Date: Sun, 3 Jan 1993 00:45:38 -0600
From: TELECOM Moderator <telecom@eecs.nwu.edu>
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Mission Impossible: IBT Getting My Order Correct
Organization: TELECOM Digest
X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 13, Issue 5, Message 1 of 9

The past week has been a barrel of laughs where IBT is concerned with an
order to change some service for me.

On December 23, IBT was given the following instructions regarding
some lines I manage:

(There were):

Two hunt groups: one beginning xxx-2700 with four lines following.
                 one beginning xxx-7200 with a second line following.

Two phones independent of the hunt groups, xxx-7347  and xxx-7296.

On 7347, there were various features such as call waiting, three way
calling, caller-id, etc.

The request:

Drop the 2700 hunt group entirely. 

Add one additional line to the 7200 hunt group making three lines in
total there, with the two back lines hunted from 7200.

Change the number on the line 7347 to 2700 and retain all the features
that 7347 had on it, plus add voicemail from IBT.

So I was dropping four of the eight lines and re-arranging the
remaining four lines.

I was promised the order would be done on Monday, December 28, the day
the billing is cut off each month. When I went to check on the work
Monday evening, here is what I found:

The 7200 hunt group was done correctly. There were now three lines in
the group.

The numbers following 2700 in that hunt group had been turned off, but
with an intercept saying 'being tested for trouble ... try again later.'
That intercept recording is still on those lines, now a week later.

7347 had been replaced by 2700, but with none of the features on it
(just a straight line; if in use caller got busy signal, etc). No
forwarding, no call waiting, etc.)

I called Monday night and complained; was told to call the Business
Office on Tuesday since 'the order had been written up wrong ...'.

Tuesday morning I called the Business Office. There was nothing wrong
with the order said the rep; the people who work in the CO have to
learn to read better. She assured me it would all be corrected that
day. 

Tuesday night I check the (newly numbered) 2700 line. Still no
features on it. I call Repair again as the Business Office suggested,
and am told they can do nothing ... call the Business Office on
Wednesday morning.

Wednesday morning I wake up early and very cranky. I am on the line to
the Business Office the minute it opens. I am put on hold, and the rep
comes back to assure me, 'they are working on it right now, as we
speak ... give them about an hour, call me back if problems.'

Somehow I got distracted and did not get a chance to look at those
phones or lines Wednesday night. Late Thursday afternoon, New Year's
Eve, I go to that location.

Now 2700 has all the features -- including call waiting, as witnessed
by the fact that *70 responded with the tone bursts -- but they had
somehow decided to make 2700 also hunt into 7200 when it was busy!!
That I did not want, and I called Repair, 6 PM New Year's Eve. The
clerk said no one would be around that evening, but Friday (New Year's
Day) there would be someone working in the CO ... again I am assured
it will be fixed.

New Year's Day, about 10 AM I called Repair. 'Colleen' took my call,
put me on hold, and came back to say that 'Arlene' was in the CO
working on it ... wait a few minutes and see if it is okay ...'.

Sure enough, about fifteen minutes later, 2700 (which is supposed to
be stand alone, no hunt group but with lots of features, remember)
gives a little ding-ding on the bell.  I lift the receiver and hear
static on the line ... no dial tone ever comes on, but there is
battery present.  Well, I figure, I guess it is being worked on.

I test the line several minutes later by using it to dial itself,
expecting to get a busy signal ... instead it rings, and instead of
hunting to the 7200 line as it had been doing, now it hunts to the
*second line* in the 7200 hunt group!

I call back Repair, bellow loudly and the clerk puts me on hold. She
comes back to say 'Arlene' will call me in a few minutes when she
finishes talking to another customer.

I leave the little office where these phones are located and go
downstairs to (a) relieve myself and (b) get hot water for my coffee
in that order ... I am on the way back upstairs and hear the phone
ringing, but it stops before I get to it.

Well, that's no problem, after all, what is Caller-ID for? The display
screen shows a number, 312-509-something, and figuring it might be the
person in the CO wanting to talk to me, I press the 'Call Back' button
on the display unit.  It rings and someone answers, 'Repair, Colleen
speaking.' I ask did she call me, and she asks 'how did you get my
direct number?' ....!!!   From here on, it goes downhill ...

A few minutes later, another call comes from a woman named 'Debbie'
who states she is a repair supervisor in the Irving CO. Her complaint
is thus:  someone has 'been calling' repair on 'unauthorized numbers'
and it had better stop. If I want Repair Service, the number to call
is 611 and none other.  

I told her all I did was press the 'call back' button on the display
unit and if she did not want calls on that line then the thing to do
would be to block her ID; that would prevent me from calling. After
all, what did she think Caller-ID was for? Furthermore, I noted, in
the Centel phone book (Centel is another phone company which has a few
exchanges on the northwest side of Chicago; they operate from the
Chicago-Newcastle CO) it plainly says people using Centel phones who
need Illinois Bell repair *cannot* dial 611 (they'll get Centel
repair) and *must* dial 509-something to get IBT. Finally, I noted,
instead of talking about my calls on 'unauthorized lines' maybe we
should talk about how her tech staff on New Year's Day could not get
their act together, and whether an appeal to the Chairman's Office on
Monday would be in order ...

I am put on hold ... a minute or so later, "Colleen" picks up the line
to tell me I need to call the Business Office on Monday, since the
order 'plainly says' that 2700 is to hunt to the second line in the
7200 hunt group ....

I defied her to find me something specific in the order which said
that and told her if she could, I'd come over to the CO and buy lunch
for her. 

Back on hold I go ...

I am told 'Arlene' will call now if I will hang up.  So I hang up.
The phone rings a second or two later, again with a number 907-something
clearly displayed on the Caller-ID.  It is 'Arlene' who wishes to
argue with me about whether or not the order called for hunting (as
opposed to call-waiting) and where it was to hunt.

I told her if it is supposed to hunt, as you claim the order reads,
then how come *70 works?  The line has call-waiting alright, it just
never gets a chance to reach that point since you have it hunting. She
finally decides maybe someone transposed the digits 2700 and 7200
somehow and that is how the hunting got installed on 2700. After
trying to gain some sympathy from me by telling me how she is there
working on New Year's Day on overtime trying to get some jobs finished
(and I try to gain her sympathy by telling her some stories from the
olden-golden pre-divestiture days of telecom) she agrees to look into
it and 'see what can be done'.

Finally about 4 PM New Year's Day, after several calls to Repair
Service and about an hour in aggregate wasted on the matter, the line
is fixed, voicemail works and all the features are present.  Four days
after the job was due, with numerous calls, the work gets finished.

Almost that is ... the xxx-7347 number (and the other discontinued
numbers in the original hunt group) still have the 'being tested for
trouble' intercept on the line. Obviously, someone did not close out
the order.  But I could care less about those numbers; they were
merely being disconnected with no referral on them anyway.

And 'Arlene' claims she still is unable to put a default carrier on
the line ... the Business Office will have to write that part of the
order all over again.   I won't worry about it for now.

For now, I'll be content if the software to be used on the computer
associated with those lines arrives soon, gets installed and works
okay. 


PAT