Verizon

Verizon Wireless: Fee? What fee? Oh, you mean that little ol' thing over there? Pay it no mind

adamg — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 22:29:59 +0000

Verizon Wireless will look to find another way to extract more revenue from customers now that it's won the Bank of America Tin Ear of the Week Award and retracted its planned $2 fee for people who only wanted to pay their bills online one month at a time.

Verizon software didn't screw Massachusetts towns, Verizon employees did

adamg — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 18:04:04 +0000

A story in the Globe today has the following headline and sub-headline:

Verizon to pay $800,000 settlement
Phone company says cities, towns were overcharged because of software

But as Steve Garfield notes, that's wrong, because as the story itself says, the problem was that employees entered the wrong data into the software:

It's human error. The 'software' doesn't make the error, a human does.

Having newspaper headline writers write captions for stories about software is like having politicians write legislation about the internet.

3G, 4G, what's the diff?

adamg — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:24:10 +0000

Sounds like some salespeople at the Verizon store in Harvard Square need some training.

Commuters should study 4G coverage maps before signing up for Verizon 4G

adamg — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 12:43:45 +0000

Steve Berry reports his Verizon 4G wireless works as advertised when he's in a 4G coverage area, but that the problem is that his commute takes him into 3G territory and that's a problem:

When the 4G signal is low and a 3G is available, the device switches modes. This drops the existing connection and 3G takes 20-30 seconds to activate. If you happen to come back into a 4G area (signal level above the 3G value), it switches modes again taking another 30 seconds to establish an active link. In the 1 hour Worcester to Boston route, I used to lose 3G connectivity twice and lose about 2 minutes while the SSLVPN and MiFi resynchronized. Since moving to the 4G, I lose 30 minutes of the 1 hour commute due to continuous mode changes.

There is no ability to force the unit into 3G or 4G only mode. There is no standard for setting up a new connection before dropping an existing connection.

The new iPhone speaks to them

adamg — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 13:28:38 +0000

CKP took this photo this morning on Boylston Street, where iPhoniacs began lining up last night to be the first to get a new phone. No doubt it would be pointless to attempt a Venn diagram showing the overlap between this group and the group of Verizon workers and Occupy Boston supporters outside the Verizon Store on Washington Street downtown yesterday evening:

Verizon DSL dead in Boston area

adamg — Tue, 10 May 2011 03:08:50 +0000

UPDATE: Four minutes after I posted this, from my phone, the service was back up.

Hey, these things happen. But it would be nice if the network techs would tell the support techs so they and customers wouldn't waste amazing amounts of time going through fruitless exercises like rebooting modems and running line diagnostics.

Not that I'm bitter after 40 minutes online and on the phone with support. Julia Rappaport says she spent two hours on hold and the 45 minutes on the line with a tech. Outage reports come from Roslindale, the Back Bay, Cambridge and Ward 2 in Somerville. Other parts of Somerville, Quincy and Salem report no problems.

Did I make a mistake trusting Verizon?

adamg — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 13:37:48 +0000

I've been a loyal Speakeasy DSL customer since forever. But when I went to the support site to see about increasing the speed on our line, I discovered they've decided to concentrate on business users. While I do use DSL for my business (natch), their rates are way more than I want to pay. So I signed up for Verizon DSL - theoretically, way more bandwidth at less cost than what we're paying Speakeasy now.

Verizon to would-be FiOS customer: Hurry up and wait

adamg — Fri, 14 May 2010 20:52:50 +0000

Rob Sama reports he just got the following notification:

We can’t wait to bring you blazing-fast FiOS Internet and an overall experience that will blow you away! This e-mail confirms your revised installation appointment for Verizon FiOS Internet Service.

* Scheduled Installation Date – 08-31-2010

Internet protocol as labor issue

adamg — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 12:59:07 +0000

IBEW fights with Verizon, Comcast/Xfinity over who gets to work on VoIP installations.

DSL slow in Davis Square?

adamg — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 12:01:28 +0000

Seems so to at least a couple of Verizon customers.

Verizon to Boston: Ha, ha, you suck

adamg — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 15:04:54 +0000

Verizon is winding down its FiOS expansion, and guess which largest city in New England won't be getting any? So now Boston's pinning its hopes on Google to combat Comcast and RCN, only hasn't Google said it's more into the pilot-program sort of thing and wouldn't be wiring up an entire city anyway?

New low for Cable Guy: Now he's stealing from Verizon

adamg — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 15:02:56 +0000

District A-7 reports that when Verizon workers asked some jamoke what the hell he was doing in one of their bucket trucks at Crestway Road and Waldemar Avenue in East Boston Wednesday morning, he claimed he was doing work for Comcast. After they chased him off, the workers discovered he had stolen roughly $55,000 worth of copper cable.

He's described as white, about 35 and unshaven.

Verizon might want to hire a usability consultant for its Web site

adamg — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:13:22 +0000

You really have to read the instructions a customer-service rep sent Jessica Lipnack for getting into her small-business account via the Verizon Web site.

Keep the telephone mural in Boston

adamg — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 14:01:48 +0000

So Verizon removed the telephone-history mural in its old Post Office Square building because the new owner is not a big fan of the working classes, or something. Jay Fitzgerald is outraged at the thought it might be sold to somebody in Rhode Island:

... It's a striking mural in the old WPA style. It depicts a major innovation developed in Boston. It should remain in Boston. ...

And that's why we have a Department of Public Utilities

adamg — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 14:50:45 +0000

The Outraged Liberal details his problems with Verizon getting his busted landline fixed:

It's now been about 24 hours since Verizon called my out-of-service landline to tell me the problem we reported had been fixed the previous afternoon.

Of course, I only found out by calling my voice mail, since the phone didn't ring because the line was still dead. And there was a Verizon tech, the third in three days, in my basement trying to solve the problem two of his colleagues had failed to fix.

Even though they reported that they had. ...