Does ISP Accountability Ever Exist? (rant!!)

[Sanna]

Edit: Well, I'm still angry, but less so, seeing as how finishing up my finals has relieved a heck of a lot of stress. The Computer "Service" people have been angering me since Thanksgiving, so the strength of this rant has been a good three weeks in the making. I'll tone down the unnecessary frills, but I do want to know... does it get better when I start dealing with 'real' people?


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Alright, I'm freaking fed up. These morons down in Computer Disservices have poked me one too many times, and the penguin is about to expload again.

When I get OUT of this coffin called college, and get a 'real' Internet Service Provider, can I expect them to provice better service than this?? I get disconnected, at the least, once inside a given 24 hours, with no way to know when and plan accordingly, nor control it. Attempting to log-out and re-sign-in does NOTHING; I will still be unexpectedly and unpredictably disconnected. Service will drop for half a day with no warning and no explaination. Often I will disconnect every 30-45 min for 4+ hours. Sometimes even every 10-15 min. They are nearly uncontact-able, or if I ever do, I get a 'we/they are working on it,' BS response.

And I thought SOE had communication issues: at least they tell us what THEY think we should know. These assmunches don't even do that.

The actual question I do want an answer to, in the middle of all this is:

When I start paying a REAL company to give me REAL service, can I expect honest-to-freaking-Pete REAL SERVICE? Can I expect to have a phone number that I can call and get someone who at least knows KINDA what's going on? Maybe even be able to tell me what the REAL problem is, and give me an honest ETA? And if they don't know, have the balls to say they don't know??


Or have I been living in a dream world for too long? /grrrrr



(And you know what's just too hilarious for any swear word, ever? I was disconnected while typing this. /grrrrrrrr.)

-- Sanna
Scowls at the Computing Disservice [strike]Technician[/strike] Pile of Bile, ready to attack -- what does he want his tombstone to say? (Woot, I con red to them...)

[Lyron]

To a certain extent, ISP accountability does exist in the real world, for the simple reason that if you are not treated fairly, you can take your little red wagon to another ISP.

Of course, this doesn't always work. My cable broadband access (the only broadband at te time) was VERY shoddy until DSL moved into my neighborhood.

[kiztent]

To answer your question... no.

I went through a two month period when every time my wife went on a raid, I'd get a denial of service attack launched against me. My ISP verified that someone was shoving a half a megabit per second at me, but wouldn't tell me who since it wasn't their problem. After upgrading our router and installing a log daemon on one of our PCs, we had it narrowed down to several ISPs who we thought it could be. Calls to technical support for attempts to track this from their end were met with nothing since it wasn't their problem. REPEATED requests to our ISP to have our IP reset were ignored since they couldn't do that (the person launching the attacks was the MB admin for wife's old guild and got our address for wife's posts). It was even escalated twice so more senior people could tell us they wouldn't help.

Despite the fact that someone was OBVIOUSLY watching my wife's character (the attacks would start as soon as she zoned into raid zones and stopped as soon as she went LD) Sony refused to do anything about it. Even though we supplied the guild that was probably instigating this and offered to supply a range of IP addresses to see if anyone from that guild was logged in from that range - we personally didn't give a **** who it was we just wanted it to stop, they refused to help because it wasn't their problem.

So for two months I couldn't play, and no one would help because it wasn't their problem.

We ended up upgrading our line speed and getting more static addresses (new ones, huzzah), as well as paying for anonymizer to hide the new addresses. We suspected the guy doing to attacks worked at tech support at an ISP, we found out our suspects real name, called tech support, verified he worked there then told the manager of tech support what his techs did in their spare time. The suspect then posted his retirement from EQ and how he was "pursuing another work opportunity" and wouldn't have time to play as much.

When I say we, my wife did most of the leg work and learned more about internet security and firewalls than she really ever wanted to know.

But yea, it doesn't get any better. I used to do phone support and call a lot of phone support. It's nasty work from both ends of the phone.

[Ngreth Thergn]

While ge3tting a person that knows something is *NOT* likely...

What you can (often) get is a refund for the day for the drop in service

So... there is something you can do at least

[Nepper]

Having actually worked for it....

