Telephone Company & Paranoid Theories (Part 1)

Bellsouth sucks! I know it’s AT&T now but I will call it what I damn well please and letmetellya the name change has NOT improved the quality of service. The company sucks. Not suckish or suckie, sucks! Not because of its mammoth corporate existence but because it takes no real pride in customer service. I say this because I’ve been a customer for more than 15 years and it hasn’t gotten any better.

I’m trying to log onto the Internet and it’s not working so I need some technical support right? So I called from my home phone (also serviced by BellSouth/AT&T) and that shit is messed up too. After calling technical support three times from my home phone, it inexplicably disconnects while I’m on hold—10 minutes the first time, 12 the second time, seven the last time. And inputting my information all over again on each call and dealing with the annoying automated system that can “hear” me speak the information but never gets the response right is really getting on my nerves.

“You said you’d like to add features to your service, is that right?” says the automated recording.

“No,” I say. “I’m having connection problems.”

“Please choose from one of the following options…”

“Connection,” I say again.

“You said you’d like to add features to your service, is that right?

“Oh for the love of God why can’t I just speak to a human being.” I scream into the phone.

“I’m sorry I’m having so much trouble understanding you. I’ll get you over to someone who can help you,” says the automated voice.

By the third round of this I am completely frustrated. But then I start to get a little paranoid, like maybe my account has been flagged for all the times that I’ve called and cursed them out. So they do this just to screw with me. But I get clever, and call from my cell phone even though it’s before my free nights kick in. But the bastards have that number flagged too apparently ‘cause I was on hold for 26 minutes that time. I couldn’t hold on anymore. These were my precious anytime minutes we’re talking about here.

So I just hung up. I have no Internet and I can’t call about it because my home phone is messed up too. This bites…