Verizon Sucks

Yeah, the title's not very creative, but as frustrated as I am, it's a wonder I can write without swearing a lot. Of course, I'm not the only one (do your own search).

When we moved in to our current place, we had our Verizon phone and DSL service transferred from our old place. After a few weeks of spotty service, they finally admitted that we were too far from the CO, and they cancelled our DSL. That was 3 years ago. Since then, we moved our phone service over to the local cable company to test their cable/phone/internet package. Their internet service is unfortunately one-way, meaning that the cable modem works in tandem with a regular modem which requires its own phone line. So it's basically just as bad as modem service, which frequent hangups and very long uploads. There was a day when one-way service made sense, but sending pictures by email can take forever by one-way cable. So we've been living with dialup for the last 3 years.

More recently, this January, a neighbor got working DSL service. I checked with Verizon, and they would only provide DSL service if our phone service is with Verizon. So finally in May I ordered both phone and DSL from Verizon. The sales operator happily took my order and gave me an install date of June 5 for both installations. (Yeah, I thought it was optimistic to think the DSL would be ready at the same time, but it was exactly what I wanted.) So on June 5, I stayed home waiting for the phone guy. At about 10am, a computer at Verizon called me "confirming" the appointment for June 6. I called Verizon and there was no record of the June 5 date. SOMEBODY CHANGED MY APPOINTMENT AND DIDN'T HAVE THE COURTESY OF TELLING ME! (This problem is not unique.)

At the same time, I found out that my DSL ready date was changed to June 18. OK, fine. Today is June 18. I call the Verizon Online customer service number and get transferred to India. Yeah, globalization. The customer service operator informs me that my order has been cancelled. I sure as heck didn't cancel it. The operator transferrs me to "the department that will handle my issue". A few minutes of bad music later, and a recording tells me, "we're sorry, but due to high call volume, we are unable to handle your call now. Please try again later." SOMEBODY CANCELLED MY ORDER AND NOW VERIZON WON'T EVEN TALK TO ME, THEY HUNG UP! (Another neighbor last week told me Verizon had to retract his DSL service, so I guess the first neighbor was lucky.)

But wait, there's more. I've received two written welcome letters. Both of them quote a monthly rate for our phone package which is $15 more than what I was quoted by the nice sales person. (The one who also told me June 5.) Another call to Verizon, and I'm assured that for the first 12 months, a $15 credit will appear on my bill. But sometimes there's a delay in the first credit, so it'll definitely be there by the second bill. I can't wait until I actually get a bill.

And that's not all. The voicemail is defective. I listened to the messages and deleted them, and now the phone is giving that jittery dial tone that indicates voice mail, and our cordless phone displays a message saying there's voice mail. I haven't had the energy to ask them about this yet.

And for strike five (If you're counting; I am). One of the welcome letters talks of a voicemail feature called "Wireless Notification". I'm supposed to be able to get a free text message to my Verizon Wireless cell phone whenever the home voicemail gets a message. This is great, because without DSL, our home computer is always online. I was talking with a customer service operator about this, and she said she had to research to find out how to activate it. 5 minutes of bad music later, and the system hangs up on me. AGAIN, VERIZON HUNG UP ON ME!

I really wish Verizon didn't have a monopoly on DSL service around here. Then they couldn't bait me with an offer of nice high-speed internet service, then switch me to a more expensive phone package without DSL afterwards.