(no subject)

[mtupyro.livejournal.com]

I saw the light turn red today. the light should never turn red.

The phone system needs approximately 100 calls or more in queue to make the light turn red. When I had a moment to check it was 134 in queue. When the manufacturer puts out a bad firmware upgrade and it makes people not have dial tone on their phone, this is a bad thing.

It's also why I got off work at 11pm CST and am now thoroughly drunk with a day off tomorrow (err, today).

EDIT: And yes, I do tech support. New job from the last time I posted however. I now work in a call center for a very evil corporation doing phone and internet support.

Comments

[gholam.livejournal.com]

Flash the upgrade into your phone system. Problem solved.

[arabwel.livejournal.com]

Seconded.

[goose-entity.livejournal.com]

mmm pie. Cherry or peach? Or maybe an apple blackcurrant crumble with hot custard... mmm, carbs...

[kgasso.livejournal.com]

That's... frightening. About how many people do you have in that call center to handle the queue?

Does said company also happen to offer television services?

[adamjaskie.livejournal.com]

So apparently everyone has cell phones so that they can call in when their home phone isn't working and complain.

So why do they have the home phone? A similar large corporation that provides my internet service keeps trying to sell me on their telephone service. I tell them that I am "quite happy with my cell phone, and see no reason to have two phones", but they keep trying to sell me on it. Ugh.

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

Cheaper LD, tied to your address for 911 and Pizza Delivery and you need the copper for your DSL anyways.

[wibbble]

This.

I don't have the option to get DSL without a BT phone, and there's no cable where I live. (And even then, they only just started doing 'cable internet without a phone line' in the last couple of months.)

[kastinkerbell.livejournal.com]

Really? I don't pay anything for LD on my cell phone.
Would rather have DSL, but the monopoly on phone/DSL here made our lives hell for 2 weeks because they didn't understand the concept of people moving.

My only reason for having a landline before that was for power outages and the security door to the apartment.

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

Free Long Distance on a cell? I love to know how you got that.

[adamjaskie.livejournal.com]

Buh? Every cell plan I've had has had free long distance, if by "free" you mean "costs the same as any other call".

My cell has location info for E911. I can tell the pizza place where I live, and I go into their computer for the next time I call anyway. Besides, it's a block away, so I might as well just walk over there. Also, it's weird halal pizza anyway, and I'd rather just get falafel.

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

Cell plans here in Canada are always extra-cost LD. Heck, if you're roaming and you receive a call, you pay LD as well as airtime.

[kastinkerbell.livejournal.com]

Well, I was with AT&T before I switched to T-Mobile and both did not charge for Lon Distance. In fact, T-Mobile states clearly:

All our national voice plans include:

• No nationwide long-distance or roaming charges
  
• Nationwide Whenever Minutes®
  
• A low rate for additional minutes

The only time I've ever had to pay long distance on a cell phone was when I had a local only plan for something like $10/month (this was something like 10 years ago). It was strictly for emergencies and had the most stripped-down options possible.

I work on a college campus and most students opt to just keep their "home" numbers because calling phones that are local to them physically cost nothing and it lets grandma reach them from their landline without paying for it.

I'm actually really baffled at this question because the free long distance has been one of the biggest benefits to having a cell phone that I know of. I haven't heard of a cell phone *not* having free long distance in years.

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

I'm in Canada, we get reamed on cell costs, the only thing that's ever free is local calling and that's usually weekends or evenings only. LD is always extra cost.

[kastinkerbell.livejournal.com]

Ahhhhhh.
Well, you probably make up for it in health care. :)

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

No such luck, we pay for that (In taxes plus a extra Health Care Levy here in Ontario) and Health Care here is slow and generally sucky compared to US health care.

Of course, when we do have to pay, we don't have to pay the HMO-induced price distortions.

[kastinkerbell.livejournal.com]

Meh. I pay a lot in taxes and it mostly goes to the military...and my health care is by no means speedy. Took 5 months to get a mole removed.

[mattcaron.livejournal.com]

generally sucky compared to US health care.

That's funny, because our politicians keep trying to sell socialized health care by talking about how much better your system is than ours.

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

The Canadian system does do some things a lot better than the US system (Handling of major one-time incidents) and we don't have the awful price distortions the HMO's Walmart-style payment policies impose, but general low-level care and chronic care are worse than the US and we don't have access to a lot of the diagnostic equipment that's ubiquitous in the US as it's beyond the budget of most local hospitals. However since the costs are not up front for the most part and you have to have actual serious health issues to trip over the real issues with our system it seems better than the US system to most users who don't compare tax rates.

The biggest advantage to the Canadian system is no pissing matches with an HMO's that don't want to pay. Downside is that if you want proper coverage you still need 3rd party health insurance in addition to the government system (Yep, I pay for additional health insurance as well as being taxed and paying a health care levy for the socialized system).

Note also that the system the Pols in the US keep trying to sell you based on the Canadian systems is actually a UK-style NHS system. The Canadian systems closely resemble Tennessee's TennCare system without the safety valve of private care, they're individual to the Province and run locally rather than a national system like the pols in the US keep peddling. NHS is far less functional than either the US or Canadian-style systems.

[mattcaron.livejournal.com]

Ah, lovely.

Thanks for the good info, though it doesn't really do anything except to convince me that the US government wants to centralize even more power under the federal government, in direct violation of the constitution.

[soruk.livejournal.com]

When I was visiting relatives in Canada for a few weeks I got a local prepay SIM card. I then discovered data was about 4 times the price of my UK phone roaming onto the same network my local SIM was on!

[adamjaskie.livejournal.com]

I have cable. Cheaper than DSL here.

[thecrazyfinn.livejournal.com]

Same price here in Soviet Canuckistan for basic service (Base broadband costs for the big providers is regulated by the CRTC so DSL and Cable packages are always $40/month for basic service, typically with a discount to $30 for a contract).

[mattcaron.livejournal.com]

Cell phones don't work where I live. I'm in a valley and would need a 100m antenna mast to get signal. So, land line. Eventually, I'll do asterisk + handsets for folks.

[compwizrd.livejournal.com]

I have both a land line and VoIP.

Both are on the same number even.. Seems Primus can't be bothered to tell Bell Canada to actually unplug my stupid land line... Been waiting for about 5 weeks now. I can make outbound calls from either, but inbound comes in on the land line.

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

What was the ratio of queued calls to phone answerers?

I've seen 2:1 and 3:1 in fairly large call centers... I guess a small team could easily hit 10:1 on a really bad day.

[mtupyro.livejournal.com]

on a saturday we have a team of about 25-30.