told repeatedly by T-Mobile’s own employees was not accurate.
T-Mobile sent us its cancellation policy, which states that death is a valid reason to terminate a contract early. Because of that, T-Mobile immediately refunded Mrs. Elliott every dollar she paid after the date of her mother’s death and solved this problem.
