Thursday, March 13, 2008

VZW.com support team says "we don't support Macs"


My jaw is still agape at the brush-off I just got from the customer support folks (specifically: B) at VerizonWireless.com when I called to report that the "View Paper Bill" button wasn't working from Firefox, Flock or Safari on my Mac.

"I'm sorry, sir, we don't support Macs."

I'm floored at this attempt to brush me off for the kind of computer I'm using. It's one of those disrespectful "shoo fly, don't bother me" knee-jerks reactions I get from someone employed as a customer support rep yet not really wanting to do her job.

I press on: I've been using vzw.com functionality from my Mac for the last several years, when did you stop supporting mac access?

"If you like, I can confirm that for you"

Confirm what? that you don't support Macs? or that the View Paper Bill button doesn't work?

"That we don't support Macs"

But that doesn't solve my problem: I want to be able to print out a copy of my bill to submit for reimbursement. Can you tell me how to get view my paper bill?

"Hold please"

B goes away and then comes back and tells me I need to remove all my cookies and log in again, then click the button (she can make it work from her Internet Explorer browser with no problems).

I erase my cookies, log in again, navigate to the button and click it.

I can even see where the button action is in the page source :

<button type="button" class="gray" onclick="getPDF('REDACTED','February 25, 2008'); _hbSet('c2', 'REDACTED' ); _hbSet('cv.c5', '4087617021' ); _hbPageView(_hbxStrip('billing options statement view paper bill'), _hbxStrip('/my account/overview/billing options'));" >VIEW PAPER BILL</button>

Still no response when I try to click it, again.

"It should start downloading a PDF... do you have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed?"

I know how this works. For the last four years, I've been able to do this specific action once a month... that's almost 50 times running. Let's get to the point: please file a trouble ticket for me.

So the ticket starts to get filled out. It's obvious from the questions B's asking and her pauses and nonreactions to the information I'm asking her to include (last time I successfully used the function, my ability to recreate the error, the line of code on the page where the trouble's coming from, etc), this trouble ticket isn't designed to actually help the customer.

I'm assured I'll get a call back in three to five days. Business days or calendar days?

"I said three to five days."

I say I need to find a PC to tackle this particular problem. And I'm tempted to go back to receiving paper bills just to add to the overhead of supporting my account.

2 comments:

Jessica~ said...

I just ordered 10 copies of Office for the Mac, which I have to download from the Microsoft site, and can only download using IE. Can you read the expression on my face right now.

Unknown said...

no good deed goes unpunished, eh?

I betcha my expression's better :)