"Oh, someone didn't tell you that?"

From previous entries, you know we now have AT&T’s U-verse. I’ve been an AT&T customer for years with a land line, DSL, and, more recently, wireless phones. And I’ve had a combined bill for all these services that’s paid automatically through a credit card each and every month.

So, it came as a surprise to me that I was no longer enrolled in automatic bill payment. The reason? “Well, you used to have an account through your land line and now it’s through U-verse.” So? Aren’t they all AT&T? “With U-verse, it’s treated like it’s a new account.” I have to enroll like a new customer? “Yes.” But, it was three different divisions all together before in a combined bill paid automatically and now it’s still one of those divisions (wireless) along with U-verse. What makes this different. “It just is.”

There are a couple of things about all this that are perplexing. First, when I was told that I would retain combined billing for my wireless and U-verse, no one said that I would have to enroll in automatic bill paying again since U-verse is treated like you’re a whole new customer. Second, the att.com website logins are very confusing. Should I log in as a wireless customer? Should I log in as a U-verse customer? Today I tried wireless since that login screen popped up first. The customer service rep was nice but had no clue regarding my question about automatic billing. So, I was given to a U-verse rep whose paraphrases are shown above. How about ONE place to login no matter what division of AT&T provides service … and then we can split off into different areas for help or FAQs or billing or whatever.

The Blinking Light

Marian called me this morning to tell me that the U-verse battery pack in the basement had an alarm sounding and a red light flashing. When I returned home, I hit the button that says “silence the alarm,” and went online to see what the story was. From what I read, it meant the battery needed to be replaced. Interesting since it was installed “new” within the last several weeks.

I went to the AT&T “contact us” page and found there was no link in their three-tiered set of questions to deal with battery backup systems. Unless you can put an answer into each of the three tiers of questions, you cannot contact them. There is no “Other” choice. Just stuff that didn’t apply to me at all.

So, I started a chat with a technician, Prakesh. He had me do a self test on the battery, but the red light was still blinking. He then told me the battery needed to be replaced. Okay, I thought, let’s schedule an AT&T person to come here and do that.

Nope. I was told that’s not handled by their division and I was given an 866 number to call (the battery manufacturer) for a replacement. So, I have to call a third-party vendor instead of AT&T doing the servicing? Yes. That’s how it is.

To find out more, I called the AT&T U-verse 800 number and, thankfully, worked my way swiftly through the recorded Q&A session to get a live technician. I was told that AT&T (1) had probably installed an old battery that was sitting around too long and, therefore, didn’t hold its charge, and (2) AT&T doesn’t have any of these batteries in stock, so I would have to call the vendor.

I did. Vendor really nice. Looked up my account. Said I’d get a new battery within a couple of days and where to recycle the old one. And he confirmed that they were having lots of calls for replacement of these batteries due to AT&T having them sit on the shelf too long before using them. Oh, I have to do the replacement.

It’s mind boggling to me how AT&T has broken up stuff into different departments (a look at my phone bill shows different 800 numbers for the land line, wireless, did have one for DSL before U-verse, but now have one for U-verse). And even within a division, there is division. Read my earlier blogs about how the U-verse installer the first time couldn’t deal with anything outside the house since it was another division of the service department. Now I have to get service on my U-verse from someone who is not even AT&T.

Anyone there hear of the words “customer service?”

Some new pix

Here's the link to my newest pix.

“Well, if it storms, the TV won’t go out”

This was one of my reasons for switching from DirecTV to U-verse. Whenever there was a thunder storm or even just heavy rain, the signal would go out due to all that stuff between the satellite orbiting above and the tiny dish on my chimney. So, for this reason among others, we put in U-verse for everything.

Last night there was a huge storm with lots of lightening. In the middle of it, our TV went blank. So much for things not being affected by a storm. It was after midnight, so I just shut things down and went to sleep.

This morning, when I turned on the TV, it was clear I was not connected to the outside world. I checked all the TVs, and they were the same. And, of course, the broadband connection to the Internet was down as well.

I called the 800 number in my owner’s manual and, after saying “customer service” about 10 times, the computer voice asked: “You say you want to speak to a technical representative. Is that correct?” Damn right, dude.

Kevin, the tech, took me through all the steps of rebooting the whole system, getting the broadband reconnected, and then rebooting each TV one by one. The problem, it seems, is with the signal coming to the house through their wires. In a lightening storm, the amount of electrical charge in the air or with hits nearby can scramble the signal causing the breakdown.

