gould@pilot.njin.net (Brian Jay Gould) (10/27/90)
I have been trying to help a non-profit organization cope with the people at New Jersey Bell who don't give a s--- whether or not the Centrex service works for them. It all started when it wasn't possible to disable call forwarding. Several calls to NJ Bell over two weeks resulted in no action from NJ Bell. I then called on their behalf. NJ Bell folks told the customer that the problem HAD to be that they weren't keying the right codes. I insisted that the problem had to be in software. Then after tedious instructions between NJ Bell and the customer, NJ Bell decided that the problem was with a faulty installation of lines several weeks before the problem began. I called again to suggest that their analysis was cow dip. They said they'd look into it. After working with the customer over the phone for a few more minutes, NJ Bell suggested that "all of the telephones" at the customer site must be defective. They called the customer again about fifteen minutes later and asked them to try it again. It worked! I asked, A software problem? "NO" insisted NJ Bell. The problem must have been with the customer's wiring but has suddenly corrected itself! (?!) Now, the same customer needs to reconfigure their services to something much more sensible. (multi-line phones, and some feature changes) NJ Bell refuses to give them the time of day. No one will call back, and customer service says that they can't help. After dealing with NJ Bell for about nine years, I have come to understand that it is their policy to deny that they have any problems (both technically, and in other matters). But if someone in the system can help, please call me at (609) 799-2706 - or send e-mail. I know that NJ Bell is too busy to help a 40 line customer, but it is a public service organization. Any disclaimers made for me, by me, or about me - may or may not accurately reflect my failure to be reflecting the opinions of myself or anyone else. Brian Jay Gould - Professional Brain-stormer [Moderator's Note: I had my service changed in numerous ways in the past couple of days: IBT is still trying to get it working right! I dropped Starline and subscribed to all the new CLASS features. Maybe I will write about it in one of the issues over the weekend. Its been a real riot. :) PAT]
dave@westmark.westmark.com (Dave Levenson) (10/27/90)
NJ Bell, like many entrenched beaurocracies, seems to employ a number
of people whose initial reaction to any trouble report is a quick
search of the 'standard responses' database for a reply that avoids
responsibility for the problem. I have been a computer and
communications consultant in NJ for more than ten years. I am always
hearing about some trouble, probably caused by CO mis-administration
or outside plant mis-arrangements. NJ Bell repair service is very
good at trying to convince the customer that their equipment, or their
use of their service, is at fault.
If I have explain the situation to the repair service call-taker more
than once and they still do not agree that NJ Bell needs to take some
action to relieve the trouble, I usually find it's best to agree with
them, and politely excuse myself from the conversation, and hang up.
Wait ten minutes, and call again. There are also enough good,
well-intentioned, and even technically competent people there that you
stand a reasonable chance of reaching one of them on the next call.
(I sometimes luck out and reach one of these helpful types on the
first call!)
It often takes more than one call to get telco trouble fixed in NJ,
but it seldom seems to take more than two.
Their customer-contact people operate under the assumption that
anybody not employed by NJ Bell cannot possibly know anything about
their network. A technical explanation of the problem, and of why you
believe it's 'their problem' is sometimes required to convince them
that you know what you're talking about.
Dave Levenson Internet: dave@westmark.com
Westmark, Inc. UUCP: {uunet | rutgers | att}!westmark!dave
Warren, NJ, USA AT&T Mail: !westmark!dave
[The Man in the Mooney] Voice: 908 647 0900 Fax: 908 647 6857 cowan@marob.masa.com (John Cowan) (10/30/90)
In article <14087@accuvax.nwu.edu>, Dave Levenson <dave@westmark. westmark.com> writes: >A technical explanation of the problem, and of why you >believe it's 'their problem' is sometimes required to convince them >that you know what you're talking about. Sometimes a little technical jargon can work wonders. The other day, I had no dial tone. Being a bit suspicious of the behavior of my cordless phone lately (maybe a new battery is in the works) I promptly plugged in my dumb ole 500 set at the main (and only) jack. Still nothing doing. I walked down the street to a payphone and dialled 611. The usual delays later: Me: "I'd like to report my line, XXX-XXXX out of service." 611: "Are you sure the trouble isn't in your phone, sir?" Me: "Yup -- I checked, and there's no dial tone at the demarc." 611: (sigh of relief). "Okay, that's a big help -- we'll get right on it." It turned out to be a major cable break on my block, and was fixed within 24 hours. And all I know about telecom internals is what I've found out reading the Digest in the last two years or so! cowan@marob.masa.com (aka ...!hombre!marob!cowan) [Moderator's Note: That's nothing! Three years ago I coodunt evun spel Moddoratur, and now I are one. PAT]
TERRY@spcvxa.bitnet (Terry Kennedy, Operations Mgr) (10/30/90)
In article <14038@accuvax.nwu.edu>, gould@pilot.njin.net (Brian Jay Gould) writes: > I have been trying to help a non-profit organization cope with the > people at New Jersey Bell who don't give a s--- whether or not the > Centrex service works for them. It all started when it wasn't > possible to disable call forwarding. Several calls to NJ Bell over > two weeks resulted in no action from NJ Bell. Well, I co-manage a 600-line chunk of Centrex for my employer (St. Peter's College) in Jersey City, NJ. We have the option called CCRS (Customer Con- trolled Rearrangement Service, or Completely Chaotic Random Scrambling, as you prefer 8-). This is a dialup service that lets you verify and/or change the service characteristics for each of your Centrex lines. That's the good news - the bad news is that this doesn't directly manipulate the switch data- base - it just generates "requests" to change things. Thus, you can get out of sync with the switch on occasion. On the few cases where that happens, I call the CCRS manager (_not_ repair service) and ask him to re-sync the switch with the database during the next overnight. I have had one case where that didn't help - one bank of lines wouldn't accept TT dialing, no matter what we did. Repair service didn't want to hear about it - "You have to configure that in your Centrex", etc. Finally I got them to run some tests on it - one complete bank was mis-configured and would not respond to TT. In any event, if you have enough lines to justify it (or if you can convince NJB to give it to you so you'll go away 8-), I'd suggest getting the CCRS so you can manipulate this stuff yourself. Terry Kennedy Operations Manager, Academic Computing terry@spcvxa.bitnet St. Peter's College, US terry@spcvxa.spc.edu (201) 915-9381