[ale] OT: tech support hell at Mindspring

[Jim Philips]

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On Sunday, I woke up to find I had no ADSL connection. I tried all of the 
local tricks I usually try. Nothing helped. So, I started calling Earthlink 
tech support. The first guy got noticeably  defensive when I told him I was 
using Linux. I explained that I saw no software errors in the log. We checked 
out all lights on the modem and that was all in order. Then he started 
insisting I had a hardware problem. He wanted me to swap out ethernet cables. 
I lost the connection before I could tell him that my ethernet card was 
blinking when connected. I called again. The next guy seemed even more 
clueless about Linux and more on the defensive. He finally said he couldn't 
help me with Linux. I explained that if nobody there could help me, I needed 
to cancel my account. He said he would see if he could find somebody to help 
me. The next person to pick up the phone was with cancellations. I was 
incredulous and demanded somebody who could help me with tech support. A 
woman came on who promised that a more knowledgeable person would call me 
after 5 PM that afternoon. Nobody ever called back. That night I called 
again. I again got a person who said she couldn't help me with Linux. I asked 
if she could connect me with somebody who could. The next person who came on 
the line told me I had been connected with the wrong department. I asked her 
to please reconnect me with tech support. By this time, I was getting pretty 
steamed. I then got connected to an Indian woman (in India?) who was kind of 
bewildered that I didn't use Windows. Finally, I said: "Look, all operating 
systems that connect to you use PPP and PPPoE. They DO have something in 
common. Can you help based on what you know?" So, she walked through starting 
up my software. When that was the same as before, she said: "In this 
situation on Windows, I ask people to reconfigure their PPPoE software and 
that usually works." I said: "That's a really sensible suggestion." Then I 
lost my telephone connection. So, I reconfigure rp-pppoe and everything 
started up again. Doh!

I spoke to no less than eight people. The Indian lady was the only one who 
seemed willing to help. The rest of these guys should be worried about the 
Indians taking their jobs, because they are just a bunch of smartass 
slackers. Anyway, now I know that I need to talk to Speedfactory.
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