It took 5 days of phone calls to get my in-laws upgraded to fiber
My in-laws were getting a bit frustrated in recent months with their internet speeds. I checked out their plan and saw they had 300mb cable internet and were paying $90 for that. With a little searching I found that fiber was now available in the neighborhood and they could pay $10-$20 more for fiber. They were up for that and decided to upgrade.
They claim they have a "Triple Play" deal and have cable and a disconnected home phone through Optimum and to cancel the home phone plan would just make the bill go up apparently. I did not see any sort of discounting on their bill about that, but I trusted them because my parents had a similar set-up until they moved to a new state. I don't know if that deal affected this in any way.
Day 1: They text us because they got an email that their account was going to be closed on the day they picked to have the tech come out and get them upgraded. They had called customer support and yes, the account would be just straight up closed, no upgrade. We went over after work to listen in on my MIL make more calls and find out we have to fix the account status situation before we can tackle the upgrade again. We were tossed around to so many departments and made no progress.
Day 2: We go back over and decide to head the conversation on behalf of them. Finally get to the right person and we get "That's gonna be a whole corrections form... that'll take some time.. I'll get started on it now but expect a call either in the next few hours or tomorrow morning to confirm the reinstatement." That's it for the night since we can't make moves on the fiber until the account is fixed.
Day 3: No call from Optimum. MIL calls after lunch and is told the account is fine, it's reinstated and won't be closed. That's cool, we don't know who confirmed that because my in-laws sure didn't. Anyway, time to start the fiber upgrades and we go over there after work again. We get on the phone with someone and they start the whole "Let's see what your bill will be with the different fiber options. Well I see here your bill is [$100 more than it actually is]" and we're all frantic. We tell them the bill is not that high and they check the bill history and go "Oh, I can see your bill is normally much less. Must be a glitch, you'll have to talk to someone else." Ultimately we make no progress.
Day 4: The Longest Day. Go over after work, call and explain that we were told our bill is much higher than it should be and wanted to make sure it wasn't a glitch. They pull up the account and say "Your bill is currently [$200 more than usual], but you're right your bill history is much lower, weird." and so we're just exhausted after 3 days of being tossed around to different departments, being on hold & getting pitched to join Optimum Mobile by every single person. We explain that we're just trying to upgrade to fiber and ask if there's any specials for that which might fix the bill or something. We get sent to the retention department. They're very happy to help us and offers them a fiber, cable and phone package for less than they're paying now. Hell yeah, sign us up! Puts us on hold and after a couple minutes.. Hangs up.
My fiance is a glass of wine in at this point and is more than ready to start making a scene and escalating this issue until it's solved. Gets on the phone and over to retention again and explains that [Employee's Name] hung up on us and was offering us a specific deal and we want that. After some time on hold, the employee tells us they can't offer that, but instead can get us the speed we want, cable, and phone for $4 more than the correct bill. Nah, we want the deal the previous person offered. More hold, the person comes back with "Uh well I'll get you the package you want but for a little more than you're paying" and obviously they meant $4 more.
My fiance had enough and asks for a supervisor, to complain about this 4 day ordeal. "Uhhh I don't have one of those" we're told. Okay, a manager? "They just left the floor.." We press to speak to ANYONE above this employee to complain, they can't. They say they'll take our phone number and someone will call tomorrow at that person's earliest convenience.
Day 5: No one called. My FIL finally decides to give it a shot and calls. Gets a deal for the internet/cable/phone for even less than the magical deal from the day before. Tech is scheduled to come next week.
I'm still skeptical it'll work out. We'll have to see.