Customer appointments useless re iPad 2

Question

On Thursday, March 10, I received a phone call from a rep at the local Verizon Wireless store that they would be receiving the iPad  2s the next day, and asking if I'd like to make an appointment to come in and pick one up. So we set up an appointment for 6:00 PM on Friday, March 11. You would think the purpose of the appointment would be so you could just walk in and pick up one that was being held for you, right? WRONG!!!
I got to the Verizon Store at 5:30, just in case my rep finished up early with her 5:30 appointment. The auto sign-in program didn't register the fact that I had in an appointment, and a store employee finally came over  and signed me in. At one point, I managed to snag an employee to confirm that if I had an appointment, they'd be holding my item for me and was told yes. So I didn't worry, thinking my iPad 2 was waiting behind the counter for me. I hung out in the store for awhile, only to hear somebody say the iPads were already sold out. I tried again confirming with someone that one was being held for me since I had an appointment, and was told they were unable to place customer holds on newly released items. I asked what the purpose was of my setting up an appointment, and they couldn't tell me.
Finally, my rep finished up with her other appointment and told me that she had tried pulling iPads for all her appointments, but was told to put them all back. So I asked why I didn't get a phone call, as then I would have known to come EARLY, and stand in line with everyone else and take my chances. She didn't have any kind of answer to that question, and I most definitely did not receive a phone call.
The staff could tell I was upset about making an appointment for absolutely no purpose, and they offered to do what they could to make it right. The only thing they could do was place an order for the iPad, and tell me they'd have it overnighted to be at no cost to me. Fine. They said because of the time, they thought it might be able to ship out on Friday, but that it should ship on Monday at the latest. They said I could check online for a tracking number when I got home. They also said that no flags came up when they placed the order, which meant the item was in stock and would be shipping to me.
Later that evening I tried to check order status online, but got an error message of technical difficulties and to try back later. So I called in, the rep was finally able to locate my order, and said that shipping was showing as process pending. She said I should have it Monday and to call back Saturday morning for the tracking number.
Saturday morning, still the same online error message. I called again, and was still told I should have it Monday. Called Saturday afternoon/evening, encountered a very nice young man, but he gave me the unfortunate news that due to the time the order was placed on Friday, shipping had already ceased for the day, and I never should have been told at all that the item would ship Friday. He looked at the records, and told me that it should definitely ship to me on Monday, and to call back Monday for a tracking number.
I called back around 11:30 eastern time today, and still no tracking number. I explained the whole sorry history to this girl, and told her how frustrated I was that every time I called back to confirm what a previous rep had told me, I was then told I'd been given incorrect information. All she would tell me at first was that it was showing shipping in process, and that once it actually shipped, I'd get it overnight. I went round and round and round, and finally convinced her to check inventory levels of this particular iPad 2 model to verify that Verizon actually had it in stock and that it was not on back order.
She confirmed for me that there were adequate inventory levels and that it was not on back order from Apple. She said to check later this afternoon to see if the shipping department had made it to my order.
I called back a few minutes ago and it's still showing pending. This rep said she would send me a text and let me know whether it did or did not ship today.
I'm very angry that at every step of this process a rep gives me information, then I call in later to talk with another rep, and I've been told the previous rep gave me incorrect information. If this had just happened once, it wouldn't be so bad. But it's been with pretty much every single step of this process.
At this point, if either my local Apple store or Best Buy receives an AT&T version before my Verizon one ships, I'm going to go grab onto the AT&T version, cancel the Verizon order, and buy the AT&T version.
I've been a Verizon customer for so long now I can't even remember, but at least 8 years. I have never received such astoundingly bad customer service in the past. But this experience has been so bad I'm not even sure I want to remain a customer. I'm about ready to switch over to Virgin Mobile when my contract expires in December: $25 a month for unlimited internet/data/tethering of the iPad. I could have 4 phones (mine, husband's, 2 kids) with unlimited data for $100 a month, instead of the $155 I'm paying now for three phones but only mine to have internet access.
Verizon's going to have to work very, very hard to prevent me from doing just that. Save $55 a month and have ALL members of the family able to have unlimited data plans on their Android phones? Why wouldn't I jump at that? There's ample competitor coverage everywhere we'd need to use our phones. I would be updating to an iPhone 4 right now from my enV Touch, but I have unlimited data on my current plan, and I'm not willing to pay yet another $30 a month just to have the same access on an iPhone.
 Because right now, I'm very fearful that there really isn't an iPad sitting in a room somewhere waiting on me, and just waiting on the shipping department to get that far through processing the order queue to pack it up and send it on its way to me. I'm very afraid that all the iPads that were originally available have already shipped, and my order is one of those that will be waiting 2-3 weeks for the next shipment of products to arrive from Apple.

Answer 1

honestly make the switch. I am soon. I have been seening this happen alot lately. Verzion looks at as we have the iphone or pads and we can treat them like crap now. There thinking they will stay becuase were better then ATT. I have been looking at other services as well. I am seeing i can get better covrage and save alot more and get a better phone with them. make the switch