You Complain Too Much to Sprint? NO PHONE FOR YOU!

No way to start this one except to just come out and say it: Sprint is cutting off the service of about 1,000 of its wireless customers. Why? Because they complained too much.

Before you get too upset, there's more to the story here than you might think. These complainers, says Sprint, were calling in about 40 times a month and making "excessive" requests from the company. Some, says Sprint, involved customers asking for information about other people's accounts. Sprint is giving 30 days notice and waiving final balances and termination fees for those getting the axe.

As someone who's had to deal with clients who just don't understand the technology they're dealing with, to the point where they refuse to learn about it and make extreme demands that simply aren't possible, I can understand where Sprint is coming from. Try working in any kind of customer or tech support role for a few months and you'll see what I mean. While the vast majority of customers are understanding and are genuinely trying to learn, there are always a few problem users who try to take advantage of the relationship. I'm more than a little sympathetic when it comes to such situations.

On the other hand, is the best course of action in dealing with a "problem" customer to simply disconnect their service? I guess I'm hopeful that big companies could figure out how to deal with issues like this by escalating problems to senior tech support managers and working out the issues rationally. But I have to imagine that if someone was calling 40 times a month, those avenues have been tried and worn out.

On the third hand, if you are genuinely having this much of a problem with a company, it's probably time to move on willingly to someone else. I mean, seriously, if Sprint is that big of a screwup, wouldn't you want to leave? Especially for free?

In the end this seems like a no-win situation where both sides are probably at fault to some degree. But ultimately, considering that these 1,000 customers amount to a mere 0.002 percent of Sprint's 53 million customers, its actions really don't seem excessive.

On the fourth hand, if you want to get out of your Sprint contract for free, now you know how....

Am I crazy? Consumerist has the expected counterpoint argument and more info from one of those affected.

LINK: Sprint ditches customers who complain too much 

UPDATE: Consumerist interviews a Sprint employee who notes that the canceled accounts were essentially scamming the company for free service and credits.