My roommate and I have had FiOS in our apartment for the past year and a half. Over this period of time, we've logged several tech support issues (probably around 5 or 6) relating to our ActionTec MI424WR router (the standard router that Verizon gives you when you become a FiOS customer). Issues included:
- Intermittently, the router would start dropping all wireless packets, in spite of 100% signal strength and the fact that wired LAN packets continued to flow at full-speed. Restarting the router always fixed the issue, if only for a few minutes.
- Intermittently, the ethernet ports would go dead. Restarting the router sometimes fixed this, other times it did not.
- Intermittently, it would be impossible to login to the router's configuration utility, as it would reject our [correctly-entered] username and password. Restarting the router would fix this issue.
Since these issues were intermittent in nature (as you may have gathered), the tech always found a way to cite "wireless interference during certain hours" or "faulty wiring in our [3-year-old] apartment" as a reason for not actually attempting to solve our problem. Whenever we asked the tech to replace the router, they denied that Verizon had ever given us one (?!), and then went on to recommend that we go to our loal electronics store to get a new one.
A few months ago, the router flat-out died, so we plugged in a random linksys as a replacement and moved on with our lives.
Fast-forward to today, when I checked the mail and discovered that Verizon has sent us a small package for some reason. Inside was an A/C power adapter for the ActionTec router, along with a letter that says [emphasis theirs]:
Dear FiOS Customer,
At Verizon, we are committed to delivering the future of the Internet to you today. To achieve that goal, we continually monitor and test our products, searching for ways to improve them. We have recently improved the life expectancy of your FiOS router power adapter and are excited to share this enhancement with you.
Please replace your current router power adapter with the enclosed enhanced power adapter. This new power adapter is provided to you at no additional charge. We want to ensure you continue to enjoy the benefits of our fiber-optic network, delivering the full potential of the Internet with mind-boggling speed and TV with 100% digital picture. [Editor's side-note: it's really unsatisfying to watch 87% digital TV.]
Please follow the simple steps in the instructions sheet* to replace your router power adapter.
Important: This power adapter is compatible only with Verizon-provided FiOS routers with Model Number MI424WR.
Sincerely,
James Kilroy
Director, FiOS Product Management
* In case you're wondering, the attached "instructions sheet" really does just tell you to unplug the old power adapter, and plug in the new one. Of course, nowhere does it tell you how to verify that you do indeed have Model Number MI424WR.
All of this very interesting for a couple of reasons:
1. After we repeatedly asked Verizon for a new router, and after Verizon repeatedly told us that they never actually gaven us a router in the first place, here we find ourselves presented with a power supply for a router that doesn't officially exist.
2. Translation of the term enhanced power adapter: "a power adapter that is actually compatible with the electronics that it is powering, unlike the previous model, which was widely reported and known to fry the router within a year or so"
So, Mr. Kilroy, although I do appreciate the free power adapter for a router that was not electronically sound and and never 100% functional (and which you may or may not have ever actually given me), I think you and your cohorts at Verizon could make better use of your time if you made a concerted, organized effort to get your marketing, engineering, and technical support staff all on the same page, and invested more in the overall up-front quality of your product than sending your customers an ex post facto half-fix transparently sugar-coated with vacuous marketing blather.
2 comments:
My mother-in-law got the same letter, same adapter. Thank you, Captain BS for giving us the unvarnished truth.
dear, dear captain bs. marketing is in fact, marketing. and the fault is always someone elses.
1) sending you a letter which suggests you should be joyful for the new battery, that was sent to you unprompted (yes!) is a classic. no mention of prior issues or possible problems. simply, be delighted that they solved the problem for you. delighted! behind the scenes, some poor account manager at actiontec didn't make his numbers for this f'up. if it's anyone's fault, blame network engineering who didn't certify the battery propery, or else somehow didn't deliver the project on time, leading to the suboptimal battery.
2)customer service did the best they could, yes, the best with the information they had, which was no information about your router/battery. if it's anyone's fault, blame IT because somehow they don't store this information in their system, and it's probably because they got the requirement but it was pushed out of scope because it takes them so damn long to do everything.
when you reset your expectations to be lower, you will understand why marketing is doing a great job.
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