LOS ANGELES (CBS) — Cell phones act as lifelines for many people, but this weekend, that lifeline went dead for tens of thousands of Southern California AT&T customers.

As many as 1,000 cell towers went dead for part of the weekend, a magnitude of hardware failure that the company has not seen in 25 to 30 years, according to AT&T spokeswoman Georgia Taylor.

The cause of the issue remained unclear and was still being investigated.

“We’re still investigating and doing kind of a deep-dive diagnosis, as to what occurred,” she said.

Taylor was somewhat coy when asked whether customers would get a refund.

“We will consider that on a case-by-case basis,” she said.

But you can do what I did, call “611” on your AT&T phone and tell them you want a prorated rebate for the time your phone did not work over the weekend. Insist on getting a $10 credit and that they text message you a confirmation.

Just be sure to do it while your phone is still working.