AT&T credits customers for service outage

AT&T is crediting customers, after ABC 17 News first reported service issues in rural parts of Mid-Missouri.

Maries County sheriff Chris Heitman called the lack of AT&T wireless service a public safety hazard. He told ABC 17 News he has been calling the wireless company since June to report bad coverage.

Now the cell phone provider is handing out credits to residents in Maries County. ABC 17 News confirmed the information on Friday with local Congressmen Blaine Luetkemeyer.

After 10 calls and a written letter, Heitman was worried the problem will never get resolved. Each time he was told the issue would be fixed in a couple of days.

Recently a deputy tried to send a picture of an armed suspect to other deputies, but he had no service.

Heitman’s office relies heavily on the wireless service because radios do not cover the entire county.

AT&T released this statement to ABC 17 News earlier in the week:

“AT&T customers in Vienna, Mo., may have experienced issues with wireless voice and/or data service during Labor Day Weekend and on September 16 due to unrelated hardware and software issues. We apologize for this inconvenience.

During each instance, AT&T technicians worked to resolve the issue and were able to successfully return service to normal. We’ve continued to monitor the network performance in Vienna closely and it is currently operating normally and has been since September 16. We will continue to monitor the network and investigate any additional concerns brought to us by customers.

Customers who were impacted may contact AT&T regarding their account. Any credits issued will be on a prorated basis, based on the length of a customer’s outage and in accordance with our terms and conditions.”