What DSL doesn't want you to know.
DSL from hell
For starters, there's Earthlink, an Internet service provider with a good reputation for customer service. I've been an Earthlink customer for several years, so I was happy to order DSL service through it. Earthlink was going to treat me right, I believed, confident in the company's ability to help me avoid DSL installation hell.
Well ...
Earthlink gladly took my order, and cautioned me of some delays. "We'll have you up and running within a few weeks," the cheery customer service rep assured me.
Three weeks went by, then four. I called. I was told to be patient. The problem, of course, was with Pacific Bell, the monopoly phone carrier in San Francisco and a subsidiary of SBC Communications (SBC).The company was dragging its feet, I was told by Earthlink. PacBell controls the phone lines and switches over which DSL service is carried, and its technicians have to do the installations, so Earthlink was powerless to help me.
"I feel your pain," said one empathetic Earthlink rep. I was confused. If
I'm ordering DSL through Earthlink, I asked, why don't you handle my
actual installation?
"Oh, we don't do that," she said. "We only manage the process, and
besides, we give you much better customer service."
The all-day appointment
May gave way to June, July was fast approaching. The phone rang. It
was PacBell. A service tech was coming to my house tomorrow to
install the DSL modem. "Great," I said. I didn't want to sound
ungrateful, but I was a little miffed that I wasn't given any advance
notice of the appointment, especially since, like all PacBell service calls,
I needed to be home between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.
"How come no one from PacBell called me to see if this appointment
would work for me," I asked.
"We don't do that," she said. "You ordered DSL through Earthlink, so
they were supposed to call you."
My wife, luckily, was home all day. The PacBell guy showed up at
noon. He stayed until 4 p.m. He left, frustrated, unable to get my DSL
service to work.
"The problem must be on Earthlink's end. Call them to find out what's
wrong," he told my wife, as he rushed out the door.
I called Earthlink, of course. What followed was four days of hemming
and hawing, of non-answers and dumbfounded customer service reps
and technical-support people. Still, no DSL, and no answers. Every
day, I was told someone at Earthlink would call me back. The phone
never rang. I had to do the dialing, and every time I did, I was forced
to recount my sad, frustrating tale.
Time to 'provision'
On the fifth day after my "install," a real breakthrough. A lucid Earthlink
rep informed me that he checked the PacBell records and realized the
phone company had not yet "provisioned" my line. Disregarding the
incomprehensible techno-babble, I asked him what that meant, venting
my frustration and anger.
Even though PacBell had come to my house to "install" my DSL, my
service wasn't really "installed" -- i.e., working -- because PacBell
hadn't thrown the switch in their offices, he explained with a
condescending tone in his voice, as if it were my fault for not
understanding the process.
"Well, when will that happen?" I asked.
"I don't know," he said.
A few days later, the phone rang again. It was PacBell! My line was
going to be provisioned on July 15! Joy! And better yet, the PacBell
tech didn't need to get into my house, so I didn't need to waste an
entire Saturday.
The 15th came and went. No PacBell. No provisioning.
On Sunday, I called Earthlink. Massive apologies flowed through the
phone. "We'll get right on this, Mr. Feuerstein," the customer service
rep told me.
I was numb. I hung up the phone. I didn't care anymore.
Bowing before Nick
Several days passed without any word from Earthlink. I took a deep
breath and called back. Yet another customer service rep dished out
the same empty platitudes, but then he transferred me to a department
called "vendor relations."
"These guys may be able to help," he said.
The phone rang, and Nick answered the phone. Nick -- I mean Nick
the DSL God -- seemed interested in my case. He looked over my
now-lengthy computer record, listened to my pathetic story and took
pity on me.
"Let me do some checking and I call you back in a few minutes," he
said.
I took the dog for a walk, not believing Nick, or anyone else from
Earthlink, would call me back. When I returned, there was a message
from Nick on my answering machine.
I quickly returned the call.
"Do you see some green lights blinking on your DSL modem," he
asked.
"Yes!" I said, in shock.
"Well, that's me. I fixed your problem. Your service should be
working."
Incredulous over this abrupt turn of fortune, I whipped open my
browser. My home page loaded quickly -- DSL quickly.
"How'd you do that?," I asked him, in absolute awe of his genius.
He explained. There was a problem at PacBell, which he managed to
persuade them to fix right away. And there was a problem on
Earthlink's end, which he also took care of. I thanked him. I thanked
him again, and again.
"No problem, dude," he said, and hung up.
That was July 17. For two days, I surfed and emailed at warp speed.
The days of dial-up modems were over for me. I thought my quest for
DSL had ended.
On Wednesday, my DSL service crashed.
"I've never seen a problem like this before. Give us a few days to work
on it," the Earthlink technical support guy told me.
You know the rest of the story.
Adam Feuerstein covers e-commerce for UpsideToday. Reach him
at adamf@upside.com.
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