Unfortunately, beeing an ex-tech for a major DSL ISP, I can tell you that there is no guarantee of good service. While I worked the floor of said ISP for a few years at various levels, at any given time there were 150+ "techs" there, and only about 15-20 of which could solve any REAL problems (other than the usual monkey-type troubleshooting for grandma who thinks turning the monitor on and off is re-booting the PC. Yes, it happens more than you would believe)
The amount of service/accountability/levels of techs (junior/senior/I know enough not to want my MCSE/etc) depends on the company, and price is a factor.
The people you are talking to are usually not technically trained, and are following pre-written troubleshooting for the most common problems (95%) of the call volume. This keeps their overall cost to employ techs down = more techs on the floor = less whining about wait times for techs on the phone. If they hired actuall, knowledgeable techs, they would not be able to have enough people to answer the phones within a decent amount of time (and at 150-250 during normal periods, adn 500+ during peak, that can still be a 45+ min. wait) unless they jacked teh price up considerably! Don't expect to get a good tech for an off-the-wall problem unless you're lucky. But hey, they are out there.
My suggestion, find a DSL provider that works on a dynamic IP basis (to avoid problems such as the one above) with an infrastructure that's been around long enough to be stable, or go BB and get a decent firewall/router/ip maskarading software to handle any problems you encounter, and pick up a book. Remember, if the lights aren't on on your modem, check the power supply before calling tech support.

Good luck to you!

[Aoladari Raveynfyre]

If you have a choice of cable providers do NOT choose Comcast/AT&T.

If you have trouble... and call them, they tell you there is nothing they can do right now but they'll be happy to send a tech out next week.

Of course if you're not having that problem next week, YOU get charged for a service call.

[Rhisk]

LOL, Mediacom cable took lessons from Comcast/AT&T...

What is even funnier is that Mediacom leases lines from AT&T for the long hauls.

But seriously, ISP Techs in general (there are exceptions to this statement) know nothing. Like its been pointed out, they have scripts.

If you go dial up, you can usually get better service from the small, local providers, but then you are stuck with dial up. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZz

Basically all the Broadband companies are part of Bigger Companies... So, instead of getting local service from local people that understand local issues, you get Joe from Timbuktu reading from the same script that the 30000 other techs in the big room are all reading from. Heaven forbid your problem isn't covered by the script.

And yes, quite often, if you have a REAL problem (one that doesn't fall into the script) you often get told that it will be a week before a tech can come out.

However, every once in a great while, the tech that answers the phone actually knows what they are talking about... don't worry, they won't be there the next week, they never are. Those techs are like a breath of fresh air. Don't get used to them, don't ever expect them, but you will learn to appreciate them when they do answer the phone.

I have dealt with broadband companies in Chicago, New York, Daytona Florida, Las Vegas, Reno, and all over California. Doesn't matter, they are all the same, wouldn't suprise me if all the tech lines ring in the same place, regardless of company, because I swear they are ALL reading from the same script.

"Unplug the Modem from power."

OK

"Wait about 30 seconds"

........OK

"Plug it back in"

OK

"Did you get lock?"

No

"Oh, well, we can have a tech out there January of 2006, are you going to be home??"

[Lilosh]

Rhisk's post kinda set me off.

*sigh* I love people who bad mouth the techs. When we give you the troubleshooting steps that solve a good 70% of people's problems, we get the "That wont help!" "I can't do that". "It's your job to fix it, I'm not troubleshooting".

And when it comes time, and people demand that we send a truck, they give us a 2 hour a month timeframe in which they're home. They call in at 11pm, not realizing that our drivers have their orders for tomorrow, and they want someone out there by midnight. And tells us that Any time between 7am-11pm Monday through Saturday is impossible, because everyone in their family is working.

Trust me, you customers have just as many knuckleheads as we techs do. And no, we don't normally read from a script. I've worked in half a dozen call centers, and we have a general checklist of things we need to check, to make sure we've covered all the bases. Most of us develop a standard procedure, because we deal with 40-100 calls a day. I challenge you to do an irritating process with someone who fights you all the way , 50 times a day and not find a way to make it as routine and painless as possible.



-Lilosh

[Sanna]

Lyron: true.

Kiztent: /cry.

Ngreth Sir: true, there is that at least. I hope.

Nepper: hehe, yes, I always check power first.

Aoladari: ugh >_< /wince

Rhisk: heh. ^_^! (re: solving everything by unplugging and replugging the modem.)

Lilosh: /hug. But: I am not a knucklehead. I may not be the most educated computer user EVER, but I am fairly competant.



