How Verizon does math

Discussion in 'The Lounge - Off Topic' started by ffreeloader, Dec 8, 2006.

  1. ffreeloader

    ffreeloader Terabyte Poster

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    Take a listen to the phone call found in the following link. In it it's obvious that out of 6 Verizon employees, including one of their managers, that none of them understood the difference between the following two numbers: .002 and .00002.

    I don't know how this guy kept his cool in the face of such repeated stupidity, but he is definitely not very good at teaching mathematics.

    http://media.putfile.com/Verizon-Bad-Math
     
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  2. Bluerinse
    Honorary Member

    Bluerinse Exabyte Poster

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    I think he did pretty well really not to lose his rag, considering how dense the reps were. Surely they should have realised the guy had a point and that he really had been mis-quoted on numerous occasions. They should have taken his details and discussed the situation with their accounts/billing department. Then they should have waived his current bill and apologised for their mistake, thanked him for bringing the matter to their attention and quoted him the rates for future downloads in the correct context.
     
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  3. zebulebu

    zebulebu Terabyte Poster

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    This kind of thing is what drives me absolutely up the wall with call centres. The 'Supervisors' are often completely and utterly incompetent - worse even than some of the poor sods answering the calls.

    Best example of this is, without a doubt, BT. I was consulting last year and turned up at a client's office where their little (BT supplied) router had exploded and been replaced. Since the replacement was put in, they hadn't been able to get their mail or out onto the net (we acted as their ISP). The config on the Firewall hadn't changed, so what was it likely to be? The router - right? It took me 45 minutes on the line with ONE 'team leader' before being passed on to the network team, who checked and, within 30 seconds (no exaggeration) they saw that the router had a default config put on it instead of the one specified on the contract and, as a result, traffic was being NATed incorrectly.

    Call centres are the worst invention ever.
     
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  4. Sparky
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    Sparky Zettabyte Poster Moderator

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    That was quite painful after a while, ffs! :biggrin
     
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  5. Baba O'Riley

    Baba O'Riley Gigabyte Poster

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    I had to stop listening to it after 15 minutes or my head would've exploded. What happened at the end? Did he get anywhere?
     
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  6. Sparky
    Highly Decorated Member Award 500 Likes Award

    Sparky Zettabyte Poster Moderator

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    They charged him $7,000 :tongue
     
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  7. ffreeloader

    ffreeloader Terabyte Poster

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    Not really. According to other sources I have read on this story, Verizon is finally starting to realize how stupid they are looking after the customer posted the recording on the internet. They are now offering him half off the charges if he will sign off on something that absolves them of any culpability.

    People who say they used to work in Verizon call centers say what this guy published goes on constantly, and is basically company policy. Whether that is true or not I can't say, but it certainly agrees with what I have experienced with other cell phone companies customer support. My experience says intentional stupidity seems to be the way they(cell phone companies at large) all deal with customer's issues when they are making money off of issues that they created through deceptive salesmen, or completely incompetent or dishonest customer service reps.

    I've called cell phone companies over one issue months on end, and not a one of the customer service reps, their supervisors, or managers would admit that I had ever called before on this issue, and the issue resulted in my wife and I losing service 2 weeks out of every month. Needless to say it finally became a yelling match and I told them I was canceling their contract and would never pay them another penny. I have never paid them another cent, and that's been 4 years ago.
     
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