About Face . . .

A complete and sudden change in attitude, direction, position, and principle etc., is what AT&T is guilty of yet again.

In what appears to be either a technical or advertising snafu, AT&T retracted a posted message from its website that stated it would provide iPhone owners with free Wi-Fi service.

The company has remain tight-lipped on what caused the error and refuses to acknowledge if the message was a precursor of whether free Wi-Fi service would be available in the not too distant future.

Why else would the message have been written in the first place?

 “AT&T knows Wi-Fi is hot, and Free Wi-Fi even hotter, which is why we are proud to offer iPhone customers free access to the nation’s largest Wi-Fi hotspot network with more than 17,000 hotspots.”

The above message was removed at 9 a.m. PDT from AT&T’s website.

“It was posted in error and was removed shortly thereafter, so it should not have been up,” said Seth Bloom, an AT&T spokesperson, in a phone interview. “We know how important Wi-Fi is and we intend to make it available to as many people as we can, but nothing can be announced today.”

It would appear that AT&T thoroughly briefed their representatives. Another spokesperson quoted the aforementioned message, verbatim.

Could they have been reading from the same script?

AT&T’s list of poor execution where the iPhone is concern continues to grow:

· Miscalculating the necessary resources needed to activate the iPhones led to long lines and a horrifying customer experience.

· Trying to appeased customers for the company’s poor planning and execution by putting out a report that Apple’s iTunes was the source of the activation catastrophe. Whether Apple was responsible or not, AT&T’s finger-pointing, does little to ease frustrated customers.

· Misleading consumers that the new rate plans for the iPhone actually saves them money

· iPhone users received free Wi-Fi service in the latter part of April. Service was terminated several days later, without an official announcement of what happened.

This latest incident however leaves AT&T with egg on its face. It would appear that the company does not believe in the authority of the printed word or the intelligence of its consumers.

Why else would AT&T refuse to disclose, although they claim the message was posted in error, whether or not iPhone owners would ever receive free Wi-Fi service.

If the message was posted prematurely, then the company should own up to the mistake, but to do an about face and offer no comment on the prospect of free Wi-Fi service, is an affront to AT&T iPhone owners.

Bradley Booth/Freelance Commercial Writer/Author