Let me start by saying that I am not looking for any bill reductions as I am OK with the price I am paying for the services I am getting from Aliant. But, I would like Bell Aliant to take notice at the quality of the customer service that they are providing. I have been an Aliant customer for about a decade now in various forms, i.e calling card, internet etc. My problems started after I moved residences. Here are the problems -
1.) After my internet was moved, I decided to get a land line as my wife needed it. I went to the Kiosk near where I work and got it added. The woman added me to it and said it would be active in 24 hours or so. That did not happen. Then I called repair and they said everything will be fine in a little bit etc, it did not work. I called on Monday morning and the person on the phone (someone who took the time to figure the problem out) said, I was not registered for a phone line at all, just for long distance. Long distance using a non existent land line, how does that work? Anyways, after more than 5 phone calls and many hours of my life, we got a dial tone for the land line. Then, we realized that it only worked in one of the rooms and had to wait for repair and so on. Anyways, this issue was sorted.
2.) The company my wife works for uses freeconferencecall for some of it's conferences, we noticed that we are unable to make calls to this number using Aliant. I was able to call using my Rogers cell phone but not using an Aliant land line with unlimited North America long distance. After lots of back and forth with repair and customer service, I was told by repair to call Bell as they were the ones who blocked it and not Aliant even though I pay Aliant for my services. Not sure what I could have said when I call Bell and they ask me my account info. Anyways, I tweeted the BellAlaint twitter account and finally got some information from someone. This issue never got resolved and my wife just found an alternative.
3.) I started noticing my internet was really slow even though I was on High Speed Ultra. So, I called tech support and did a bunch of speed tests as I was asked and they said they would send a tech. The tech came and left saying everything was fine. Not sure what they did. I called again and complained and this time someone else came and a message was left on my phone which said that there is a congestion issue and so on. I accepted this but did not want to pay full price for this as I am not getting the service that I am paying for here and I wanted to know if I could get out of my contract. I call Aliant Billing, the person on the phone said that I need to get Ultra as that will get me better speeds. I was already on Ultra and this person was mistaken. I repeatedly told him this and he said he doesn't agree with me. So, I asked for a supervisor, he said he cannot for this issue as I need to get Ultra. He says, I could talk to Customer Solutions. I talk to someone there who I explain my problem to, she knew what she was doing, she was excellent and I believe that she should be training everyone that works at an Aliant call centre. She called tech support, found out all the info and came back to me and confirmed that I already had Ultra and there were congestion issues. She also explained about the fact that Aliant is promoting FibreOP. Fibre is just not available where I live at the moment. Anyways, she was able to keep me as a customer by giving me free long distance for the year and giving me the option of cancelling my contract without penalty. I decided to stay for now as I was not sure if I wanted the hassle of getting internet etc set up again and the deal she gave me is more than reasonable.
4.) I had switched to online billing when I set up the land line.For some reason, I have been unable to log in to this Aliant account on the web site. So, I call technical support, the person on phone says that there is a problem with the name on the account as it does not match and to call customer care on Monday to resolve this problem as he could not do it. I call customer care and explain my problem, first thing she does is transfer me to technical support as she cannot help me. The technical support person tries to help me and registers my account etc and tells me to wait about 30 mins and I should be able to access my bill. Of course, it did not work. I call billing, she again transfers me to technical support, this time I made sure that both departments were on the line at the same time and explained the problem. The technical support person said she could definitely help me. I lucked out here, this person seemed to know how to fix this problem and said it was a corrupt account or something of that nature and was able to reset the account and I am now able to access my bill. After all this, being somewhat annoyed, I asked her if there was some way I could "make an official complaint as I believe that there is a training issue here", she transfers me to sales (I thought it was customer solutions), I explain the problem to her and say that I believe that there is a training issue here. She says that the person trying to sell me Ultra may have not realized what I had because of all the codes they have etc. To me, that is a training issue which she did not agree with. This went back and forth and then she suggested I talk to customer solutions, I get transferred to customer solutions. I ask the person if he knew about all the problems, he said that he did not really know but said that he was told that I was looking for a bill reduction, which I had never asked for. I then proceeded to explain to him all the problems I have written about above and said that I am not looking for a bill reduction and just wanted Aliant to be aware that they have a training issue. He was nice enough to admit that he did not have much power in his position and would get a manager to call me back. He empathized with me and said he would pass the info along.