So much for the idea that since our signal is coming from underground wires instead of from the sky that storms won’t interrupt it. But at least I have a clue how to reboot the entire system when it happens again.

Chocolate and Bacon Bars

Two bars from the same company. Both are chocolate and bacon (yeh, bacon!). The only difference is that one is dark chocolate and one is milk chocolate. They are the same size and weight. The dark chocolate bar says it contains two servings while the milk chocolate bar says it contains two-and-a-half servings. Then there’s the math about calories, grams of fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, sodium, and carbs PER SERVING. And they are higher per serving for the dark chocolate bar.

It ends up that if you multiply the per-serving figures for the dark chocolate times 2 and the per-serving figures for the milk chocolate bar by 2.5, the total dark chocolate bar as a whole is still higher than the milk chocolate bar. So, why show it as 2 vs. 2.5 servings per bar? Inquiring chocoholics want to know.

Duck Collages

In Honor of our 49th

 
 
 
 

Are the Lights Flickring?

I have commented before regarding Facebook changing how you can automatically update pictures from Flickr to your Facebook page. And I have done all that is required of me to use the new linking method which originates on Flickr. But to no avail.

I have written Flickr’s customer service and have been communicating back and forth via email with “Jake.” His main message seems to be to make sure all the pictures I post to Flickr that I want to be forwarded to Facebook are marked to be publicly searchable, safe, able to be viewed by anyone, and that the uploader I am using also be set in the same manner. Sounds like good advice.

However, 100 percent of the pictures I have sent to Flickr over the last six months or more have been tagged as safe, public/anyone, etc. and the uploaders I use (one from iPhoto and one from Lightroom) are appropriately set in the same way.

He keeps beating the drum on his major theme/message. I keep replying that I’ve checked on all this and all the pictures and uploader preferences are as they should be. I’ve even gone to my Flickr site and have looked at entire collections of pictures to confirm they are all safe, open to the public for viewing, etc. and have gone onto my Flickr account and checked the proper sharing is active. It is.

And yet, I have still to see any of my recent uploads appear on my Facebook profile page.

I hope his next message back to me has something new it. Too bad this isn’t a call where I can say: “May I please talk to your supervisor?”

Face It, Any Flickr of Privacy Has Gone Up in Smoke

Facebook changes stuff, as it seems to do about every hour and a half, so it looked as if my automatic updates of my Blogger blogs (like this one) and my photos on Flickr were a thing of the past. I cruised through every setting I could find on Facebook and could not see any way to either see if the updates were still working or how to reestablish them. I did know that I had posted some recent pictures on Flickr that were not being shown as a link on FB. And any semblance of either FAQs or chat room or whatever to get some help was to no avail, not to mention there does not seem to be a place where you can email an inquiry to FB.

I asked in a comment on FB if anyone knew what was going on. I also posted a question on their Help site. In the first instance, I got nothing. In the second, nothing helpful came from anyone out there in the dark void of the Internet.

So, I decided to use brute force at this point and posted manual links on FB to my newest blog posts. Several hours after I did that, automatic links showed up on FB. There must be some hidden link either on Blogger or FB to allow these automatic updates to still flow. Now for Flickr.

I found the place in Flickr where one could ask it to link to Facebook. I clicked on it. I got another screen that asked if Yahoo! (which owns Flickr) could have access to all my data on Facebook (my profile, who my “friends” are, etc. – 100 percent of everything I have links to or have posted on FB). I could either “Allow” or “Don’t Allow.” I clicked on “Don’t Allow.” It then told me there was an error in connecting my Flickr account to FB and to try later. I did. It gave me the same error. I tried several times the next day. It gave me the same error.

In the midst of this, I wrote an email to Flickr Help (yes, they do respond quickly and it’s a real person with whom you can ask further questions). The Flickr person told me how to link with Facebook. I told him I had done this and kept getting the error message. I did let him know that I had been clicking on “Don’t Allow,” but this never was addressed in his responses.

He then told me how to go to Yahoo! and try it from there. I did. I clicked on “Don’t Allow.” I got the same error message that it couldn’t connect with my FB account and to try later.

Just as a test, I went through the same procedure but clicked on “Allow” for all the data that Yahoo! wanted. Yeh, you know what’s next – it connected effortlessly. Is there a message anywhere that says: “For those of you who only want your friends to see your personal data, you cannot connect your Flickr account with Facebook?” Of course not. Did the Flickr customer service man let me know this? Nope. Is my experience a fluke? Well, you can try it yourself and let me know.

