*WEDDING.BLOG.LINK*

So any of you out there expecting me to go on a tireless diatribe about how much I love the phone company are probably ready to fall out of your tree any minute anyway - so I'll bid you all adieu right now.

For those still with me, I'd like to let you know that I'm pissed at the phone company. The one and only, Aliant.

After years of less than stellar service at home with my parents, I moved to NB, where I was promptly gouged for a phone line worth about a 10th as much as I paid for it in my residence room. (The kids now pay about what a phone is worth, thanks to some slick Eastlink action). Not long after that, I realized what type of company I was dealing with when my residential phone on Union street, not only cost a fortune, but worked like a**, picking up Radio Canada Internationale and producing enough static to make it impossible to yell over - all AFTER someone came to fix it.

I had almost forgotten about Aliant for a while, but when I moved to Moncton, I was quickly reminded of their inadequacies. I requested to have my phone number changed because I didn't want someone to call me. (Turns out he never did, but that's beside the point) I requested the service, and requested again, and again, and again, and eventually gave up. I was assured again and again that it would get done, but it's now a year later and I still have the same number. Thankfully, I don't need to have it changed anymore, but there's no way that the phone company knows that - I asked to have something done and they didn't do it and that pisses me off.

And now, a new dilemma presents itself.

I want to add voice-mail to my phone service. I go to the website, fill out the request form, and they send me an e-mail saying "please tell us your password, then we can work on your account"

Two problems I have with this:

1. There isn't really any such thing as a 'secure' e-mail, so there's no way I'm going to e-mail, in plain text, a password that apparently has ultimate powers in unlocking some information about me that is password protected. That's just stupid.
2. I haven't interacted with the phone company for at least 8 months. Are they really expecting me to recall a piece of information I invented and last accessed 8 months ago? I didn't even remember that I even HAVE a password, let alone what it is. Now, they could be assuming I'm using a password that's the same as all my other passwords (bank, email, etc), or that I wrote it down somewhere, or that it maps to some important bit of info from my life, such as a birthday or something - but these ALL completely negate the reason for having a password in the first place, which is security. Are they expecting me to start guessing, by using passwords that I use for other things? (try the bank password, try the e-mail password, try the NT logon password, try my home computer password) Fat chance I'm going to give any of those vital bits of info to someone who's willing to have me fling my password across the internet in plain text!

Anyway, so I figure if I CALL them, they'll be able to verify what phone I'm calling from, maybe ask me some security questions, decide that it's safe to proceed and make the changes I need, like a reasonable organization. When I called them, the lady told me that they cannot do ANYTHING to my account without the password. Great.

So I get off the phone with her - disgusted but holding it together.
I call back, go to a different place in their little automated push-button thingy, and get on the phone with another lady and ask her if she can take my complaint. I made it very clear that my complaint in no way had anything to do with her or any other Aliant employees in specific, and was a matter of policy - so please don't get offended. I just wanted to make my voice heard and move on.
I tell her what I'm upset about - it's not reasonable to expect someone to remember information this way, it's not reasonable to provide no recourse if the information is lost, etc - and she starts to argue with me !! I couldn't believe it. I kept my cool and didn't argue back or anything, but I couldn't believe that she was trying to talk me out of my opinion.

She also told me that the account passwords are 'optional' and you don't have to have them set up if you don't want them, but once a password is set, you have to show up at one of their special identity verification stations (ie: mall kiosk) and present your ID to reset the password - which is crazy because I never would have put a password on the account if I didn't feel like it was necessary, so someone at Aliant 'pressured' me into it a long time ago, neglecting to mention that my account would be totally inaccessible if I ever forgot what that password was.

Lady: "Aren't you happy we're protecting your account so effectively?"
JD: "No. I'm upset because I can't do anything with the account. If I was pleased with it, I wouldn't be asking you to record a complaint."

Lady: "We're regulated by the CRTC and have to have checks like this in place."
JD: "Didn't you just tell me that the passwords were optional."
Lady: "Yes, they are"
JD: "Well, are the passwords optional, or does the CRTC require them?"
Lady: "What do you mean?"

The whole time she's been interrupting me, trying to get her points in.

I'm starting to get upset at this point so I ended the conversation by asking her to please just log my complaint so that someone hears what I have to say.

Maybe I don't have the security requirements that the typical Aliant/CRTC user has. It really wouldn't be a huge deal if someone called and added a $5 option to my phone service without me knowing. I'd just call and have it removed. So what - I'm an atypical customer. Arguing with me about the merits of a password verification system is not going to make me into a typical customer. And I should not have been persuaded to password protect my account if it's not something that suits my usage pattern with the phone company.

Also, I want to point out that it's a little sad that a 25+ girl is sitting in a call center somewhere making $10/hr and working terrible hours, and is willing to stand up for the phone company she works for to the extent that she was willing to treat me so poorly - not only was it a bad way to treat someone who is your customer, but I would have been offended talking with anyone if they were arguing with me in such a manner. I couldn't believe she was interrupting me! I certainly let her finish everything she had to say...

Anyway, here's to competition in the telco sector.