What gets me the most is the projected image of, "We don't have to tell you anything... So we won't, and we will screw you over in the process." My uni is totally atrocious about that, it angers me to no end, and this is 'just' one more poke in my head. At a time when I reaaaally don't need to be poked anymore.


Thank you all for your answers. I get these little flashes of, "I'm graduating in two or three semesters and I know next to nothing about how real life operates..... o_0", so it's good to be able to network with people who are really there, so I kinda have half an idea....


-- Sanna
And mostly, thanks for letting me scream. I needed to.
The dorm needs to hang a punching bag in the lobby between the elevators, so right when you walk in from class, you can beat the crap out of it, then feel better and go to your room and relax, or go hang with friends. ^_^ Get your frustration vented quickly and easily.

[Dunthor Warsmith]

Originally posted by Aoladari Raveynfyre
If you have trouble... and call [Comcast], they tell you there is nothing they can do right now but they'll be happy to send a tech out next week.

While the Comcast call centers have been utterly useless (other than the occasional automated "We know the system's down" message before they ask you if you really want to talk to a tech, so I know the problem's not on my end), the tech's they've sent out have been quite useful.

They've wound up redoing a large number of the coaxial connectors in the house, work on the telephone pole where our line splits off, modifying the attributes of our account, and who-knows-what else, but whenever a tech actually comes out here, problems go away for a few weeks

Sure, inevitably problems arise again (often the same ones ...), but at least there is benefit to the techs.

I just wish Comcast would be a bit more reliable - the number of outages we've had in the past year and a half has gotten rather frustrating - if any of it is "scheduled" they definitely haven't provided a means to find out. Losing the net for a few hours, or more often 12-24 hours, a few times a month gets really irritating.

[Nhin Impious]

Alright, I'm freaking fed up. These morons down in Computer Disservices have poked me one too many times, and the penguin is about to expload again.

When I get OUT of this coffin called college, and get a 'real' Internet Service Provider, can I expect them to provide better service than this??

Is there an issue with paying someone to provide you with internet access now, for when the college service doesn't work? Or simply to use all the time? I have cable service for most of the time, and a dialup account for when I'm away from home with the lappy, or the 2-3 times a quarter that cable goes down for an hour or two.

Free is worth what it costs.

Oh..and just a note, the cable company here requires their techs to go through basic troubleshooting before scheduling a truck roll. So even if the tech knows straight off that a roll is needed, they still have to ask you 5-10 questions and go through a basic step or two with you. Even if it only saves 1 truck roll out of 500 when they miss an easy solution, that's quite a bit of savings.

Basically all the Broadband companies are part of Bigger Companies... So, instead of getting local service from local people that understand local issues, you get Joe from Timbuktu reading from the same script that the 30000 other techs in the big room are all reading from.

And surely only a "local person" can understand your local Linksys router; no one who didn't grow up in California knows where San Diego is; and if you don't live in Texas, you've never heard of a Dell computer. And just how many ways do you want people to say "have you powered down the computer completely and turned it back on since the problem began" anyhow?

So what is it with people complaining about "scripts" in tech support? Do you complain that every darn time you go to the doctor for your heart, that son of a gun wants to take your blood pressure like it's part of a script? How about the grocery store, they always tell you the total and then ask for the payment, not vice versa! It's a script too! Seriously-- most of the common problems have a common thread of diagnosis and solution, and after asking the same questions 1000 times a month for X months, someone may actually sound like this isn't the very first time in the world that they've ever asked the question.

Your tech problems are not unique, any more than you are the sickest person in the world or your children are the cutest ever. While you can expect sympathy or appreciation in appropriate amounts-- your problems are not unique and you don't deserve the Medal of Honor for putting up with them. You do deserve assistance from someone who is courteous and knowledgeable, but you aren't allowed to insist on an all-new way for the technician to tell you "Let's do X, like I did with the previous 200 people who had this problem, and for 104 of them, it fixed it."


Nhinx "the lag meter's conning red again" Aphsion
"For me to assist you with this problem, right now I need to give the instructions and you need to go through them with me, okay?"

[Cubwynn]

Is there an issue with paying someone to provide you with internet access now, for when the college service doesn't work?

most likely they are forbidden from having the access through anyone other than the college. Dialup would probably work, if it's her own phone line, but having a Cable/DSL provider come out to your dorm (assumation...) is probably a big no-no.

