My experience with PLDT

October 23, 2006
7:00AM - i dialed 171 because my phone line could not make an outbound call and my DSL modem did not have any signal. I followed the prompts,

until i got to a rep. I told her my DSL wasn't working. She said that there is a problem on the system, and it will be fixed in 24-48 hours. I

asked her what the status of the account was. She said it was okay and it would be fixed in 24-48 hours. fine.

about 11:00AM - i called back. I felt uneasy about what that other lady told me. anyway, I was able to get in touch with another rep after waiting

on the line for about 10-15 minutes. i told her the same thing i told the other lady. this time, the lady said that the account was temporarily

disconnected because of a past due payment. (what the hell?! same company, same extension, same concern, 3 hour interval, and a totally opposite answer! what the heck is going on?!) anyway, i said fine and i will pay that due.

2:15PM - after i had a light lunch, i got ready to go to the office to speak with a manager. we settled the payments, processed the reconnection and i told her. "I do not really care much about the phone. What I need more is the internet." She said, "It's okay sir, the phone will be reconnected first, and shortly, the DSL will follow." Okay. I guess it's protocol. She assured me that I will be reconnected within the day. So I left it at that. The manager was very polite, by the way.

about 4:00PM - i got home, looked at the DSL signal on the modem. no light. i went into the room where the phone was and picked it up, no tone. fine. anyway, it was still 4PM. i went to get a drink of water. when i came back to the room to pick up the phone, there was now a dial tone. i called up a friend to check if i was able to call outbound. we were talking. things were starting to look good at this point.

7:00PM - i started to feel uneasy now because it's been 3 hours and still no dsl connection. i called up 171 and followed the voice prompts again. I was able to speak with another rep after 17 minutes of waiting. i told her my concern and everything that has transpired. she told me that since i already paid for the account, i will be reactivated in 24-48 hours. what the hell?! the manager at the office said, "...within the day." She said the ff: "Sorry po sir, sir, kase hindi kami maka bigay ng exact time kung kailan mag balik yung dsl ninyo kase pending pa ang activation. basta 24-48 hours ang oras para mag activate." For those of you who do not understand monkey language, this is the english translation: "I'm sorry sir, but we cannot give an exact time when the DSL connection will be back because the activation will take 24-48 hours." Okay. At this point, I was starting to really get pissed, but I maintained my composure. I told her that I was informed that I would be reconnected within the day. I asked her if there was anything she could do to speed up the process. She said that since the account has been paid for, she will do follow ups to activate my account. I said thank you very much, and hung up.

At this point, it was already 9:00 PM so I went to sleep. Enough aggravation for this day.

October 24, 2006
12:00AM - i got up and got ready for work. When I checked the modem/router, still no DSL signal. Fine. I understood because it wasn't business hours yet, anyway. I went off to work and did my daily routine.

11:00AM - i got home from work, immediately checked for the DSL signal, and still nothing. Okay. My heart rate went up again because of the anger building up. I called up 171, informed them of everything that has happened so far, and i got this service order number which they gave to me. They told me to call up 17144 and provide the service order number. Well, I did and this is what I got. "Sorry, this is an invalid extrension, please press 0 to speak with a customer service representative." I was pissed at this point because I felt I was given the runaround. Anyway, I remembered that I had two phone lines at home. One was mine, and the other was my father's. I pressed 0 and spoke with someone after about another 15 minutes of waiting. I informed the rep what happened and I was wondering if I could give the service order number instead to look it up. She told me that she was from a different department and told me to call once again 17144 to get to the correct department. I said, "Look ma'am. I just dialed that number and your prompt told me that I dialed the wrong extension." And she told me I might have dialed it wrong. (okay, bitch, we'll see about that!)

11:30AM - i was still on the line with the rep when I told her, "Stay on the line and I will dial that number with my other telephone line, okay?" "Okay," she said. I dialed 17144 on my father's line and I got the same voice prompt and another rep who told me just the same. At this point, I hung up my father's phone. I said to the rep on my phone that I got the same results. She told me that to keep dialing that number until I was forwarded to the correct department. What the hell?! Russian Roulette on an automatic response?! I told her, "Listen to me, if you cannot help me with this, forward me to your supervisor." She said okay and placed me on hold. She came back about 2 minutes, and told me that she didn't have a supervisor that was available. Hell. I was really, really pissed off at this point. But still, I managed to remain calm. I told her I'd wait. She placed me on hold for another two minutes, and then hung up.

The End.

Moral of the story: Subscribe to PLDT, and experience your very own customer service hell.

Note: I don't blame any of the reps that I've spoken with. I understand that these people are merely gears in a bigger wheel trying to make ends meet. I understand that they have limitations on what they can do on their systems. They can only help us so much. My main concern, is the system itself. PLDT, how much are you spending on your customer service department? How much do you really care about your clients? I guess you don't. After my 1-year lock-in, I'm moving to Globe. They may also have bad customer service there, but I'm willing to take the risk considering the kind of shit PLDT put me through.

P.S.: My DSL connection came back about 3:00 PM on that day. I'm wondering, if I didn't call to bitch about it, would it have been reconnected at all? I guess we'll never know.