Ameritech From An Ex-Employee
Written: Jan 04 '03
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Pros: none
Cons: everything
The Bottom Line: steer clear
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| kymbadlee's Full Review: Ameritech SpeedPath ADSL |
Whenever I write a review of something that already has been reviewed 30 times, I usually try to explain what new angle I am adding. I decided to write about Ameritech for a few reasons:
1. The service is so unbelieveable unrealiable I'm surprised there aren't more people complaining.
2. I would like to add an ex-employee point of view.
3. Being an ex-employee, I belive the information provided previously about this service is slightly biased.
First, I would like to give some background inforamtion on what exactly happens if you ere to sign up for this service. One possibility is that you will recieve a call from the sales team trying to get your business. Or, you could call sales yourself and request service. Either way, these people who are setting up your service are employed by a company who is NOT Ameritech. They do not live anywhere near the area for which Ameritech provides service. If youa re told the service is not available in your area, it is very possible that if you call right back and get someone else, you may just find it IS available in your area.
Once you request service, it could take several months until you HAVE service. The technicians who install your DSL are contracted by yet ANOTHER company. When you call the 800 number and ask where your tech is, the person you call in PA has no idea where the tech is who lives in MI. They do not know and to be quite honest they do not care, it is not their problem. You may find a sympathetic ear on the other line, but really they can do nothing for you. If you call Ameritech phone service for answers you will reach yet another company, who cannot help you. All you really can do is sit back and wait possibly several months.
You may be lucky enough to have it installed quickly. Not likely, but possibly. You now must contact the billing depatment to set up your new account. Billing is conveniently located with sales. So any descrepencies there can easily be worked out between the two departments right? Wrong, all that does is send you back and forth between departments. It makes it really easy for the two departments to blame each other and send you back and forth. Eventually someone will be in a good mood and decide to set you up with a username and password. They'll tell you to put them in and start surfing with ultimate speeds.
So that wasa big hassle but it was all worth it because now you are going to surf the web with speeds of 700 kbps right? In two years I never heard of one person who had nearly that much speed. But I'm getting ahead of myself. You will never get your DSL connected to know what speed you are getting. You will most likely have to call tech support, who is also in the same building with sales and billing. Well guess where you are now... If you have never been connected, tech support is allowed to blame it on billing. If you can't connect billing is allowed to say that's a tech support issue. And sales? Well they are off the hook once the tech insatlls your DSL. And guess what? THAT tech ran out of your house the second he had it installed. SO NOW what? Now you sit on hold for hours at a time while people who have never used Ameritechs service, or even heard of it before they took the job, send you from department to department.
(Another bit of advice, the Compaq computers that Ameritech promotes, have never and will never connect. Do NOT purchase this deal.)
By chance that you were somehow one of the lucky few to get connected, service is always dropped. Tech support will almost alwasy say (insert your area) is down. Mail never works. News servers have been down since 99. Chicago is the absolute worst area to have service in, their server is a piece of crap.
Lastly, as far as tech support goes... I'm an ex tech support agent for Ameritech, well the company Ameritech hired to do their tech support anyway. I never had any formal training in computers. I had to take a pretty simple test to get the job. It is fair to say that many of the techs had no idea how to use a computer let alone be a tech suppport agent. But for the most part, in our defense, most of the problems were related to the fact that the service sucks. And for the few of us who knew what were doing, there wasn't much we could do for you.
A couple more things.
-If you have a router, there is no one in the whole building who can help you.
-The longer we talk to you the worse our stats are, techs want to get off the phone as soon as possible.
-Trouble tickets rarely make it past the supervisors desks.
-If you ask to talk to a supervisor you are put on the phone with a regular employee who is designated to take sup calls that day.
-There is no power outage in your area, that's an excuse.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
kymbadlee
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Location: Pa
Reviews written: 67
Trusted by: 23 members
About Me:
Self preservation is a full time occupation" -Ani DiFranco
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