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Poor Customer Service

I wanted help upgrading. Now I wish to register a complaint. If this is not the place where I can get action, please direct me to the correct department.

Today I tried to accomplish two upgrades to my existing (month-to-month) Triple Play FIOS service; I am a retired firefighter with severe hearing loss. I didn't find out that I cannot get closed-captioning with my FIOS TV Prime HD until after I tried to use it; so I was trying to upgrade to the Extreme (next) level. I also wanted to upgrade my internet 5/15 mbps to 25/50. After :20 minutes of effort with no success I went into the online chat (#06181251047). I spent :90 in chat with the agent. Even though I selected month-to-month, the 2-year agreement kept showing. I mentioned numerous times I had family matters to deal with, but stayed at it. Finally the agent said they were having connectivity issues, and needed to have another department to take over, don't worry, they'll have the chat info (It's obvious now they were "closing"). Yet that second agent simply told me the office was closed. Absolutely nothing else. NO direction as to what I should do, even if it was tomorrow. The chat narrative will show that I told her I felt she represents Verizon in a bad light. I'm not happy with having to take 2 (unnecessarily wasted) hours away from my family at mealtime, only to have a "Sorry - Closed" sign put in my face. I see this as a routine upgrade to these agents, but instead they wasted my time, and worse, made me lose confidence in Verizon FIOS.

Greg {edited for privacy}

Comments

Anthony_VZ

Sorry Greg for the problems you are having. Let me state first and foremost you do not have to upgrade your service to get closed captions to work. They are controlled by the Verizon set top box. To turn them on, press the * button on your remote over and over until it says "Closed Caption: CC1" . Please let us know if you need further assist and we will work with you to make sure the closed captions to work.

konabish

RE: Closed-captioning -- I have already upgraded.

Back THEN: When I initially subscribed to FIOS, and tried to use cc, there was a message that I must upgrade to have cc.

NOW: I tried to use cc today: Fresh batteries, clear access between remote and set-top box, known cc-enabled channels...

I press the * button over and over; yellow light flashes to right of channel display, but no cc: .... I tried on major stations, clicked up to 30 times. NOTHING

BTW, When I upgraded I clearly told the agent I was upgrading because I couldn't get cc: with the channel line-up I had. If I already had cc: as you say, I have to ask why she didn't tell me that?

I appreciate your response. I would have by now expected some response about my initial complaint regarding poor customer service, instead of "piecemeal" replies.

tns

These are peer to peer forums, although one Verizon person did decide to respond. But if you need support lookd for a "Contact us' option often at the bottom of these pages.

?Subscribe for CC??

As far as I know it was always available. For most connections and remotes the * (asterisk) button should allow you to select. Most channels have CC. Only for coax connections to TV should you have to use CC on your TV (may or may not map correctly on Verizon remotes).

Try a reboot of your box. Either from menu, settings, customer support, in home agent, Or by pulling the power.

tns

Peer to Peer. I.e you need to use "contact us" option

konabish

I'll retry all that, then contact support. Thanks for the input.

konabish

RE: "Let me state first and foremost you do not have to upgrade your service to get closed captions to work. They are controlled by the Verizon set top box." {....... Ah, Catch-22 !! You do not need to upgrade your service; BUT you must pay an additional $9.99 per month for a closed-caption enabled box..}

OK, I followed your directions. 50 times I pushed the star button, 50 times the yellow light flashed, but no CC.

I was fortunate; customer service called me about the other issues, including CC: Today she put me on the phone with a tech, who spent about 15 minutes trying without success to get me into CC. He went away to get help. When he returned he said that "You need to upgrade your set-top box to a model 1700 or above". Hmmm, I already had to upgrade my TV service..... So he's done with tech help, and I must call customer service back.

Remember, I was never told the set-top box I received (when I had FIOS installed) WAS NOT closed-captioning enabled. I was not told this either when I called-in after trouble-shooting the CC: at home with a Verizon agent on the phone. I can't recall what they said; but I do recall reading after that, on a FIOS screen, that I had to upgrade my TV service to get CC: Which I did. Still no CC: I liked the extra channels, so I left that 'issue' alone.

Back to customer service today; I tell her that the tech says I need a 1700 or above box. Checking.... OK, we can deliver that for 19.95, and we'll give you 6 months 'free', after which you'll pay 9.99 extra a month. You get HD, too; but that's not what I want.

And this is nickel-dime-ing me, for errors of Verizon employees.

So, okay. I'm still working with a very good Verizon customer service lady. Thank Heaven for her. If she keeps handling this as well as she is, I'll be happy. Nothing really resolved yet. My issues really should have been settled by now. But at least there's "hope". BTW, I'm keeping this going so that 1. maybe someone else having troubles will get some benefit from it, and 2. To show you there was more to it than your answer. Not criticizing, just passing-on the info that completes what you said.

Now I'm going to watch a movie, struggle to understand what they're saying, and resume with customer service after the weekend, Wasn't this fun.

tns

FIOS started operating after CC rules were mandatory. I never heard of any of their boxes not supporting CC. What boxes do your have? How are the connected to your TV? For certain types of conections like old fasion coax, the TV not the STB must do the CC.

konabish

Now you have heard of a STB not supporting CC, and it was from a tech, affirmed by a customer service rep, then (after I said something similar to your experience) finally by a 'manager'.

I'm going to have to spell it all out for the customer service rep when we talk again on Monday (7/9/12), so you get it all:

Trouble was, I really needed that high-speed internet installed for a big project; I already had FIOS DSL, but it was seriously slowing down my project. Not a good place to be coming from.

The STB is a Motorola QIP 2500/1006. I should say here that in the first 5 minutes the Verizon installer was at my home I could see things were probably not going right. He's a mumbler, and talks mostly with his head turned away; even though I told him I was thinking of calling for another installer; he drifted back to the mumbling on and off. I know they can only do so much w/o extra charge. I wanted the o/s cable to 'split ' before going into the house: One part thru the wall for the router, then run the FIOS cable another 25 feet further, and thru the wall for the TV. At first he said he could do that. But instead of continuing his o/s FIOS cable another 25 feet, he ran it only thru the wall by my office, to the router.

Right now the FIOS incoming line comes only thru the wall by my office, He attached a short cable, to which he connected a 2 way splitter: One side has the router's connector attached. To the other side of the splitter he connected to an existing an old coax cable that runs 20 feet under the carpet along the edge of the wall (between my office and the living room) to the living room. He connected 'his' coax (cable?) to the end of the old coax to get the STB about 10 feet away.

I know I should have insisted he do what I wanted. But I suspected early-on that besides looking somewhat grubby, he was lazy. It got to the point I didn't want to deal with his trying to avoid work; our conversation was mostly 'polite' arguing. The TV was working, 'seemingly okay', so against better judgment I let it be. But I still thought the line should have been split.

BTW, I've tried using the TV set's CC:, but it requires the TV to be tuning each channel. I don't see a way around that.

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