Last year we told you about some of the shady stuff that had been going on at T-Mobile TPR stores owned and operated by Arch Telecom. Arch is a T-Mobile Preferred Retailer which means that it is a third-party retailer authorized to sell T-Mobile products and services in retail stores it owns. Many consumers wouldn’t know the difference between a TPR and a corporate-owned store since they both use T-Mobile signage and branding. Smaller signs will usually reveal that a store has an owner independent from T-Mobile.Reportedly, Arch Telecom puts the most pressure on its sales reps to meet certain sales goals which forces them to resort to shady business practices such as signing up customers for lines they didn’t ask for and ringing up accessories that they didn’t want to buy. Last summer, Arch said that it wanted to bring integrity back to the wireless industry. There are several former Arch employees who probably think that this is the funniest thing they’ve read all day.On Reddit, one rep working for Arch was about to celebrate his one-year anniversary working for the company when the whole store got laid off. Management cleaned house apparently because of the actions of one employee who had 300 new line activations. Instead of giving the SIM cards to the customers, the rep kept the cards and used them on a single device that he owned or controlled.
By using the SIM cards in this manner, the rep generated artificial usage on the lines preventing them from being deactivated in T-Mobile’s system. This allowed the rep to keep his commissions. We assume that most or perhaps even all of the 300 new lines activated were ones that the employee added to customers’ accounts without getting their permission. A well thought-out scam to be sure.
Another former Arch employee also saw his whole store let go because the manager “was up to some shady shit that we had no involvement in.” Among those canned was a new hire that hadn’t even finished the training program. The scam that this person’s post mentioned was one that victimized elderly customers who was unfortunate enough to walk into an Arch-run store.
The elderly victim would be told that he was going to receive a free tablet and watch when in reality the subscriber would be put on the lowest-priced plan without permission and enough accessories and extras would be added to the account to bring the monthly cost up to the previous level or slightly higher. The rep would earn a nice commission and the customer might never realize he was lied to.
One Redditor wrote, “I left Arch Telecom 3 weeks ago. Best decision ever.” Another said, “I work for corporate. Some of these stories of people getting laid off are terrifying but it’s usually TPR or people doing shady stuff.” If for some reason you don’t want to conduct business with T-Mobile via their website and you prefer doing it in person, make sure you visit a corporate store.
We have requested a comment from T-Mobile and if they ;eave a statement we will update this story.
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