giraffedata
join:2009-07-11
San Jose, CA
| tech support matters even when you can run your own system
I don't think I've ever hated a business relationship more than my relationship with AT&T, due to the lack of support. And I am an Internet engineer. So I don't need AT&T to tell me how to configure my router, but I do need AT&T to configure AT&T's router. Three times in three years, AT&T's system broke and they simply don't have a system in place for a customer to report that and get it fixed. Going through the support system that is designed to help non-technical customers fix problems on their end is a painful, time consuming process. I once spent 3 whole hours transferring around before they let me talk to a person who could speak IP and type the commands to fix the problem.
BTW I am an unusual user with an unusual old grandfathered AT&T product: a static IP address subnet routed through the DSL subnet. I pay $65 a month for it, but would gladly pay more if when the service stops working I could call up an engineer and have him fix it.
Oh, and I moved down the street once, and they messed that up. I was without service for a week, and part of it was just a mandatory 6 day waiting period to see if things come alive normally, at the end of which you are allowed to call and report that it doesn't work and they type the commands to turn on the service while you wait. That's the kind of product it is -- low prices made possible by not paying people to do customer service.
If I knew of a smaller, more expensive, less reliable company from which to get DSL, I'd have switched a long time ago. |
