At this moment, I’m fed up and annoyed with two companies that previously, I had been very happy with: TextDrive and Cingular. I rely on both, TextDrive to maintain my web presence and promote the simple shareware applications I write, and Cingular to stay in touch with the rest of the world (as Hamilton’s gotten rid of landline phone service). Both have failed me exactly when I need them the most.
Sometime between Saturday and Sunday, my Nokia 6230 cell phone decided it would stop working. Instead of displaying the standard welcome screen, it presented me with the abrupt and disturbing message: SIM card blocked. Huh? I know that if you enter an invalid PIN code too many times you can lock up the card. But this hadn’t happened; the phone had simply been in my pant’s pocket all night long. So, failing to resuscitate the phone by unplugging and reconnecting all the parts, I visited the closest Cingular owned store which was about 15 minutes away in New York Mills. There, I was told that someone had messed with my phone (in person) and burned the SIM card. No matter how many times I told the sales person that that was impossible, he didn’t believe me. He gave me a new SIM card and instead, the phone welcomed me with the words “Phone Restricted.” Great, we’re going from bad to worse.
Here’s where my expectations differed from reality. In my ideal world, he would have said, “I’m sorry you’ve experienced this problem. Let me go ahead and get you a replacement phone as you’re under warranty and I’ll deal with everything doing with being reimbursed by Cingular. We’re in the same family, you know…” This is what I’d like to refer to as the “Apple mentality.” It’s good customer service. Next time I need a phone or an accessory, I’ll remember my good experience and revisit the store. Did that happen?
No. Instead, stating that my phone was from downstate (upstate, downstate, it’s all Cingular to me), I’d have to deal with customer service myself. He gave me a landline phone (ironic, I know) and I sat waiting on hold for a Cingular customer service agent to respond. I spoke with a nice agent named Jack. He asked a bunch of questions, I repeated myself, and finally, after having the Cingular agent in the store try my SIM card in another cell phone, declared the phone to be defective. Here’s where my expectations once again differed from reality. Again, my ideal response would have been, “I’m sorry you’ve experienced problems with your Nokia phone. As it’s under warranty, let me go ahead and send you a new one - right here, right now.” Instead, he gave me a new number, told me I’d have to wait on hold once again, and that when it came time to talk to the agent, to re-tell my story, as well as be forceful as they most likely won’t believe you.
Great. Fast forward a few hours. Back on the phone, holding for twenty minutes, finally I get through. I speak with a nice agent who processes my claim dutifully, efficiently, and reads me the riot act agreement. Yes, yes, I understand, I’m signing my life away for a new phone and $8 for express shipping. Just please, send me a replacement.
Today. Delivery notification from UPS: package delivered. Wonderful, I’ll have my replacement phone and all will be good. I head to the mail center and look for my package. It’s not there. I ask the wonderful mail center staff (who have known me by name since the week I got to Hamilton) and they have no record of a package delivered to me. Long story short, turns out it’s been delivered, but the box has no name on it. Efficient Cingular, very efficient. I get the phone, replace the SIM card, activate it, and power it on: “Phone Restricted.” At this point I’ve had it. I’ve given my cell phone number out on my resume and have just applied to two jobs I really, truly want. But even if they want me, they can’t get ahold of me. Just great. (Aside: Dear HR Director, if you’ve been trying to get in touch with me, I do want the job. I truly do.)
So, it’s time to get back on the phone with Cingular, talk to two more customer support agents, and send back the replacement. Hopefully by Friday I’ll be receiving a new, new replacement: fingers crossed that it works.
Now, what about TextDrive? Anyone who knows me, knows that I like them. They seem to be the one hosting service that is friendly, efficient, and love to do what they do. Plus, and a small minute factor here, I bought a lifetime hosting deal with them. So what’s wrong now? Their reliability is terrible. You know how most hosts claim 99.9% reliability or some large number like that. No deal here. The server I’m hosted on, Bidwell, likes to crash. A lot. Today, the day I decide to release High Priority 1.1 is the day that it decides to go down again. Like yesterday, and a few days before. So you may ask, why is it going down? I’d like to know that too. It seems that most users on this shared server can do what they want. Ruby on Rails, PHP, MySql, it’s all fair game. So, as a result, too many people are doing too many bad things. Bingo. A crash.
Why am I fed up? Because there’s no way to say to them, “Look, I like you guys. Your service is good, your customer service is better, and your price, well it’s perfect now. But I really need reliability. Really, I need it. So, I’ll give up all my little perks: full access to run any program and do anything, for a spot on a dedicated box protected from strangers.” In the end, all I really need is PHP and MySQL, plus SFTP access. Instead, I get headaches and the loss of my email account. That makes me incommunicado to the outside world: no phone, no email. It’s such a perfect situation to be in.
Why have I written this? Mostly to pass the time and make me feel just a bit better. But here’s the real problem: I can’t actually post this right now. Why? Because Bidwell’s down.
I’m having the same misgivings about TextDrive. I feel pretty bad about it though. What I don’t understand is why they don’t use a journaling files system. These hour-long fsck sessions are lame.
Erich Ocean on February 3rd, 2006 at 05:36 am
I’m with you. I’m on Burnaby and I can’t stand it any longer. It seems one or more reboots a week.
Plus, I can’t stand Webmin….and no stats packages. Seems like it’s a sandbox for everyone.
Jeff Hartman on February 14th, 2006 at 05:45 pm
I finally switched, by the way. No more weekly downtime for me.
I moved to http://www.asmallorange.com/ . If you end up moving there too, mention my name, maybe they’ll give me a freebie.
Jordi Bunster on February 26th, 2006 at 07:34 pm
Copyright © 2000 - 2007, Aram Kudurshian. All rights reserved.
Syndicated Feeds: Journal Entries, Journal Comments, and Noteworthy Links.
Sad about Textdrive, is it not?
I also had huge expectations for Textdrive. I still keep my account around in the hopes that they will unveil the promised improvements to the control panel, and maybe improve reliability. But patience has limits. I feel your pain.
Jordi Bunster on January 27th, 2006 at 01:22 pm