The Perfect Storm

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Over the past week or two I have gone through an interesting confluence of issues, all centered around communications.

1. My Comcast Triple Play is about to hit the one-year mark, which means that my rates are about to go way the hell up.

2. My company is deploying Cisco IP phones to all telecommuters. These phones require a VPN initiated at the router, so each of us was issued a Cisco 851 or the wireless equivalent.

3. Verizon is trying for a third time to finish pulling down their fibers so every unit in this building is finally ready for FIOS.

4. I just finished converting all of my home wiring to cat 6, and every device has access and is wired to Gigabit ethernet (not all can support it).

I had expected the Cisco router to be the biggest pain in the ass, but in reality it is a matter of education. I just don't know enough about it, and troubleshooting it takes time. What I had not expected was for my bailout from Comcast to Verizon to turn into a god damn comedy of horrors.

Yesterday, I decided that a company that treats its incoming customers as bad as Verizon does is not really a good way to spend my $150/month for telecommunications and cable TV. The solution is simple: cancel the order and move on.

The problem is that it is not just an issue of killing the order, I still need to deal with a rate increase from Comcast (who, by the way, have exceptional customer service for my area) which is going to leave me paying over $60/month for a VoIP service that is buggy and flaky. Also, *that* part of their customer support is not as good as for their TV and Internet sections.

My caller ID and voicemail work on and off, and opening tickets doesn't help much. I don't think I have lost the voice line once in the past year, but all of those ancillary services have been average at their best, and the web interface is just terrible.

Since I'll have a company issued phone, the VoIP line now reverts to personal use. I decided to switch it to Vonage, only to find out they are not able to transfer my number. No big loss there, I am sure that less than 15 people have that phone number so it should be easy to send them the new number. Vonage is $25/month (actually $30 after you add all of the regulatory taxes) for more features than Comcast's VoIP product, which in two weeks or so is going to cost me more than $60.

Even if my TV and Internet rates go a bit up, I'll still end up paying less by using Vonage.

The first thing that impressed me about the Vonage setup is that it allows for an automatic failover number. If your network goes down, it forwards your calls to whatever number you specify. This is a pretty sweet feature, assuming it actually works. The rest of the web management area is clear and uncluttered, and it is clear of eye candy, unlike Comcast's which looks like they spent more time making it pretty than making it useful.

Another thing I noticed is that some enterprising MBA type figured out a way to blend-in feature up-selling without making it intrusive. Some features are optional, but they are not shoved in your face, instead they are simply listed on the side or clearly marked as optional and available at an additional cost.

If Comcast's only competition is Verizon, and they keep treating new customers the way they have treated me since March, FIOS is going to be a monumental flop. It doesn't do them a god damn thing to have a technically superior solution of the business is not capable of handling the business part properly. When Comcast basically redid their whole cable network in this county, it was transparent to us. One day they simply told us that they have finished to redo everything with fiber to the curb, then offered us digital cable and cable modems.

Zero disruption.

When HD came, it was a question of switching digital cable boxes, again, zero disruption.

When voice came, they simply brought in a voice capable Arris cable modem. It took them about an hour, but most of that time was spent with the tech on the phone to his dispatcher trying to check the phone line. They did not even take out my old cable modem until weeks later.

Verizon doesn't want my hard-earned money

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Like Dolores Claiborne used to say: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on you."

I guess since this is fool me thrice, it's the part when Dolores pushed her husband down the dry well.

They did it again: one more time they scheduled to come here and finally pull down the fiber into mine and the three condo units above.

Once again, they didn't show up.

This time I let myself believe they would do it, so I ordered FIOS again. My order was put on hold by the website, and was asked to call them directly.

This is a straight report of the calls I made to Verizon yesterday without any kind of success:

The report is missing a 40 minute call I made in the afternoon, where basically I had to redo my order.

Most of the time spent on the phone in the morning was either on hold or being bounced from office to office. My record for staying on hold was one hour.

So, what happened? Simple, their web ordering system allowed me to request my current landline number to be transferred to Verizon, something that they claim it shouldn't do.

Fine, I said, give me a TV-Internet bundle.

"No, I can't. Bundles must include phone service. You'll have to pay for both of them at regular price." Ouch. The idea was to drop the phone part of the order until the FIOS equipment was installed, then order an upgrade to the triple bundle. Still not the end of the world.

The problem is that my install date is next Tuesday, and the wiring guys did not show up on Friday, so I already know I won't be getting FIOS on Tuesday. Fuckers.

It really makes you wonder what is the point of competing against a company that is so big that they can afford to push around people that are gladly trying to commit to $150 worth of monthly services over 24 months. I wonder how many people are having the same problem?

By the way, here is the mystery of the wiring: I own a condo, and I am on the lowest floor. Our wiring goes top down, starting at the attic and running down each unit's HVAC closet. In order for them to give me FIOS, the fiber runs through my three neighbor's HVAC closet. This means that the condo association management company sends out a memo so all four owners know that a service person will enter their unit on some date for the specific purpose of pulling that cable. If they miss a date, they have to send another memo with enough notice so people can make arrangements in case they can't be around.

This of course could had been avoided when Verizon contracted to have all of our 300 units setup for FIOS. They paid for the work and did not bother to send somebody to make sure that the work was done.