Maybe, I will get a call back, but at this point I got annoyed enough to write this blog post.
1.) After my internet was moved, I decided to get a land line as my wife needed it. I went to the Kiosk near where I work and got it added. The woman added me to it and said it would be active in 24 hours or so. That did not happen. Then I called repair and they said everything will be fine in a little bit etc, it did not work. I called on Monday morning and the person on the phone (someone who took the time to figure the problem out) said, I was not registered for a phone line at all, just for long distance. Long distance using a non existent land line, how does that work? Anyways, after more than 5 phone calls and many hours of my life, we got a dial tone for the land line. Then, we realized that it only worked in one of the rooms and had to wait for repair and so on. Anyways, this issue was sorted.
2.) The company my wife works for uses freeconferencecall for some of it's conferences, we noticed that we are unable to make calls to this number using Aliant. I was able to call using my Rogers cell phone but not using an Aliant land line with unlimited North America long distance. After lots of back and forth with repair and customer service, I was told by repair to call Bell as they were the ones who blocked it and not Aliant even though I pay Aliant for my services. Not sure what I could have said when I call Bell and they ask me my account info. Anyways, I tweeted the BellAlaint twitter account and finally got some information from someone. This issue never got resolved and my wife just found an alternative.
3.) I started noticing my internet was really slow even though I was on High Speed Ultra. So, I called tech support and did a bunch of speed tests as I was asked and they said they would send a tech. The tech came and left saying everything was fine. Not sure what they did. I called again and complained and this time someone else came and a message was left on my phone which said that there is a congestion issue and so on. I accepted this but did not want to pay full price for this as I am not getting the service that I am paying for here and I wanted to know if I could get out of my contract. I call Aliant Billing, the person on the phone said that I need to get Ultra as that will get me better speeds. I was already on Ultra and this person was mistaken. I repeatedly told him this and he said he doesn't agree with me. So, I asked for a supervisor, he said he cannot for this issue as I need to get Ultra. He says, I could talk to Customer Solutions. I talk to someone there who I explain my problem to, she knew what she was doing, she was excellent and I believe that she should be training everyone that works at an Aliant call centre. She called tech support, found out all the info and came back to me and confirmed that I already had Ultra and there were congestion issues. She also explained about the fact that Aliant is promoting FibreOP. Fibre is just not available where I live at the moment. Anyways, she was able to keep me as a customer by giving me free long distance for the year and giving me the option of cancelling my contract without penalty. I decided to stay for now as I was not sure if I wanted the hassle of getting internet etc set up again and the deal she gave me is more than reasonable.
4.) I had switched to online billing when I set up the land line.For some reason, I have been unable to log in to this Aliant account on the web site. So, I call technical support, the person on phone says that there is a problem with the name on the account as it does not match and to call customer care on Monday to resolve this problem as he could not do it. I call customer care and explain my problem, first thing she does is transfer me to technical support as she cannot help me. The technical support person tries to help me and registers my account etc and tells me to wait about 30 mins and I should be able to access my bill. Of course, it did not work. I call billing, she again transfers me to technical support, this time I made sure that both departments were on the line at the same time and explained the problem. The technical support person said she could definitely help me. I lucked out here, this person seemed to know how to fix this problem and said it was a corrupt account or something of that nature and was able to reset the account and I am now able to access my bill. After all this, being somewhat annoyed, I asked her if there was some way I could "make an official complaint as I believe that there is a training issue here", she transfers me to sales (I thought it was customer solutions), I explain the problem to her and say that I believe that there is a training issue here. She says that the person trying to sell me Ultra may have not realized what I had because of all the codes they have etc. To me, that is a training issue which she did not agree with. This went back and forth and then she suggested I talk to customer solutions, I get transferred to customer solutions. I ask the person if he knew about all the problems, he said that he did not really know but said that he was told that I was looking for a bill reduction, which I had never asked for. I then proceeded to explain to him all the problems I have written about above and said that I am not looking for a bill reduction and just wanted Aliant to be aware that they have a training issue. He was nice enough to admit that he did not have much power in his position and would get a manager to call me back. He empathized with me and said he would pass the info along.
Maybe, I will get a call back, but at this point I got annoyed enough to write this blog post.
