Rubber Balls and Liquor

FIOS and the riddle of the Faster Plus internet.

FIOS is a mess.  I don’t know how else to put it.  I originally placed a phone order with them a couple of weeks ago for FIOS internet, phone, and cable TV.  I upgraded to the 20/20 internet plan which you can see offered here: Plans.  They call it “Faster Plus!”  Well needless to say, about a week before the scheduled installation I found out the install was going to the wrong location.

It was time for another round of phone calls and this time I was able to get a hold of “Miss Calo” who insisted she was going to take care of everything after a very tense opening.  A lot of “I don’t know what you want”, and “You don’t need to be snippy!” (that last one came from me).  Eventually I was scheduled once again on the same date at the right house with my 20/20 internet - “I’ve never done this before!” she said when adding the 20/20 to the order.    Unfortunately that apparently is still true.  It’s worth noting that when asked about the price, it matched the first operators quote.  This was good.  This was consistent.

I received my confirmation email and after checking the status I had “20/5” and not “20/20”.  Back to the phones.

Calling in again this time had a much different result- I got an operator who could not offer 20/20 let alone at the price listed on the web site.    I eventually had to read him the URL of the plans page (see: Plans) and when that didn’t work I emailed it to him.  There was nothing he could do.  It seemed that the web site was a magical place full of tricksters and charlatans and it is not to be trusted.  Apparently the entire network was far too busy showing up outside of people’s houses tethered to that fellow with the glasses then they were updating the pricing pages on the home page.  Alas, he gave me yet another phone number to call.  BACK TO THE PHONES!

This time fate smiled kindly on me as representative “Miss Grant” took the reigns for awhile and within minutes “updated” my account with the 20/20. Done and done.  Just like that.  Once again I inquired about the order contents and the price.  They matched exactly as the other two.  Maybe the last operator was just new.  I was told a confirmation email would be sent shortly- but it might take a few minutes as it goes through a “filter” to make sure they don’t send out anything “bad”.  It’s waitin’ time!  Hey it beats “back to the phone” time.

Waking up this morning (Feb 26) I checked my email- no comforting confirmation message.  I went ahead and checked the status of the order to see if perhaps it was updated there.  Sadly it still listed 20/5.  Yes.  Back to the phones.

Calling in this time met with a train wreck of a customer service rep- after taking a long time to get her up to speed I was told the only thing she was seeing was “the phone”.  This couldn’t possibly be right, as even I could check my order online and could at least see most of the order, even if it was inaccurate.  Eventually she found it, but informed me that they do not have 20/20.  Despite having told her repeatedly my experience with all of the other operators she insisted that she in fact was the one telling the truth, the others not so much.  Holding back the temptation to ask her, “If I asked the other operator if they offered 20/20 - Is what they say true or false?”, I did what I was always told to do-

“Can I speak with a supervisor?,” I asked.

“Why do you need to speak with a supervisor?”

“Because your the fifth person I talked to and I don’t know who to believe,” I responded.

“You can believe me”

“How do I know your telling the truth and the others are lying?  I need to speak with a supervisor.”

“Why do you need to speak with a supervisor?”

It WAS looking to be the start of some kind of logic puzzle.  We once again went over all the details, I tried to use the FIOS web site as a reference to what they offered and what the price should be but this woman was not having it.

“The web site is not accurate, ” she said.

“What so it hasn’t been updated?” I asked.

“We do not offer 20 over 20” she stated emphatically.

I then reiterated that I talked to three other operators who said it was possible, coupled with the online evidence, and the fact that I was given a price that seemed to match services by all three representatives.  She did some “calculations” and came up with a price that did not match the other estimates (it was higher) and it included promotions that did not match what the other reps had told me.   On that note it was checkout time.

“I need to speak with a supervisor” I asked again for a third time.

“Why do you need to speak with a supervisor?” she replied.

“I need to speak with a supervisor or I’m going to hang up”

“You do not need to speak with a supervisor” she insisted, ” I can help you.”

“Then I am terminating this call,” I said hanging up the receiver and feeling briefly like Harrison Ford describing the assassination of Colonel Kurts.

Now I find myself at a loss, not sure where to turn.  Not sure who to believe, what my bill will be?

Luckily Miss Calo had left me a direct line to her.  I’ve called twice now without a response.

—————-

UPDATE:

After posting this, I recieved a message over Twitter from John C. at Verizon (Twitter.com/cz).   He sent the issue to the “escalation center” and I found much help in a Mr. Seymore.  As you’d imagine there IS a 20/20 package, though interestingly enough a friend ((Twitter.com/danjnj)) called FIOS the other day and was told they no longer offered it.  Either way that was taken care of and a NEW issue emerged.

Verizon FIOS use Motorolla set top boxes that, as I learned, are not quite ready for production.  I recieved two HD DVR boxes and both worked for about 30 seconds before the television screens would go completely green.  This occured with two different HD LCDs- one from Samsung and the other from Toshiba.  The sound comes over just fine but the image turns a solid green.  The tech at the time mumbled something about a “Green Screen of Death” and I assumed he was simply making a joke.  Turns out this is a known problem at Verizon.  Apparently the newer 7000 series boxes (model numbers starting with 7) have issues with HDMI, a list of which is available to Verizon customer service if you ask.   If there is such a list, why are they not required to post it on the FIOS web site?  Why are reps not instructed to inform consumers of the limitations of the hardware before making the sale?  Why did Motorolla and Verizon release these bad boxes to market in the first place?

The stock answer you will get from support is to use component cables.  Since this is an HDMI issue component cables will work fine.  In my case, my father’s LCD was wall mounted with an HDMI cable running through the wall.  The idea of having to have component cables running up my wall on the outside after having paid for an in wall installation was unacceptable.  Another tech who visited our house trying to repair the issue let me in on a secret.  Apparently the 6K series that FIOS used till about November of 2008 worked fine and had no issues, and these green screens have been cropping up en mass after the roll out of the 7K boxes.

I called Mr Seymore who had helped me with my earlier problem and he manged to locate me two of the old boxes- about 30 minutes away.  The drive was worth it however as both boxes worked flawlessly.  I’m certainly grateful to Mr Seymore and John for helping me get to where I am now, but what if I had never complained over Twitter?  Customer service over the phone was of no help and selling flawed boxes to the consumer when there are known techinical limitations with them does not seem a fair way to do business.

Talk amongst yourselves.