Tag Archives: terrible service

One More Reason To Hate The Banking Industry

Today, I received a letter from Wachovia, my bank. In this letter, Wachovia claimed to be “committed to meeting [my] needs” by telling me how to handle my money. More specifically, they told me that I was exceeding the number of times I could transfer money from my savings account into my checking account. Furthermore, if I have the nerve to do what I want with my money once more, they will kick the money in my savings account into my checking account and shut down the savings account.

Oh no! I might lose the one percent or so of internet I earn on it! Oh no, I will have pissed off one more bank because they won’t let me control _my_ money! Oh no!

Looks like I will just accelerate my planned transition to do all of my banking with ING, which has a checking account that earns 4+ percent.

WiGo Wireless’ Incompetence (i.e., Commerce Is A Difficult Thing)

I understand exchanging goods for services is a difficult thing. And WiGo Wireless, a Falls Church, Virginia, reseller of cell phone plans that I have recommended in the past, struggles with this exact problem. The point of this post is tell you never to interact with WiGo Wireless, or at least its sales person Paul Jaeger. If you understand this, then there is no point in reading further.

The simple version of the story is that Paul Jaeger and WiGo Wireless actively lied to me in selling a phone that does not sync with my computer and in selling me a more expensive service plan. Once I realized both of these deceptions, I demanded my money back. They refunded me all but $15, saying that this $15 is a non-refundable upgrade fee. Besides the fact that my decision to upgrade was based upon Paul Jaeger and Wigo Wireless misleading me, they (1) never filed the paperwork to actually upgrade my service (i.e., I asked for a refund before they actually upgraded my service) and (2) their bill did not specify this was a non-refundable fee.

In the end, I filed complaints with my bank and the Better Business Bureau, and received the refund in full. The lesson, as promised in the first paragraph, is do not do business with WiGo Wireless or Paul Jaeger.

Three last tidbits:
(1) The repetitious use of WiGo Wireless and Paul Jaeger is meant to assist with search engines.

(2) If you want the long version of this story, which has even more instances of lies and deception on Paul Jaeger’s and WiGo Wireless’ parts, I can e-mail you my four-page single-spaced letter.

(3) I also had the pleasure of paying a “migration fee” when I moved from ATT to Cingular, a fee I doubt Cingular will refund me now that they are ATT (again).

FiOS Install Insanity

In mid-October, I decided that I would switch from Cox high-speed Internet service to Verizon’s FiOS. The decision was made because of speed, price, and reliability issues. That decision has proved to be a miserable one.

My first call to Verizon went smoothly, with my order being placed quickly. Ooops, she didn’t bother asking me for my credit card number. As a result, she let my order “expire” without notifying me.

My second call to Verizon was meant to quickly re-order FiOS. We went through all the questions and information, only to find someone in their system using my SSN. I was transferred twice before I spoke to someone who could de-conflict the identity issue. Oops, he was an ass and I wasn’t about to deal with him.

My third call to Verizon was to de-conflict the identity issue. Because of Verizon’s inability to keep identities straight, I had to fax several identity documents. They promised a call back within four hours of my fax. Oops, no one called back.

My fourth call–to check on the status of the de-conflicting–led me to be transferred about five times and on the phone for more than an hour, only to–oops–end up at the number I began and being told that everything had been cleared.

Too stupid to realize I should bail on FiOS, but smart enough to know calling was idiotic, I took to the Web. Signing up for FiOS on the Web was simple and I scheduled an appointment for between 8-12p on November 11, 2006. I wake up bright and early November 11 to be ready for the coming technician. Oops, the technician didn’t come.

At 1230p, I call Verizon–my fifth call, stupid me. Oops, they can’t find an order using my name, phone number, or address. Eventually, they were able to using my order number included in my order-confirmation e-mail.

The operator tells me the technician is on his way and that she will have him call me to provide an ETA. Oops, no one calls.

At 130p, I call Verizon for the sixth time, wondering (1) where’s my call back and (2) when is the technician coming. The customer service operator says that my “ticket” has been picked up and he should be there any minute, but that she’ll call him to see how long he will be. Oops, he’s still on a job and _has_no_idea_when_he’ll_be_here.

The operator tells me I should reschedule. Yeah, one more weekend day–if I’m lucky!–wasted! Oops, in trying to reschedule, the scheduling system that was supposed to take five minutes to “come up” is down, something I find out only after 15 minutes of abysmal ambient-space-jazz hold music.

Because the system is down, I’ll have to wait for a sysadmin to help. I tell her to forget it and cancel my order. Oops, she doesn’t have authorization to cancel my order and I’ll have to call a different number Monday through Friday. I tell her yeah right and that she’ll have to do whatever it takes to cancel my order because I’m done with Verizon.

Bah!