Back when we bought the house, Kate’s parents were having miserable problems with their cable Internet service– at peak times, the real bit rate went down so far that it was impossible to get anywhere– so we opted for DSL service. Five years later, we still have DSL, and even the same modem.<\/p>\n
When we had the garage remodeled, we had the contractor install a phone jack near the front windows, with the idea being to move my computer downstairs to free up a bedroom to become a nursery for FutureBaby. The contractor put in the jack, and we dragged the computer downstairs, hooked everything up, and… No connection. A line tester showed that the polarity was wrong, so I spent a little time swapping wires around until the tester lit up green. Nothing.<\/p>\n
So, we called Verizon to get a DSL tech sent out to fix the new jack. This was one of the most frustrating customer service experiences I have ever had, as will become clear below the fold.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
When we first called, it didn’t seem that bad. Kate called from work, and the service rep arranged to call back in the evening to check things. After verifying that the DSL modem worked just fine on the upstairs jack where it had always been, they agreed that there was something weird going on, and gave Kate a number to call to set up a service call. As I have a more flexible schedule than she does, I agreed to make the call.<\/p>\n
First of all, Verizon has the smarmiest-sounding phone menu voice ever– some incredibly smug-sounding woman who just oozes superiority to the people calling for tech support. Their computer system is also completely worthless– every time I called, I had to give my account number to the automated system, and then again to every single person<\/strong> I talked to. They never once managed to transfer my account information from one person to another.<\/p>\n This, of course, gives me great confidence in their abilities as an Internet service provider.<\/p>\n After several minutes in Phone Menu Hell and on hold, I was connected to a thickly-accented woman in India, who did manage to locate the record of Kate’s earlier call, and agreed that a service visit was called for. However, she said that the dispatching of technicians was handled by the analog service department, not the DSL service department, gave me a different number to call, and transferred me.<\/p>\n After several more minutes on hold, I got a woman in the analog service dispatch department who asked what the problem was, and as soon as she heard the word “DSL” transferred me back to the DSL hold queue. Without waiting to hear my explanation.<\/p>\n Two calls later, and a lot more Phone Menu Hell– the “direct” number I was given went to exactly the same phone menu system as the first number– I managed to get another operator, who actually listened, and set up a service call for Saturday, between 1 and 5 pm.<\/p>\n At 5:30, before heading out to see Hellboy<\/cite>, Kate called and told them that the technician hadn’t shown up. They apologized, and set up a new appointment for Monday morning, between 8am and noon. I agreed to stay home from work and wait for the tech.<\/p>\n At 11:00, I called to see what the status was (more Phone Menu Hell, more holding). “They picked up the job at 10:30– they should be there any moment.” was the answer.<\/p>\n At 12:05, I left for work, steam coming out of my ears.<\/p>\n After lunch, I called them again (more Phone Menu Hell, more holding), and said “This is the second time in three days that your service people have missed an appointment. I am no longer willing to pay for a service call– I’ll give you one more chance if you waive the fee, or else I’m calling Time Warner.”<\/p>\n After a flurry of transfers and call-backs it emerged that what happened was that the tech who picked up the job at 10:30 was not one of their regulars, and managed to drive all the way out here before noticing that it was a DSL problem. He didn’t actually have a DSL tester, so he turned around and went back to the office without closing the ticket<\/strong>. And nobody saw fit to tell me, the customer waiting at home for the goddamn tech to show up.<\/p>\n They apologized profusely, and agreed to send a tech out Tuesday morning. He was here for all of about fifteen minutes– the problem turned out to be a 25-year-old radio filter that was put on the line entering the house back in the 80’s. The upstairs jack was a later addition, and split off from a point before the filter, so it was the only jack in the house that could possibly get DSL service.<\/p>\n When he finally got here, the service guy was terrific– he fixed the problem in no time, and was very nice about the whole thing. The process of getting a tech out there was absolutely miserable, though, and I can’t recommend it. The next time we have a problem, I think I’m going directly to “Fix this, or I’m calling Time Warner,” which seemed to be the magic phrase for getting results (the contractor put a cable jack in with the phone jack, just in case).<\/p>\n The important thing is, we’ve got wired connectivity again (which means I can use my desktop to access the Internet, and not wreck my neck and shoulder hunching over the tablet). We also have a spiffy new networked multifunction printer, so I can hasten the deforestation of the Amazon basin by printing book drafts out for editing purposes…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Back when we bought the house, Kate’s parents were having miserable problems with their cable Internet service– at peak times, the real bit rate went down so far that it was impossible to get anywhere– so we opted for DSL service. Five years later, we still have DSL, and even the same modem. When we… Continue reading The Verizon Saga<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2749\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}