Ooo! Ooo! I have a story too!
I am currently trying to cancel my accounts with Optus not through moving house but because of their inability to deliver a service.
Bear with me....
Optus call me up out of the blue: Hey, as a loyal customer, we want to help you out. What do you have now? [They should know of course] and what do you use it for?
Me: Erm.. 10GB per month mobile modem (as you well know). We use it for email and looking at movies of cats falling off sofas mainly. Most weekends we go and do other stuff and I like to take my LOLCAT machine with me so I'd like some mobile capability.
Optus: Hey! Good news. How about we give you a cable modem for home (120 or so GB per month) + a 2GB mobile for pretty much the same price? A little more for the mobile.
Me: ...[Weighs up the necessity of the mobile, given my phone has almost that anyway, but hey, no biggie. I can work it out] Ok.
Optus: When suits for delivery & installation? It will be in about 2 weeks.
Me: Ok - Monday the 14th [2 weeks time]?
Optus: Sure. Between 12 & 5?
Me: Ok, I can work from home. I have internet!
All smooth sailing so far, but fun and games to come.
The following Sunday I get a bunch of texts from Optus warning me I am about to go over my bandwidth allowance. WTF?
I check the usage and sure enough, they have applied the new mobile plan immediately (pro-rata to 2 weeks as it's mid month) while I still have to wait 2 weeks for installation of the cable modem. Doh! So I phone them up.
Me: [The above]
Optus: Have you tried rebooting etc....
Me: No. Listen. [The above]
Optus: [Penny drops]. Ok, I understand.
Me: Great. I need to go to work now and you need to do some homework as to how to fix this. How about you work out what needs to happen and call me. I'm free at 4pm-5pm and then any time after 7.
Optus: Ok.
Of course they never call back so I call them sometime in the evening.
Optus: Have you tried rebooting etc....
Me: No. Listen. [The above]
Optus: Ah yeah - I understand.. No I can't just give you free data blocks as this plan does not work like that. I'll give you 5GB then when your modem arrives I'll downgrade the plan and rebate the difference and any additional data charges.
Me: Sounds pretty involved but if that's the way it has to happen then fine - I'm not that fussed. Thank's Maria [Seriously - well done - good job]
.... time passes...
Monday 14th arrives and I'm working from home. The guy arrives to install at 2:15. Nobody's fault, but we have to work out where stuff is going so I have to cut my 2:00 call short and start the 2:30 late. Only 2 meetings of the day. That's nobody's fault, not even Optus' but even so....
Yep - seems to work fine. I get on with it.
Tues 15th at work:
Colleague: All good with the internet
Me: Yeah - too easy. Can't say I can tell the difference between this and the old mobile one though which is surprising.
Him: Ah - try speedcheck.net [or something]. I had a similar thing and turns out someone hadn't set it up right.
So that evening I do the check. 800 Kbits/S down, 900 up .... WTF.
Try old mobile connection: 2.5 Mbits/s
I call optus at around 8pm. using the number left by the installer.
Me: [The above] after getting through almost right away.
Optus: You have called the mobile broadband. You need to call 123455.
Me: Erm, I did call that number.
Optus: Ok, must have been a routing issue. Putting you through.
.....1/2 hour or so I get someone.
Optus:[Blah] and reboot the modem.
Me: Ok that did it. Slightly embarassed I didn't try that but didn't really think about it.
Optus: No worries. Bye!
Next day:
hmmmmm. ... where's my superfast cats/sofa/interwebs gone? WTF? It's gone back to 800kbs.
Me: [The above. INCLUDING THE BIT ABOUT CALLING THE WRONG NUMBER!]
Optus: Ok, reboot etc.
Me: Ok but I have 4 devices all running slow. Fix this problem please.
Optus: [more stuff]
Me: It's still slow.
Optus: Transferring you to Netgear.
Me: oh fuck....
Netgear: Hi, how can I help
Me: [The above]
Netgear: Ok, change this, this and this. (Including setting a new password and giving it to the engineer. WTF).
Me: Ok done. All seems to work.
[Fatal mistake - didn't check the actual speed]
...later....
Fuck - 10Mbits/second. I know this can go to 25. I've seen it! I've paid for it! Puts it all back again.
Now at this point I'm unsure if I should just suck it up and live with 10mbs. Even so, no saying it might revert to 800kbs. In any case - I didn't feel good about 1/2 speed and someone else having my password.
It's also gone midnight, so I've had enough.
Next day I call Optus again.
Me: [The above. INCLUDING THE BIT ABOUT CALLING THE WRONG NUMBER!]
Optus: You have called the mobile broadband. You need to call 123455.
Me: I'm begining to lose it now....I give a fairly rational and calm description of the course of events, though clearly through gritted teeth.
So I get transferred and wait on hold. We get nowhere...
It's gone midnight again so I ask to cancel my account. Fuck the 2 year contract, fuck the mobile internet and fuck the fairly recent mobile phone renewal. I want to deal with one telco and Optus is not it. They've had my custom for 7 years and if they cannot do this, I'm done.
Optus: I can't help you with that. you will have to call the sales desk tomorrow.
Me: fffffffffffuuuu...
Gets onto the Optus website (which is an abortion of gargantuan proportions in itself, stuffed full of adverts, double menus, random crap everywhere....the mind boggles.) and send sales an email through "Contact Us" explaining the above in abridged terms.
Next day:
Optus: Hi this is Maria [the good one]. How's it going? I've applied the rebate to your account and put you back to 2GB/month plan.
Me: Thanks but I'm now tring to cancel.
Maria: Oh that's so sad. How can I help? What can I do?
Me: [The above]. So can you fix it?
Maria: No. Sorry. I want to help but I am support. If you have to cancel then you need to call sales.
Me: You've been great. Thanks for all your help, sorry Optus is not all like you. Can they call me?
Maria: No.
Anyway, my "contact us" email comes to nothing. Nobody calls or replies.
So I try again and this time (because it's not fucking 1am) I notice the "we will not answer account specific enquiries") so I put it through as a technical enquiry. I do actually get an email acknowledgement this time, though it's classified as a mobile issue.
So, still waiting for a reply (though I've got a bill which apparently is overdue) and still rebooting the router every now and then to get decent speed.
Sigh.....
I might give the tech support another go. They're not really that bad, but why do I need to reboot my modem every few hours to get a decent speed? FFS?!?