Service Providers

Sorry for the rant, but I spent a fair amount of the day reminiscing about significant events in my life, and one of the ones that my mind spent some time on recently was my daughter’s kindergarten graduation, and play. I don’t remember all of the details of the play but a strong memory was that it was adorable and that my daughter did an excellent job with her lines. After everything that was done, we spent the rest of the day together just having a good time. One of the places we went to was a local park that was built back in the… well, it was around back when I was her age, and my daughter loves it, especially the tire swing. I remember as we came close to the park I asked her if she knew where we were, and as soon as she could see the tops of the playground’s structures the joy in her voice was evident as she cried out, “We’re at the tire wheel park.”

When I let her out, she instantly ran into the park and started playing with everything, but her first target was the monkey bars. Of course, she needed a little help to get across, and I was happy to oblige. But when she had her fill with the monkey bars, she went to other parts of the park and just started to play. And as I watched over her, I was instantly transported back to my childhood through memories. And I remembered how I was eager and excited about the world held within the playground. Of course like any child, all she cared about right then was the playground, not any kind of responsibilities. Of course, that just made me think about all the things I have to do in my life from paying the bills all the way through dinner and everything in between.

Like anyone I can and unfortunately do let the world consume me all too often without taking time out to slow down and enjoy the world around me, but eventually, the world comes crashing down around us, and the daily requirements come nipping at our heels. Aside from the things required just to live, one of the most essential services in this day and age is our access to the internet. Be it our ability to work (telecommuting) or just how we unwind and relax from a hard day of work. We depend on them as the backbone of our day today, but they just seem not to care. If life were a movie, Telco companies would always be cast as villains, maybe not the lead villain, but at least one of their minions. And it is a fair role to cast these companies into. Though, as with all rules, there are some exceptions, most notably, the techs. But, anyone who has to deal with a customer in person can usually avoid this casting. After all, they have to deal with the angry customers after the company’s phone support just aggravates the customer to tears.

The most typical problem I’ve had with Telco Companies is their refusal to work with third-party modems. More than once I’ve tried to use my own modem that I bought instead of renting one of their modems, but they refuse to work with them, or more politically will not guarantee a flawless experience with them. Even when you use their equipment, sometimes it just doesn’t work. There was one time that I had customer service on the phone because I was unable to connect to the internet and they told me that modems just die every so often and that since I had mine for a couple of years that it was only time to replace it. The lack of immediacy on their end to replace a product they have designed to fail every so often is disgraceful. The fact that this equipment is designed to fail is, of course, just as unfortunate, especially when we pay as much as we do for their service.

However, the ultimate frustration that comes from some of these companies was when a customer service representative flat out refused to let me pay my bill over the phone. Seriously I tried to pay a bill over the phone, and one of their employees refused to accept it because I couldn’t remember my ex-wife’s SSN. To make this experience even worse when I asked her to transfer me over to her supervisor she refused to transfer me, in fact, she hung up on me. I was eventually was able to talk to someone who tried to apologize for that and let me pay them. Telco Companies need to do so much better with all of their customers, stories like mine should not exist. They just make too much money off us for things like that to be allowed to happen, especially when we have all of the responsibilities in our own lives.