Harry
07-21-2007, 10:25 AM
I have been a FIOS user for just over a year now. I had some trouble when things first started with them turning me off twice in error. That experience is posted here somewhere. I just lost service again Thursday for a real hardware problem.
I will copy in below the letter I have sent today to the CEO of Verizon about my repair experience. I will no longer recorrmend Fios as I have been doing to friends and neighbors. Read the saga to understand why.
Harry
"I realize this will be a fairly long letter but I would ask you to read all of it to understand my anger and frustration with the way my service outage was handled by your organization. The people who dealt with me either outright lied or are truly incompetent or both.
My wife and I have been traveling for business four days a week and working from home on Friday each week. We are independent consultants and need phone and internet service in order to do our jobs. We arrived home Thursday evening as usual and checked for business messages on the internet and then went to join family for dinner. When we returned home we noticed that we did not have any service for our telephone, internet or TV. (We have the whole FIOS package). The phone was just a fast busy if someone called, they could not even leave a message even though we pay for your voicemail service.
I called the FIOS phone line and after going thru the usual messages and selections the automated system offered to check and see if it could fix the problem. After a few more minutes it decided it could not and transferred me to a human. The fellow was very pleasant, he checked and decided he was getting an indication that there was no power to the optical connection box. I went and checked the power supply and after a few minutes of plugging and unplugging stuff he decided that someone would have to come out, it looked like the power converter might be bad.
I asked for as early an appointment as possible since we had a lot of work to do the next day plus since we are out of town all week, we have a lot of household errands to run when we are home. I was promised a service call between 8am and 12 noon on Friday.
We limped thru the morning using our cell phones and asking people to read us email over the phone. We also dictated a few emails that needed to get out over the phone to people we are working with. It was awkward and difficult but it was only short term so ….Noon came and went and no word from Verizon repair. I called the FIOS line again. I went thru the usual nonsense and was told by the automated system that records showed that I was out of service and that you were committed to have me back in service today. “Did I still want to talk to someone?” I did and was transferred to technical support. I explained the situation to the person who answered. He put me on hold to check on things, came back, got more information, put me on hold again, came back said he needed to talk to his manager, put me on hold, came back said he needed to talk to dispatch, put me on hold and finally came back with an explanation. All this took about 40 minutes. He explained that the person the night before had messed up and put in the service call for 8:45 pm. He gave me a new promise that someone would be to the house between 1pm and 3pm. This was after he had called dispatch to make sure that a tech was available. Since it was 12:45pm at this point, I figured what the heck.
Well 3pm came and went with no tech. So I called again. Went thru the usual stuff the only difference was that now the automated system transferred me to someone very quickly after retrieving my record and said nothing about repairing me today. Well this technical support rep checked my records and told me that the tech had been dispatched but had not yet left the job before mine. I was next on his list and he should be there shortly. The rep obtained this information very quickly but seemed very sure of the situation and like everyone I talked to on Friday was very apologetic about the problems I was having.
As the time started to approach 5 pm and I had still not seen or heard from the tech I called yet again. I again worked my way to tech support and again someone said they were sorry and went to check on my status. After holding for about 20 minutes while he tried to reach the dispatch center here in Tampa he said that he would have someone call me back that they would continue to hold from the call center until they got thru to dispatch. Sure enough about 15 minutes later I got a call on my cell phone from Verizon. I was told that no one would come out to repair me today, and that they would put me on the list for Saturday morning.. I was now being told that dispatch had never had me on the list for the day and they did not even have a trouble report for me! So what had the other guys I had talked to done?
As you can imagine this was not welcome news. First I had spent all day waiting for the promised visit. Secondly, I no longer believed anything that I was told by the call center. Thirdly, I was pretty sure it was a 15 minute fix if someone would just come to my house.
I asked to speak to a manager. I got one on the phone and explained the situation to him. He said there was nothing that he could do about it. I asked to speak to his escalation point. He said there was none. In short there was no one to whom I could appeal my shabby treatment. According to him, if your (Mr. Seidenberg) service was out he would not have been able to get that fixed then either. I found that hard to accept. I asked him to go back to dispatch and try again and that the least I wanted was the direct phone number of the manager who would be responsible for dispatch the next morning.
He got back to me about 20 minutes later with the name and phone number of the dispatch manager who was going to be on Saturday morning. I was told they had talked to the field rep who was working that night and if possible he would try and get by Friday night but they were not making promises. I was assured that I would be taken care of Saturday morning one more time and they offered to forward our home phone calls to our cell phone until mid day Saturday so that if someone called they could at least get thru.
I stayed home Friday evening just in case but of course no one came to repair anything.
This morning about 8:30 am I got a call from a tech who was on his way. It took him exactly 11 minutes (from the time he rang the bell until he left the house) to replace the power supply unit that plugs into the wall. He did not have to work outside or do anything else. If I could have gotten the part, I could have fixed it myself in just a few minutes. Instead, I lost my Saturday morning chance to play golf so that I could stay home again and wait for the repair tech.
Now, if you had been treated like this by a company that you paid about $225 dollars a month to for service, how would you feel? What would you say if someone mentioned they were considering switching to that company for service? What would it take to make you feel better about dealing with the company in the future?
I think that we all deserve a complete and honest explanation of what happened. Did I have a repair ticket? Was I just blown off by a busy repair center or does the communication process between the call centers and the dispatch center just plain not work or do the call center personnel just lie to customers? I also think that I deserve an apology from whomever is responsible for the way this was handled. Lastly I believe I am owed a credit for the month of July for all my Verizon FIOS services. Not only was my life disrupted unnecessarily but I burned a huge number of Verizon cell phone minutes trying to get the repair done in a timely fashion and trying to keep my business life at least partly together when I was not getting the service I was paying for from Verizon."
