About 10 days ago, we took steps to get rid of our lifelong landline. In the process, Qwest (so much easier to say and type than CenturyLink) offered us deals that made us look like chumps for having paid so much for so little all these years. We stood our ground on the landline, but decided to opt for an upgrade in DSL speed from 1.5M to 7M. Amy in Idaho Falls assured us our old modem would work with 7M, but that she had to order a new modem to ‘trick’ the system, and then cancel that order.
Yesterday, our old landline was disconnected. DSL went down, too, but we were assured that the new speed would be available by 5pm. When we called after 5pm, we were assured it would be by 7pm.
It was a service nightmare surpassing the Dell Debacle, the FedEx Fumble, the White Glove Wipe-out, and the Butterflyphoto Follies of 2007.
For 24 hours, the DSL light blinked futilely. In that time, we spoke to a half a dozen people and I made repeated attempts to chat online with Qwest service (using a neighbor’s wireless). Understand, I’m very patient, polite, and clear on the phone. Merri could not be more personable or pleasant, as well as thorough. We are not the customers from hell. Each person we talked with seemed helpful but none really understood the problem or had the correct solution. It was tremendously frustrating to have to start over again and again in describing the problem, as if there is no record of previous calls — no institutional memory. However, very late in the process, one rep seemed to see a complete list of our contacts over the past 24 hours. Why didn’t one person look at that and say "we need to do something special"? Why doesn’t Qwest issue an incident number you can enter at the first prompt to reconnect to someone who knows the situation, instead of starting anew with each representative?
Like the uninformed person who told us we could not go back to 1.5M, as if overnight the feature was gone from the earth. Like Ellie, stammering through her script, who asked if I’d called Netgear to discuss the modem with them, and who was rattled out of her script but did the right thing when I said "either give me to a supervisor or hang up — your choice." Like that supervisor, JoAnn, who patiently listened as I said she would be the last person I ever talked to at Qwest: "downgrade the service or get us a compatible modem by 5pm," I said. She apologized and connected me with someone to downgrade our service (rather than recommend a $99 modem), but Eisley had to talk to her supervisor about an odd $25 fee; no follow up. Or Sue J, Tia, and Bambi — all online — who repeatedly forwarded me to Internet Services, which instantly triggered a Remote Support function that plastered a graphic on screen and nothing more — no way forward, no way back. The second and third times I started my chat with "Don’t activate Remote Support or forward me to Internet Services" — yet each time they did. As an aside, the Qwest website is NOT compatible with Internet Explorer 10 on Windows 8. (The Qwest website is simply gawd-awful. However, IE10 crashes every day and is incompatible with Google and Facebook, ad nauseum.)
In the end, the fix was simple. Ten days ago, Amy in Idaho Falls should have told us that a new VDSL modem cost only $99. You can’t find that info on Qwest’s website, even if you’re logged in as a customer. Or the tech who switched service yesterday should have known — from Amy — that we had an ADSL modem and configured the system accordingly. This, we got from Johnny in Idaho Falls, whom Merri dubs a hero. Johnny even told us where a CenturyLink store is (a mile away).
I can’t convey the misery, anger, depression, and powerlessness both Merri and I felt over the past 24 hours. We lost most of two full days to this nonsense. But, I know anyone reading this has a comparable story.
Lastly: for god’s sake, don’t run loud endless ads on hold. It’s clueless at best, infuriating at worst, to make me listen about your great service while on hold for tech support over and over and over again. Some VP bought a summer house in Aspen with the proceeds from that idiotic idea. How is it possible that large corporations with vast sums paying VPs hundreds of thousands of dollars can’t provide the service they exist to provide? Management and the board should be very, very embarrassed. Maybe some overpaid suit should steal some ideas from Amazon’s service. Amazon’s going to take everything from the Unservices, if it can continue to avoid becoming like them.