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Correspondence on Verizon Outage - July 2011 |
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Letter from GCA Glencarlyn Citizens' Association Arlington Virginia September 5, 2100 Federal Communications Commission Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau Consumer Complaints 445 12th Street, SW Washington, D.C. 20554
Dear Sir: The Executive Committee of the Glencarlyn Citizens' Association has been asked to prepare a consolidated response on behalf of a number of residents in our community of 540 homes who are Verizon land line customers. Many, we are not sure what percentage, lost service for up to a week as a result of a line failure outside of our community on Monday, July 11, 2011. Our community is in Arlington Virginia, 22204 between Arlington Blvd on the north, Harrison St on the east, Montana on the west and 5th Road on the south. The officers of the Association, which represent this area, received a number of calls and emails from residents regarding this event. The major concerns were: · Very poor communication · Customers calling for service were not given consistent or complete information on what caused the problem and what the logistics would be involved in correcting it. · Customers were given project completion dates that were not met. Extensions to the time were added without useful explanations. · Customers received robocalls that the service was restored when it was not. · Customers talking to service crews were often given incorrect or conflicting information. · Service call staff indicated that they would call back daily but never did. · One resident's series of calls made it clear that the problem resolution manager was clearly on a different page than the area manager on what was happening and when things would be done. · Length of time to resolve the issue · We know of some customers who did not have service restored until Sunday, July 17, seven days without service. Some had service restored earlier, however, we understand there may be some customers who did not have service restored until after Sunday. · Please note that the outage was caused by a vehicle hitting equipment not storm damage in multiple locations. · Phone service is a utility, like electricity and water. Customers expect the service to be restored quickly when problems occur, particularly when the outage is not part of major natural event. · A resident was told the repair crews do not work at night, which is obviously a customer concern during an outage of this type. · A number of our residents work from home, so the phone and internet outage was an income hardship, not just a significant personal inconvenience. At least one had to purchase a smartphone to be able to continue business.
Understandably, there is considerable frustration among all of the customers. There were a number of other comments made in the emails we received, both about this outage and other frustrations. We have attached the full email from each customer for your information. We appreciate your attention to this matter and hope that Verizon handles both the speed of restoring service more quickly and that the poor communication with the customers is improved. If you have any questions, please contact Peter Olivere at president_gca@glencarlyn.org or 703-626-2520.
Sincerely,
Peter Olivere President Glencarlyn Citizens' Association
Attachment
cc: William Irby, Director Division of Communications Virginia, State Corporation Commission communications@scc.virginia.gov
Christopher Zimmerman Chair, Arlington County Board countyboard@arlingtonva.us
PDF version of the letter with attachment — 5 pages of comments from residents |
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Email from the Virginia State Corporation Commission From: Gladys Huddleston <Gladys.Huddleston@scc.virginia.gov> To: 'president_gca@glencarlyn.org' <president_gca@glencarlyn.org> Subject: SCC Verizon Complaint Date: Thu, Sep 29, 2011 5:56 pm --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Olivere,
This is in response to your complaint filed in our office on September 6, 2011 against Verizon Virginia.
According to Verizon, a local manager has contacted you to explain the magnitude of replacing a 2100 and 400 pair cable. Per the manager, the cable had to be spliced together before customers would begin to regain their service. The damage to the cable was done on July 11, 2011, however Verizon could not begin restoration until the power company had replaced the damaged pole. The pole was replaced on July 12, 2011 and Verizon started their work that same afternoon and the work was completed on July 15, 2011. Based on Verizon’s response, this complaint has been closed. If you are still experiencing telephone issues, or if additional problems arise, do not hesitate to contact our office for further assistance.
I would like to thank you for allowing me to assist you with your complaint.
Respectfully,
Gladys Huddleston Telecommunications Specialist SCC gladys.huddleston@SCC.virginia.gov (804) 371-9420 |
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Material included on this page: Description of the Verizon Outage in November Village View Email from the Virginia State Corporation Commission GCA Response to September 29 email from SCC Letter from Verizon October 14 |
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Letter from Verizon October 14 Verizon National Customer Relations 13100 Columbia Pike Silver Spring MD 20904
October 14, 2011
Giencarlyn Citizens Association Arlington Virginia
RE: Delayed Verizon Service restoral
Mr. Olivere: Thank you for your recent communication with the Virginia State Corporation Commission concerning the delay in restoring services to your community. First, I would like to apologize on behalf of Verizon for the inconvenience and frustration this matter has caused. In reviewing the situation I found the outage began July 11, 2011 when the line was taken down by a passing truck. Verizon was unable to begin restoration until the power company replaced a pole which was done on July 12th. We began our work that afternoon and closed the ticket July 15th. Please be advised as each customer calls to report a trouble, the information is entered for their respective service and the next available date is given based off the availability of a technician. The initial representative is unable to determine if a particular customer is part of a larger outage, as that is something our systems do after the ticket is submitted. As the system tracks the tickets, it associates them accordingly and groups them in an effort to restore customer’s services in the most efficient way possible. Again we apologize for the inconvenience and frustration this process may have caused and assure you we work diligently to restore all services as soon as possible.
Sincerely,
Lisa Morse Verizon Customer Advocacy
Cc: Virginia State Corporation Commission
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Description of the Verizon Outage in November 2011 Village View The letter the GCA sent to the Virginia State Corporation Commission (VSCC) regarding the several day Verizon outage in July and the poor communication to the customers is on the website. Since then we received a letter from the VSCC in which they affirm that a local manager has contacted the GCA to explain the magnitude of the repair. A trash truck hit and broke two overhead Verizon major cables. One had 2100 pairs of wires and the other had 400 pair. This means that up to 2500 phone lines were taken out of service. The damage to the cable was done on July 11, 2011, however Verizon could not begin restoration until the power company had replaced the damaged pole. The pole was replaced on July 12, 2011 and Verizon started their work that same afternoon. The work required the insertion of a new section of cable, with each of the 5,000 wires (2500 pairs) being spliced on each end. Teams worked on the repair continually in 12 hour shifts. The work was coordinated so that the splices for each pair for a phone line were done together then checked. This is why phone service was house by house over several days. According to Verizon, the work was completed on July 15, 2011. Although Verizon’s wanted this response, to close the complaint, we took exception and requested that they address the incorrect and incomplete information which was provided to the customers. We expect to hear back on that soon. |
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GCA Response to September 29 email from SCC
Ms Huddleston The complaint focused a much on the terrible communications by Verizon with incomplete and misleading information given. As far as we are concerned the complaint is still open. We are hoping the SCC would respect our request for a response on what is being done to address the issue of communications which was presented in considerable detail in the letter sent on behalf of the community. This chronic lack of useful communications continued to the first call I got from the Verizon local manager, who when he called asked if I wanted to know about the brief outage a day or so before. He had not even looked at the transmittal letter of any of the attachments. I asked him to look at the material we sent and call back. He called back several days later with a lot of information about the technical issues which was very useful. At the end of the second call I asked for a written response from Verizon to the SCC, with a copy to us, about the terrible communications during this outage and what Verizon were doing to fix it. So far we have heard nothing on that issue. I hope that the SCC pursues this issue with Verizon of communication with customers and requires them to do a better job in the future. I expect to hear back from you once Verizon has responded to that part of the complaint.
Thank you. Peter Olivere President, Glencarlyn Citizens' Association. 703-626-2520
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