I will copy in below the letter I have sent today to the CEO of Verizon about my repair experience. I will no longer recorrmend Fios as I have been doing to friends and neighbors. Read the saga to understand why.
Harry
"I realize this will be a fairly long letter but I would ask you to read all of it to understand my anger and frustration with the way my service outage was handled by your organization. The people who dealt with me either outright lied or are truly incompetent or both.
My wife and I have been traveling for business four days a week and working from home on Friday each week. We are independent consultants and need phone and internet service in order to do our jobs. We arrived home Thursday evening as usual and checked for business messages on the internet and then went to join family for dinner. When we returned home we noticed that we did not have any service for our telephone, internet or TV. (We have the whole FIOS package). The phone was just a fast busy if someone called, they could not even leave a message even though we pay for your voicemail service.
I called the FIOS phone line and after going thru the usual messages and selections the automated system offered to check and see if it could fix the problem. After a few more minutes it decided it could not and transferred me to a human. The fellow was very pleasant, he checked and decided he was getting an indication that there was no power to the optical connection box. I went and checked the power supply and after a few minutes of plugging and unplugging stuff he decided that someone would have to come out, it looked like the power converter might be bad.
I asked for as early an appointment as possible since we had a lot of work to do the next day plus since we are out of town all week, we have a lot of household errands to run when we are home. I was promised a service call between 8am and 12 noon on Friday.
We limped thru the morning using our cell phones and asking people to read us email over the phone. We also dictated a few emails that needed to get out over the phone to people we are working with. It was awkward and difficult but it was only short term so ….Noon came and went and no word from Verizon repair. I called the FIOS line again. I went thru the usual nonsense and was told by the automated system that records showed that I was out of service and that you were committed to have me back in service today. “Did I still want to talk to someone?” I did and was transferred to technical support. I explained the situation to the person who answered. He put me on hold to check on things, came back, got more information, put me on hold again, came back said he needed to talk to his manager, put me on hold, came back said he needed to talk to dispatch, put me on hold and finally came back with an explanation. All this took about 40 minutes. He explained that the person the night before had messed up and put in the service call for 8:45 pm. He gave me a new promise that someone would be to the house between 1pm and 3pm. This was after he had called dispatch to make sure that a tech was available. Since it was 12:45pm at this point, I figured what the heck.
Well 3pm came and went with no tech. So I called again. Went thru the usual stuff the only difference was that now the automated system transferred me to someone very quickly after retrieving my record and said nothing about repairing me today. Well this technical support rep checked my records and told me that the tech had been dispatched but had not yet left the job before mine. I was next on his list and he should be there shortly. The rep obtained this information very quickly but seemed very sure of the situation and like everyone I talked to on Friday was very apologetic about the problems I was having.
As the time started to approach 5 pm and I had still not seen or heard from the tech I called yet again. I again worked my way to tech support and again someone said they were sorry and went to check on my status. After holding for about 20 minutes while he tried to reach the dispatch center here in Tampa he said that he would have someone call me back that they would continue to hold from the call center until they got thru to dispatch. Sure enough about 15 minutes later I got a call on my cell phone from Verizon. I was told that no one would come out to repair me today, and that they would put me on the list for Saturday morning.. I was now being told that dispatch had never had me on the list for the day and they did not even have a trouble report for me! So what had the other guys I had talked to done?
As you can imagine this was not welcome news. First I had spent all day waiting for the promised visit. Secondly, I no longer believed anything that I was told by the call center. Thirdly, I was pretty sure it was a 15 minute fix if someone would just come to my house.
I asked to speak to a manager. I got one on the phone and explained the situation to him. He said there was nothing that he could do about it. I asked to speak to his escalation point. He said there was none. In short there was no one to whom I could appeal my shabby treatment. According to him, if your (Mr. Seidenberg) service was out he would not have been able to get that fixed then either. I found that hard to accept. I asked him to go back to dispatch and try again and that the least I wanted was the direct phone number of the manager who would be responsible for dispatch the next morning.
He got back to me about 20 minutes later with the name and phone number of the dispatch manager who was going to be on Saturday morning. I was told they had talked to the field rep who was working that night and if possible he would try and get by Friday night but they were not making promises. I was assured that I would be taken care of Saturday morning one more time and they offered to forward our home phone calls to our cell phone until mid day Saturday so that if someone called they could at least get thru.
I stayed home Friday evening just in case but of course no one came to repair anything.
This morning about 8:30 am I got a call from a tech who was on his way. It took him exactly 11 minutes (from the time he rang the bell until he left the house) to replace the power supply unit that plugs into the wall. He did not have to work outside or do anything else. If I could have gotten the part, I could have fixed it myself in just a few minutes. Instead, I lost my Saturday morning chance to play golf so that I could stay home again and wait for the repair tech.
Now, if you had been treated like this by a company that you paid about $225 dollars a month to for service, how would you feel? What would you say if someone mentioned they were considering switching to that company for service? What would it take to make you feel better about dealing with the company in the future?
I think that we all deserve a complete and honest explanation of what happened. Did I have a repair ticket? Was I just blown off by a busy repair center or does the communication process between the call centers and the dispatch center just plain not work or do the call center personnel just lie to customers? I also think that I deserve an apology from whomever is responsible for the way this was handled. Lastly I believe I am owed a credit for the month of July for all my Verizon FIOS services. Not only was my life disrupted unnecessarily but I burned a huge number of Verizon cell phone minutes trying to get the repair done in a timely fashion and trying to keep my business life at least partly together when I was not getting the service I was paying for from Verizon."