In the last 13 months, earthlink has failed to have my free web space put back online. They have refunded me around 5 times (showing that they admit this is their error) for the 8th maybe 9th time this is happening this month; though they fixed it eventually the other 7 or 8 times they claim it is a very hard problem (as they always do) and takes a long time
Since they always repeat everything they say, both within one chat and over the course of all my calls and chats, i think they are doing nothing about this. Up until now I had thought they were doing something, now i presume the ignore me.
I want to include one of these chats, they read like surrealistic literature or a Monty Python skit. I can never get them to tell me how to contact someone in public relations or at least at corporate headquarters, they never give me the address, though this month they have given me a phony email address taht no one looks at ([email protected]) and three phone numbers, one supposedly to the engineers, two to corporate headquarters. None got me anything but the same recording, the same system. Prioroty phone call got me someone I couldn't understand his accent was so heavy.
Up till now i thought corporate would realize how lame support is on this (escalate, soon be fixed, that is all they ever say except when they argue with me trying to feed me false information, but now i see that corporate is just as lame and fraudulent
I have free web space, 8 addresses off the one account, each allowed 10 MB linit, none are even close, the closest is about 4 MB. It is mostly html and text and tables. It has become so popular (it is sports history and stats) that up to 800 a day visit the pages. I get a 1 GB download limit each calendar month. Hey do yank the pages usually with a week to go in a given month.
The problem comes on the 1st of the next month. Maybe once in the past year did it come back up on the 1st. I call, I chat, everything gets beyond frustraating. When I come back the next day I get a new person, usuaally tehy know nothing of this particular problem, always they know nothing of my case, even if I talked to them a week before. I always have to start from scratch. Last night a Shirley A., a particularly dense support staffer, a broadband supporter, told me I was wrong. They always try and convince me it is the 10 MB, tehy take up a half hour of my time adding up my files in a web space and see tehy are wrong. Sometimes tehy say it is 30 days suspension. I point out it is rest of calendar month and that, anyway, it has been 45 days or somesuch since it was taken down.
The most ridiculous thing is tehy say I have a big file but the file doesn't say what my problem is, even if I give them an issue case number I was given, it is teh same nonsense. Tehyw on't give me anyone of higher authority past the support chat loop, tehy give me fake phone numbers when they give me anything.
It also puzzles me how a problem that repeats itself every other month and is eventually fixed every month but this one - that tehy can't use the same fix, the same solution, that they still claaim it is a complex problem. I think they just forget to turn the switch back on and never get around to remedying it. As a matter of fact once an engineer left a message on my box that he couldn't do anything because a page instead of my site said it was down for overdownloading over 1 GB. This was left on my answering machine despite the fact that that page is just the visual evidence of this problem I was asking about, that time for two weeks.
I believe they don't care, this would never go down with pay sites, though after reading this site about earthlink that may not be so, huh?
Never an email, some promise to call but never do, what is that part of the scam?
Never an email saying it is being worked on, never an explanation on why it happens, why so often; no updates, no progress reports. It is teh worst company in the world.
Here are two dada transcripts of recent chats, pardin my typing, it gets worse as I get more perplexed and flummoxed.
No, they are too long and have passwords in them. I presume all know how ludicrous these conversations are.
Here are some excerpts
Shaun A: I understand your concern about the website.
[email protected]: yesterday I was chatting, an hour later the support person kept repeating that it was escalated and would soon be remedied, three times, to anything I wrote. This has been told me twice, thrice a night
[email protected]: If earthlink was down for 19 straight dats, then you would understand my concern
[email protected]: 19 straight days
Shaun A: To best assist you, you need to speak with a Broadband Technical Support Representative. Please standby while I transfer you.
Please wait while I transfer the chat to the best suited site operator.
You are not currently in a chat session.
You are not currently in a chat session.
'Shirley A.' says: Thank you for contacting EarthLink LiveChat, how may I help you today?
[email protected]: Just read the above please. This is the part about free web space violations on earthlink's part, please don't ask me dumb questions after you finish... You also should know of me and my case, but as you no doubt don't, this is just another example of earthlink's unthinking service policies The stupid one here is me as I know you inept service people can't or won't take charge and stop this disgraceful technical support, fire the engineers, etceteras, so I am just wasting every hour I am on chant, all you are good for are the simple things like my problems with a new password
Shirley A.: Hello, I see you've already been chatting. Please give me a moment so I can read the previous chat and pick up where you left off.
[email protected]: I had you yesterday didn't I, did you give me a run-around?
Shirley A.: Thank you for your patience.
Shirley A.: Are you a Web Hosting customer with us?
[email protected]: I have free web space off my account, 10 MB in 8 address alloted webspace slots. I get 1 GB maximum download each calendar month. It is supposed to be back on the 1st of each month by the contract, by agreement that I pay for email account. It is admitted as so, don't question this, it is true. It is 19th day of June, this is the 8th or 9th time in last 13 months this has happened, this is the worst one, before the record was 14 days.
[email protected]: It seems quite logical that past solutions to this error towards me and maybe others should work again, and there is no reason after the first time for this maddening delays
Shirley A.: When were you promised for the 1GB maximum download calender?
Shirley A.: Are you talking about Web Life?
