Things Qwest should do

I admit it. I'm angry. Qwest has given Acme terrible service and they've treated some of our customers poorly. I write this blog having cancelled one of our Qwest accounts today. I plan on killing the other account we have with Qwest within the next 30 days. We'll recommend other service providers whenever possible from now on.

I'm not going to list my complaints. I'm just going to throw out some observations as I look back via my rear view mirror.

Qwest,

Go back to paying outside agents or show you are going to take care of the customer.

Back in the day, a subagent would get a kicker and residual from Qwest for taking care of customer needs. The subagent was local, so the customer would have a local number to call for help. The customer also benefitted because the subagent was always looking for the best Qwest deals. Now Qwest doesn’t pay the subagents if they improve the customer’s package. Qwest only contacts the customer to sell them more services by mail.

Make notes for installs/changes and make sure they are followed.

A business customer needs to move. They have a static IP that needs to move with them, plus the building they’re moving to has other Qwest customers, so the customer needs their stuff tagged so they can tell what’s theirs. All of this should be noted when explained to the Qwest rep at customer service. The rep schedules the move. The move happens ON TIME and a tech comes out. The customer can’t wait two or three days (soonest a Qwest tech can come out) so they pay someone to figure out what DSL line is theirs. The Qwest rep should also note static IPs and make sure they move with the customer. This is not hard.

Find out what will happen when you turn off services.

Of all my gripes, this one may be the least fair. What I do know is that Qwest came out looking pretty bad when they allegedly turned off Iptimize’s T1s. The story as I have heard it was that Iptimize didn’t pay their bill to Qwest. They were reselling Qwest T1s. So Qwest pulled the plug and a number of businesses went down. It seems like there could have been a better way to handle this. I think Qwest should have sent mail to all the locations first. They run the T1s, so they had to have the physical addresses.

Make it possible for a customer to break a contract if they upgrade other services.

Let’s say I have two DSL contracts because I have two locations. I need to consolidate to one location but I need more bandwidth and more services. Qwest won’t let me out of my contract with them, even though I’m going to increase services. I can’t even bond the DSLs together for more upload speed, because Qwest chooses not to offer it. Notice I said it’s a choice. You can bond DSLs with other providers. Why should Qwest treat contracted customers so poorly?

Don't create a new 3 year contract out of the blue--talk to the customer!

Aahhh. I feel better. Buh-bye, Qwest!