dsl customer service complaints

On Thursday, 6/12/14, I contact technical support at AT&T to alert them of a DSL service outage at my home address. I informed them that I had gone through all the troubleshooting that is typically involved in resetting your modem but that there was restoration of service.  As we had thunderstorms overnight I was wondering if there was a service outage and inquired if that was the case.  I was told that there was no outage in the area.  I complied with further repetition of the rebooting and troubleshooting and after an hour, it was determined that there was an outage and that someone would be out within the next 2 to 3 days to check the line.  I called the following day, Friday, 6/13/14 to ask for an explanation as to why we they initially denied the line outage and why their software utilities could not identify the problems in their system.  I was give a poor explanation that seemed to indicate me that they rely on customer’s reports of outages before they decide there is such an outage.  That didn’t make much sense to me but I didn’t pursue it as I was told a technician would be there later that afternoon to make repairs to the line.  I requested that I be contacted via, phone, text or e-mail message to explain the outage and notify me of the state of the repair.  I was led to expect that this would happen.

I arrived home later that evening and rebooted the modem and while the DSL light was on, the internet light was not.  I called technical support again and was told that the technician was there, completed the repair and it was determined that I had to reinstall the modem on their system as their system outage had wiped out my modem settings.  I reset the modem and was able to access the internet.  I asked about how it was that I was not contacted by technical support to advise me about the repair and was told that the file reflected that I was.  This is clearly a false business record indicating an action that was taken which was not.  Adding to the insult of the process, whenever I contacted AT&T there were lengthy delays in reaching an actual human being due their cumbersome inhuman voice recognition menu system and lengthy hold times.  Further, each person with whom I interfaced kept asking me to repeat information that I had provided to their voice mail system and related to me as though there was no understanding available to them about my previous contacts with them.  When I asked them to review the notes on my account, it was evident that they had that information available to them.

I expressed my frustration with my treatment as a customer and was offered sympathetic apologies but no explanations or offers of adjustment.  I requested that I be provided an e-mail acknowledging the problems I had, responding to the questions I had about my experience of their poor response to my service needs and their general technical and customer support practices and be provided compensation for my loss of service.  I was told by the person with whom I was speaking, that they could not provide that, so I asked to be transferred to a supervisor.  After twenty minutes of being on hold and being told several times during that interval that the supervisor was being briefed about my issue and advised to hold further, I was told that they would not be able to speak with me and I should expect a call back the following morning.

As anyone reading this might guess, I received no such call back.   I called early in the afternoon to pursue the issue and after another nightmare of their inhuman interface and several holds, transfers to individuals who requested more information to update my account who could not respond to my questions and further transfers until I was told by a supervisor who indicated that he was in India, that the technical support staff from Louisiana with whom I spoke the previous night would not be here today, Saturday, to make such a call.  He did advise me that there was a notation that this issue had been forwarded to management but he could not assure me that I would ever hear anything, but maybe they would contact me next week. 

I have had other issues with the DSL service in the past as provided via AT&T which has made this most recent experience my “last straw.”  They have provided poor equipment, routinely lower speed of service for which I pay and clearly a vulnerable line system that has gone out several times over the years due to weather related issues.  I have no choice where I live but to use them and their gratuitous ending of calls with “Thank you for choosing AT&T” only serves to be like rubbing salt in my wounds. 

I greatly concerned about not only my experience of AT&T’s poor service but also the others who are essentially captive of them by nature of the lack of competition.  I have no other choice as there is no cable provider or other ISPs who offer service on my street.  By visiting their customer service forums on their website, it is evident to me that they have been aware of their obvious problems in providing service but have been unable to remedy these problems.  They clearly lack the skill, interests or resources necessary to manage the customer service needs of their subscribers.