Dear Editor,
I was given clear conditions, no connection fee, the first month rent free, my monthly charge will be the same as my monthly DSL charge, and that my phone service charge will be incorporated with the Fibre charges. The technicians finally arrived with the plastic wrapper that contained the connectors, and some twenty foot of coax cable strewn in my yard. The next day, in attempting to use the service, I had to connect the ethernet cable myself, and although I was getting dial tone I could make no telephone calls. I made numerous attempts to report this problem; both at the Brickdam office and the assistance center; I was regaled with the most inane questions and no positive results.
I also on the 3rd November contacted a Director of the Company seeking his assistance, incredibly, despite occasional reminders, it was only on the 22nd December that I received a call from a technician and thus the fault was rectified. My November bill, that should have been free, had charges that was claimed to be left over from the previous month, which I reluctantly paid. My December bill had an amount of over $2,000 for which I could be given no satisfactory rational explanation, by staff at the Brickdam office, which I again in total frustration, paid. However, lo and behold, when I attempted to make a call to the UK this week, after many attempts and a variety of confusing recorded messages, customer assistance informed me that I could make no international calls as I did not request that feature on the changeover, despite the fact that I had that facility from the inception of my service some fifty plus years ago.
The rep gave me the undertaking it would be done in a couple of hours, twenty four hours later the situation remained the same, another call the rep informed me that my service was suspended due to an outstanding balance. The last payment she was seeing was at the end of November. No record of the payment I so reluctantly made Jan 8th.2023. This entire sad episode is all the more distressing to me having previously served at the level of senior management in this organisation. On reflection, this sorry saga brings home forcibly to me the lack of human capacity, system, and operational procedures in what is one high tech organisations.
We are all appalled by the crudity and lack of intelligence we see displayed on our roads and with the personnel in GPF; but I will humbly submit it permeates over the entire spectrum of our workforce and in the population generally. Just reflect upon the shoddy work done in all our public projects, roads, bridges, and sluices etc. As well as experiences during interaction with personnel in our financial and service institutions. Obviously our educational system; formal, vocational, technical is failing and addressing it ought to be the government no 1 priority, above all other and developmental projects.
Sincerely,
Thomas Pinkerton