MOTHER NATURE AND THE SERVICE ECONOMY

Wind Damage

Mother Nature by Jim Warren

Ten days ago, a ferocious wind beat us up here in Minnesota, with sustained winds above 30 mph. Minnesota often welcomes spring with brisk winds, but this was different. Not the usual punching for an afternoon and then subside. The higher-than-normal winds beat us for over two days.

When I first moved to Minnesota from the east coast, I didn’t think much about the wind. I grew up in a valley surrounded by small mountains – or good-sized hills, depending on your view – and while the wind blew, rarely was it so abusive. The northern plains of Minnesota stretch out in all directions flat, flat, flat – although rolling hills exist here and there. Rolling hills provide an ineffective barrier to high wind. We see our share of tornadoes as we did ten days ago when a storm front came through on the ferocious wind.

Over the years, I’ve grown to dislike the wind. Whether the reason is the very real tornado warnings I’ve lived through – touchdowns in 1981 in my neighborhood, multiple touchdowns in July 1987 – or the memories of damaging straight-line winds, I’m always happy when the wind dies down. I’ve thought that a light breeze on a sunny day is preferable by any normal human being to window-rattling, tree-bending, howling gales. Mother Nature will have her own way, however.

As Mother Nature did ten days ago. The wind ripped new leaves off trees and flung weak branches to the ground. The usual. But then I noticed the monitor on my landline phone read “No line.” I lifted the receiver to listen to the dial tone only to hear…nothing. Not even a hiss. Oh, crap. The last time this happened, someone had cut the phone line outside the apartment building and somehow connected to it to make long distance calls that were charged to my phone bill.

I went to CenturyLink’s website the next morning to see if there was a general outage. No. We’d lost power for a couple hours the night before but that hadn’t affected the landline phone. So, I opened up their chat feature – first time I’ve used it. I usually call. The chat agent was savvy and ascertained I needed to chat with their repair techs. The repair tech helped me set up a repair appointment for the next day. Great.

The next task: change my phone number at my grocery store website to my cell phone so they could contact me regarding my online order to be delivered that afternoon. Late morning, I received a text from CenturyLink with the excellent news that a repair tech was coming in the afternoon instead of the next day. Yay! Of course, the wind was still blowing viciously. I received my grocery order delivery without a hitch because I used the delivery tracker and could estimate when I needed to head for the front door to let him in. Another text arrived from CenturyLink: the repair tech had to refer my issue to a different repair tech. Hmmmmm. Not very informative. Another text arrived an hour later: my repair had been rescheduled for the next day and they asked if I wanted to keep or change it. I texted back that I wanted to keep it.

Back on the CenturyLink website, I opened the chat function to find out what was going on. The chat agent was gone for a long time, researching the issue, but when he returned, he told me that the repair tech had determined the issue was in the cable outdoors that connected my building with CenturyLink, and so the repair had been referred to a cable repair technician. The good news was that since the problem was an outdoors cable, I would not be charged for the repair; and I did not need to be home for the repair.

The next morning, I received yet another text letting me know that the repair tech was scheduled to arrive between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., I would receive a text when the repair tech was on the way. I received no further texts that day. I checked my phone’s monitor during the day to see if the “No Line” message had disappeared. No. Nothing. After 5 p.m., I returned to the CenturyLink website and opened the chat. Unfortunately, the chat agent that responded forwarded my chat to another chat agent who didn’t have a clue. I kept telling him it was an open ticket and I just wanted to know what had happened with the repair tech, that it was a cable repair issue. He kept telling me to go to the website to troubleshoot my issue. I finally told him that if he couldn’t find someone who could answer my question, the chat was over. He didn’t respond, so I closed the chat.

Frustration!

My landline was down for the entire weekend. I received a text Sunday evening from CenturyLink that my repair had been rescheduled for Monday between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. and did I want to keep it? Yes. Another text with instructions about doing troubleshooting at the website.

Monday morning, I received another text confirming the rescheduled repair and I’d be notified when the tech was on the way. I waited patiently for…nothing. I decided to not try the website chat function again, but wait and see what happened. I checked outside the building to see where the cables were connected but I couldn’t see that anything was amiss.

Tuesday morning, I received an apology text from CenturyLink with the information that my repair was scheduled for that day and the time I could expect the technician. Again, I went about my day but received no further texts. No repair that day.

Wednesday morning, I received another apology text from CenturyLink with another rescheduled repair for that day, followed almost immediately by a text rescheduling the rescheduled repair for Friday. This was getting kind of ridiculous. But, again, I decided to be patient and see what happened.

Friday morning, I received another apology text but this time it was to tell me my repair would happen in the afternoon. A couple hours later, a text informed me the repair tech was on the way. Twenty minutes later, the repair tech, S, had arrived according to another text. But a minute later, I received a text that the repair tech had referred my repair to another technician. Oh, for Pete’s sake! This was just a repeat of the previous Friday.

Friday afternoon, I called CenturyLink customer service. They have an irritating phone tree but I managed to finally connect with a human being – D in the repair tech department. Yes! A human being! I explained what was going on and he responded that he knew what had happened today. The regular repair tech had been sent in the morning to check what was wrong and he’d confirmed that it was a cable network issue. He doubted that I’d see anything done that day. I asked if the problem was because of the vicious winds last week – it was possible, but it could be any number of reasons. Then I asked about the cable outside the building and explained that I couldn’t see anything wrong. He explained that the cable connecting my landline to CenturyLink could be miles long, wending its way through the city, above ground or underground. So, the cable repair tech would need to identify where along that cable the damage was before they could repair it. Wow. No wonder I don’t need to be home for this. I asked if he could give me an idea when I could expect a resolution, and he could not. So, I returned to being a patiently waiting customer without landline phone service.

I did ask D about receiving a credit for the time my phone was out of service. Still too early to do that – I need to call back for the credit after my phone service is back up and the repair ticket has been closed so I can tell them how many days total it was out.

Yesterday, I received a text from CenturyLink at 7:45 a.m. letting me know that my repair was scheduled between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. I’d be notified when the technician was on his way. No further texts from CenturyLink, and no repair yesterday.

CenturyLink customer service has performed inconsistently for me. Initially, I thought the chat function at the website was slick, despite the script-like character of what the agents typed. I found especially irritating being told by a chat agent, “I’m going to do everything I can to own your experience today.” Own my experience? What does that even mean? No one else can “own” my experience, only I can. I would have welcomed, “I’m going to do everything I can to help you today.” Thank you. The other irritation – if I took too long to type a response, the agent would respond with some canned instruction about how to send a text. I think I’ll just call in the future.

It’s Sunday, ten days after I first contacted CenturyLink because I didn’t have a dial tone on my landline. Has my issue been resolved? No. I received another apology text at 7:45 a.m. telling me my repair had been rescheduled for Tuesday, May 27.

Geez, Louise.