[Rhisk]

Lilosh,

I didn't mean for anyone to take that personally.

I have worked a call center, I have done on site tech calls.

I know the whole story. I know all about stupid customers (yes, the power cords not being plugged in, power strips being turned off, monitors not turned on, every dumb problem you could imagine). And boy do I know the people who complain you can't have a tech there 20 minutes ago.

However, now I am a customer, and as a general rule I think that big company call centers/service leaves a lot to be desired.

OK, no scripts, but what are checklists but scripts that allow minimal variation. And yes, it becomes a dull droll routine. But when I am having problems, the LAST THING I want is the guy I am talking to for support sounds like he would rather be watching Mtv.

And if my service is completely down (I never get small problems) I do fully expect a tech to be there as soon as possible. And yes, since I am unable to use their product at all I would think that my problem would rate higher up the scale than someone who has a slow connection issue. And yes, when I call on a Thursday and say they can't possibly get a tech out their until Next Friday I think its ridiculous, however Monday isn't an unreasonable hope. If the company takes that long to service a paying customer then they need to hire more techs, simple as that.

And to totally honest, I don't blame the support people for being bored with their jobs, it is. I also don't blame the support people or the techs for scheduling problems. Nothing can be done to make phone support more exciting, its wait for POed customers to call and scream at you, fun fun fun. However, the scheduling thing is entirely the big companies fault.

If anyone wants to read my rant about big businesses and poor customer service, it will be on my website sometime in January (my current rant is seasonal, so I have to wait until after the holidays to change it).

So again, I say that IN MY EXPERIENCE, the Broadband companies that I personally have delt with have just blown at customer service, specifically poor phone support and timeliness of scheduled on-site service. And I point out that if I have never delt with you or a company you work with, then don't sweat my stories because obviously they don't apply to you.

[Lilosh]

Originally posted by Rhisk
Lilosh,

I didn't mean for anyone to take that personally.
I have worked a call center, I have done on site tech calls.
I know the whole story.

No worries. Your post was kind of provoking to read, but it was more the imagined attitude behind it that set me off. It seemed that you were implying that 99% of techs were reading from a book instead of "fixing MY problem!". It's a common enough attitude that I used to see.

Every customer is convinced that there is some EASY, Simple solution to their problem (Their problem being unique and something we've NEVER heard of before.. You know , like losing a connection, or something) that we are just REFUSING to do, and insist on wasting their time with all of this "Troubleshooting" that we enjoy doing to confuse them.

Trust me, if 1,2, or 3 experiences is what make people (not you, as you're more experienced than most) think that all technicians are lazy, stupid, and lord knows what, I'd LOVE to see what 4 years in tech Support on the other side of the phones would do to people.
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As something of a related side note:


Tech Support is on my list of "In a fair world, everyone would be forced to have this job for 6-12 months". Right along with Retail, Fast Food, and Customer Service for a bank. I think it would be a wide-open eye opener for folks to realize that what takes up 5-10 minutes of their day is significantly more difficult and riddled with innane rules, complicated restrctrictions, and annoying people than they know. It's suprising how difficult it can be to "Just get me through this line" " Just bring me my food" or "Just tell me my balance" can be than most would believe.

I've timed it, and most people's morale, and theories about "Treating people like unique and color snowflakes, explaining every problem until the customer understands it, and treat every problem as an opportunity" last somewhere between 1-3 months before people start getting frustrated and regress into "I'm going to get this call done efficiently, quickly, and with the least effort possible" after being yelled at for 15 minutes straight by a Pointy Headed boss and your 8th straight customer of the morning.


Sorry to derail, but It's early and my thoughts flow in an odd pattern, I suppose.


-Lilosh

[Draggar]

Originally posted by Aoladari Raveynfyre
If you have a choice of cable providers do NOT choose Comcast/AT&T.

If you have trouble... and call them, they tell you there is nothing they can do right now but they'll be happy to send a tech out next week.

Of course if you're not having that problem next week, YOU get charged for a service call.

I used to have them, they went downhill after Excite went under. Their typical troubleshooting:

1) Reboot the computer
2) Unplug the modem for 6 minutes
3) Check the network settings (OK, an actual real troubleshooting step!)
4) Reboot the computer (again)

Most outages lasted less than 10 minutes, so 99% of the time that *seemed* to fix it (even though it was a coincidence).

And don't get me started on the nightmare of transferring my service...