Another Case of Right Hand, Left Hand Ignorance

I have an American Express card. In fact, I’ve had one for 50 years. Like most consumers, I have switched from one form of the card to another as times have changed, my needs have changed, and different rewards are offered.

I get the AMEX bill in the mail. I pay it to arrive days before it’s due. This is where the “right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing” comes in.

When AMEX receives my payment, they send me an email acknowledging such and thanking me for it.

Four or five days later, I get another email from AMEX which says “Your next payment is almost due” and lists the amount of the statement for which they have already told me they have received my payment. The email also says: “If you have already sent or scheduled your payment, please disregard this reminder.” Well, it was sent, you told me you received it and thanked me for prompt payment several days ago.

So much for integrated databases, I guess.

Second U-Verse, Same as the First

I received a telephone message from AT&T the day after the failed attempt to install U-verse saying all is well in the telephone world and I should call a particular 800 number to reschedule their coming to our house. I did as I was told.

What ensued was a half-hour of being shuttled from one person to another while, in between, listening to some lame music and a recording telling me periodically how important my call was to them and to keep on the line.

Upon dialing the 800 number, there is the usual set of choices given by a cheery digital voice including things like “Let me look up your account.” Sure. Right. So I hit the number button I thought nearest to what I wanted. The recording told me I had two outstanding service orders. The first one “it” read was the aborted installation from yesterday. The computer guy said it showed it had been completed. (Wrong.) I could respond with choices like “complete,” but nothing to reschedule other than “talk to a technician.” That’s what I said.

Person #1 was, indeed, a technician. I explained the background, the call today from AT&T saying it was all ready for installation, etc. He told me he was a technician and not in sales and he would switch me to sales who scheduled installations.

Person #2 was in sales. I went through my story again. He looked up my account. I asked for an appointment for installation. He told me that this was not his job (he just “sells” U-verse) and he would now shift me to a dispatcher who did the scheduling. He asked what state I was in and I gave him a geographical answer.

Person #3 was a dispatcher. She heard my story. Asked what state I was in. She then asked me what my U-verse account number was. I told her I didn’t have U-verse installed yet and wouldn’t my telephone number pull up what she needed? Nope. She needed my U-verse account number. Luckily, I had jotted it down on some scratch paper last week and could find it to read it to her. She put me on hold for five minutes while she looked up my account. She came back and said Missouri was not in her region for scheduling and she would have to forward me to a dispatcher who handled my state.

Person #4 now came on the line. He asked what state I was in (I resisted snarky answers, but told him I was getting really impatient with this whole process). Again, he put me on hold while he pulled up my records and read through them. He then asked whether a technician had called to say the outside wiring problem had been fixed. I told him (again) I had received a phone message saying I should reschedule my installation.

“When would you be available for us to come?” he asked. I told him to tell me when there were open times. “Well, when are you available?” I told him a date later in this week. Pause, pause, pause … as time passed. He said, “Well, we’re booked up all this week.” In a somewhat exasperated tone, I asked him when were they not booked up. He said I could make an appointment for the end of next week. I did.

Four people, half and hour, and all I wanted to do was to reschedule an installation appointment. Who knows what part three of this tale will bring?

Things in the U-verse Are Not What They Seem

Today is the day AT&T is scheduled to install U-Verse. I have been skeptical about the whole installation since I have not seen any new AT&T boxes anywhere near our house, but they assured me they could do it.

The installer called me from the elementary school down the road. Seems as if this is where the whole shebang is located for the area. When he arrived here, I pointed out that had an alarm system tied into the phone line. There is the question whether the alarm system is set up for a digital dial tone since the phone line will now be VoIP instead of analog. He said they had been given some grief by supervisors since some folks had them rip out the whole U-Verse installation when they found out their alarm didn’t work with it.

I called my alarm company who had a non-committal response: “Well, before the guy leaves, call us and set off the alarm and we’ll see if it works.” I then assured the AT&T guy that if it didn’t, I would have the alarm company come out and put in the needed equipment and, regardless, wanted him to go ahead.

Next he tested my incoming phone lines. They need two pairs for U-Verse. One of the pairs into the house was live, the other dead. He drove over to the terminal box on the street, then back to the elementary school, and then returned here. That second pair he needed could be connected to the house just fine, but it was not “conditioned” for U-Verse. While he knew exactly what had to be done and could do it, that would be stepping on the toes of another division’s employees and he’d get in trouble.

So, he called it in. Hopefully they will fix the problem within days and we can reschedule the installation. Ah, but who knows what still lurks ahead?