[email protected]: It says so on my account page, it says so on the page that goes up after I pass this 1 GB; the page that is erronously still up... Why don't you know these things? They refunded me $39.95 because of this, tehy have been refunding em over the year. This problem actually hurts earthlink and they should teach you about these things
[email protected]: No, I am talking about my earthlink DSL basic account. Please give me to someone who knows what I am talking about
[email protected]: I request the transcript of this long long chat be sent to the highest authorities at earthlink, no one else cares.
Shirley A.: Okay. Can we fix one issue at a time.
Shirley A.: You have stated about your Web Space issue.
Shirley A.: You are now talking about your DSL basic account.
Shirley A.: Next, you also do have something about refunding.
Shirley A.: Can we address them all one by one?
[email protected]: I only have the one issue unless issue two is you not knowing the basics of an earthlink account relating to free web space
[email protected]: I already have the refund, I wish I didn't, that would mean my web space would be back online at a logical time of the month, a reasonable timeframe
Shirley A.: Now, that we have concluded about you having only 1 issue which is of your FREE Web Space, then let me inform you that with each email address you get only 10MB of FREE Web Space and not 1GB.
[email protected]: No, the 1 GB is for the amount of downloads possible. This is what the page reads:
[email protected]: Sorry... Page Temporarily Unavailable The Web page or file that you requested is temporarily unavailable. It has been so popular this month that it exceeded its free monthly traffic allotment. Access to this Web site will be restored on the first of next month. Please come back then. Thank you for your visit! If you are the owner of the Web site in question, please refer to your Community Web Space Terms and Conditions under Web Site Size and Space Limitations for more information.
[email protected]: Please give me to someone who knows this, why should I start as if you are going through training. 19 daays and I still am talking to unknowledgable small fry
[email protected]: Web Site Size and Space Limitations: All EarthLink Members receive at least 10MB free webspace for use with their EarthLink Internet access account. Each members free webspace is allocated at least 1GB of traffic per month (traffic is calculated on a formula multiplying the number of hits that your site receives by the size of your files). If a site exceeds its maximum monthly allotment of traffic, the site will become unavailable until the beginning of the next calendar month. A site that exceeds the maximum allowed webspace size will also become unavailable. Unavailability includes but may not be limited to the inability to access the site publicly or to publish to or modify the site's contents via certain Web creation tools.
[email protected]: That was from this earthlink page:
[email protected]: http://www.earthlink.net/about/policies/webspace/
Shirley A.: Let me check.
[email protected]: I just noticed the "at least" Next time if I ever get someone who knows what they are talking about and is high enough, since the aggravation is immense the past year, I will request more than the at least
[email protected]: I think I am going to publish the transcripts from these chats. They are Dad masterpieces: my mispellings, bad typing, you chat people's robotic answers, and then you take the cake
[email protected]: This has now become the most ludicrous chat of them all
[email protected]: If these chats were ever seen by anyone with any scruples and integrity I would leave now, this is so obviously fruitless, but no one sees these ludicrous converstaions, maybe I should call, they claim to record those
[email protected]: I have gone through at least 24 hours of time this month, please give me to someone who can at least start past Go
Here is another dense exchange:
Rocky T: I have escalated the issue so once you contact them they will report the status.
[email protected]: They will double talk me, tell me to get a pay site, tell me no details, though I guess it will then all of a sudden be up that day. But I even doubt that
[email protected]: THEY SHOULD FIX IT, why do I have to go out of my way at work and ask them? It is contracted I get the space each month until the 1 GB limit. A fair company would suspend taht for two months to make up for teh aggravation every other month, sometimes every month
Rocky T: I am sorry for inconvenience caused to you.
Rocky T: I have re-escalated the issue and found the your issue is under the process.
[email protected]: The embarrassment every month when my professionally run historical research site is used by journalists and historiaans worldwide, this is pitifully embarrassing. This has happened in June, July, September, October, November, january, March, April, I think I misseda month... Why in the world must Ic all tehm to explain to me how incompetent this is?
[email protected]: One chatter claimed many have this problem... You want me to believe each p[erson has a separate glitch somewhere, that they are not related, or was he making that up?
Rocky T: Yes, Many customers are having the same issue.
[email protected]: When someone calls because he can't get his modem to connect, you work him through it and help him fix it, for all problems this is done, but for free web space not coming back, one must continually call and chat all month until I happen to run into you and tehn get engineers number no one else would give me? Explain the responsibility of earthlink in that?
[email protected]: What would earthlink do if these frustrated customers brought a class action suit for damages?
[email protected]: The problem with earthlink is that teh people in charge, supposedly behind the TV ads know nothing of what is going on in this stuff
[email protected]: Someone should be writing us updates, progress reports, explaining this insult to us
[email protected]: You know of my situation but after this chat ends you have no connection to my issue. This is another mistake in the process. That tehy have those surveys, I write scathing things and they never respond is another error in judgment
[email protected]: Or else tehya re laughing at us
Rocky T: The Issue is updated and the necessary action is being taken.
[email protected]: You would think they wouldn't want to give me so many refunds teh past year
[email protected]: OK, you are just repeating yourself. You know the things I said are right, should be done that way... That a good company has you call the engineers, not me
Rocky T: I would like to inform you that I have escalated the issue and our engineers are working on it as many customers are having the same issue.
[email protected]: If they can't rememberw hat they did the last times, maybe they should be relieved of their jobs
[email protected]: Ok, I have been chatting since 8:30, that is enough. I know I will be seeing no site next week or next month. Goodnight
This is like a horror show version of Groundhogs Day
Paul
Baldwin, New York
U.S.A.
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