Most of the time

I don't find Customer Service provides actual customer service! Yesterday I actually talked to someone in customer service who was not only friendly, she provided an actual service. Who knew!

I realized last week that trying to work in sales, out of your house, is next to impossible without a land line. Especially when one lives in the middle of no where with crappy cell phone towers. Let me rephrase that, it stinks for cell phone service but it's nice for one's quality of life. It's a balancing act.

I decided that the cheapest and easiest way to get a land line was Vonage. You can sign up on line from the comfort of your pj's, you can pay on line, you can be connected to the outside world in a day and never leave your house. My kind of service. So I signed up and paid my $19.99 for express shipping of my adapter. Basically, Vonage assigns you a phone number or you can transfer your existing number then they send you an adapter that you add to all the other crap hooked up to your computer and wah lah! You have phone service. It sounds easy doesn't it?

As with most things in life, just because it sounds easy doesn't mean it is. I consider myself a pretty capable person. If you give me the instructions I can do most things by myself. Listen, I was single, and a homeowner for a long time. I'm a firm believer that anything can be fixed or assembled with duct tape and a buttah knife. I wasn't worried about getting the phone to work I had my duct tape and mah buttah knife and I was ready to roll.

There I sat, with my nose pressed to the window, waiting for the UPS man. Now on any given day the UPS man drives down my street by 9 am. I know this because with the exception of the 6 people who live here, no one evah drives down my street. When you hear a truck it's big doings so it's mandatory you look out the window. It's also possible I'm a bit nosey. Hey, if my neighbors are getting a delivery I need to know about it. How else will I keep up with them!

Of course because I was waiting, the UPS man chose yesterday to change his route. I swear that damn Murphy and his law follow me around just to screw with my brain. At around 10:30 I finally heard the familiar rumble of the big brown truck. There's something about getting a UPS delivery that brings me back to being a little kid. A package was coming and it was for ME! It's always exciting to get a package, it's kind of like Christmas. It also doesn't hurt that the UPS guy is young, buff and has a damn fine arse.

So I get my package and I open it up and retrieve the little instruction pamphlet. I give it a quick read and decide this will be a breeze. Unplug this, hook up this, replug into here and I'll be good to go. Heck, I wasn't even going to need my trusty buttah knife! I followed the instructions and plugged in the adaptor. Just like they said it would, the LCD display lit up and said "powering up". Woo Hoo. Even the cat seemed impressed! Or maybe she was just pissed that I yelled Yay and woke her up. I choose to think she was woo hooing in solidarity.

I sat on the floor, because god forbid they give you a long enough USP cable to actually put the damn thing up ON the desk, but I digress. I sat on the floor and watched the screen flash it's progress

Powering up
Retrieving customer profile
Retrieving ISP address.......

Retrieving ISP address.......

Retrieving ISP address.......



ERROR CODE 002

Crap. Error code! I don't know nuthin bout no error codes! I go back to the instructions and I do what they tell me to do. Check my Internet connection. Yep, it works! Go to the next step, unplug it all, wait 30 seconds and try again. Fine, I have nothing better to do then try it all again. I do, and guess what? Same shit different hour. ERROR CODE 002. I'm now at war with ERROR CODE 002 and I'll take hostages if need be, I want my damn phone to work.

As with most instructions there is always that little, call our helpline if you need assistance. I grabbed my cell phone and decided it was time to admit defeat and call the help desk. I wasn't looking forward to it. One because help desks are often not very helpful and two, I was going to have to use my cell phone, which has crappy service, which is why I need the Vonage but the Vonage isn't working which is why I have to call the help desk......yeah, I was dizzy too.

After finally hitting option 1 62 times I got a real live person. She gave me her name but of course that's when my cell phone decided to drop off for a second. She was a lovely woman who told me try this, do that, unplug cord b and reinsert it into cable d. Yeah, I've tried all that but I'll do it again because hey, you're the professional! While I was on the phone and waiting for everything to reset the inevitable happened. I lost the call. Yep. Nothing but a dial tone. I was on my own again. Good thing I still had my duct tape and buttah knife because they just might be needed after all.

As I sat there thinking "well now what?" everything rebooted and once again I got to watch the now familiar scroll across the LED screen

Powering up
Retrieving profile
Retrieving ISP address........

Welcome to Vonage!

I felt like I had won the lottery! Welcome to Vonage? Indeed! Thanks for having me! I immediately dialed my boss and said "we have liftoff". After having nothing but a cell phone it was nice to actually have a phone conversation where I actually heard everything that was being said. After a brief chat with her I hung up and prepared to go on with my day.

That's when it happened, my phone rang. I figured it was my boss calling me back because no one else had my new number.

Hello?

Ms. Johnson?

Yes?

This is Janine from the Vonage help desk, we were disconnected earlier.

Hi Janine! Thank you for calling me back but I'm all set now. The system seems to be working fine!

Great, is there anything else I can help you with today?

I don't think so Janine, I'm all set now. Thanks

Great, if you any problems please don't hesitate to contact us. Have a good day.

You too Janine buh bye

I give Janine two thumbs up. She knew I had a problem and she was going to stick with me until my problem was solved. Course in hindsight I don't know how she thought calling me on the Vonage line was going to be helpful since, yanno, I called her because that line wasn't working. I'm going to go with the theory that she had my account up on her computer screen and saw that it was now working. She still gets two thumbs up for the follow up.

If you need a land line, call Vonage and ask for Janine. Tell her I sent you.