No Chat Available and Payment Arrangement Question

Boy oh boy has it been a ride since T-Mobile bought out Sprint.

First, we used to have fabulous service in our home (in the middle of nowhere) but the minute everything switched from Sprint to T-Mobile our service tanked. We now have to go outside or sit in exactly the right place to have any service inside. I’ve asked about it multiple times and they swear nothing has changed but clearly it has. Anyone else having this issue?

Second, where on earth is the chat option? This is definitely my preferred communication method but it seems to rarely be available. I’m not sure why since often questions regarding cell phone accounts are pressing and need an answer quickly but I hardly ever have the chat option pop up.

And last but not least, whew. We were definitely unprepared for the drop in customer service since the changeover. We’ve had Sprint/T-Mobile since 2006 and were, in general, pretty happy. We always had great customer service with Sprint. But with T-Mobile? Nope. Long story short, our son was badly injured in an accident a couple of months ago and both my husband and I were off work for a significant amount of time dealing with it all. I get paid time off but my husband is in construction and does not. This threw our bills all off kilter and I’ve had to make arrangements, make payment plans, clean up the mess, etc. Well T-Mobile was a nightmare. I chatted with one rep that stated flat out that they were sorry but couldn’t really help. I did finally get a really great rep and he was able to go above and beyond to extend my payment and set up an arrangement and he was incredible. He broke the payment into two parts and told me just to chat again if I needed anything or if we needed another extension and he’d make it work. I made the first of the two payments but needed an extra week for the second part. I chatted for over an hour with a rep (not the really great one) and she said there wasn’t much they could do and that the best she could do was to check my account and manually reconnect it if it’s disconnected but that I’d be charged $60 per line (I have four) for reconnection. I appreciate her trying to find a solution but really? There’s not a single thing they can do to bump it out one more week? Anyway, a rep had previously advised that I put a credit card or checking account on file for my payment that did not have the funds to cover the payment so that when the payment is declined it’ll buy me another couple of days to get my payment in. So, rather than paying $240 in reconnection fees for a $141 payment, I just did exactly that. I’ve now set up a payment to process tonight on an account that only has $5 in it just to buy me an additional couple of days because the customer service reps apparently are given no leeway whatsoever in helping customers through an emergency. We’ve been solid customers since 2006 but we needed help to get through this and frankly, it’s really disappointing that this is T-Mobile’s idea of customer service. Any ideas or thoughts on how we can get a few days extension to pay our past due balance on the 14th, customer service?