Re: GTE?

Charles Scott (cscott@freeway.net)
Sat, 12 Oct 1996 00:57:35 -0400 (EDT)

Jacob:
We've also had some major problems with GTE, but things are starting to
work out now. We managed to develop some contacts at GTE who seem
genuinly interested in helping us out and try their best to get things
done.
The worst problems we've had are reliabilty. It seems that their techs
have a tendancy to jump into circuits to fix problems without much
concern for what effect this will have on other circuits. We're working
on putting together a meeting with them to discuss this and come to some
agreements which should help to define what we expect.
Yes, I'd have to say that they aren't as hi-tech as companies like
Ameritech or whatever, but then Ameritech manages to come up with some
really creative hi-tech problems we haven't yet seen with GTE.
I find it really difficult to believe that GTE would intentionally
prevent you from testing your own lines, unless you want to do something
unusual, but I'll take your word for it. I'll also keep that in mind as
we continue to expand into GTE territory.
Somewhat unrelated, the other problem we've had with GTE is related to
billing. We've ended up with a number of phone numbers in our hunt
groups which were still having calling card charges accumulate from the
previous holders of the phone numbers. Some of these charges are
current so it appears the calling cards are still in use. We've found it
difficult at times to convince MCI and AT&T or whomever to drop those
charges and so far GTE's response is to ask US to call the long distance
provider to complain about the charges. As far as I'm concerned, it's
GTE I'm dealing with and I don't want to have to bother with that
nonesense on our bills (it's hard enough trying to keep that stuff all
straight).

Chuck

On Fri, 11 Oct 1996, Jacob Suter wrote:

> Is anyone else out there in a non-competitive area having trouble with
> GTE lines for their business? My competition and I are both having
> similar problems with GTE's quality, which is basically shit.
>
> If this is a problem in more than just my area, it sounds like its high
> time for a class action lawsuit.
>
> GTE is now (unsuccessfully but irratating as hell) trying to keep me
> from testing my own lines, by making it near-impossible to call my own
> lines (dump after a few minutes), and in the process of their
> 'testing', making it impossible for my users to stay logged in for more
> than a few minutes at a time.
>
> They also hung a padlock on their demark, I jumped into the
> supervisor's stuff with both feet (professionally of course)... He
> made one mistake.. and I quote:
>
> "We cannot test those lines." MAJOR SCREWUP since I am demanding
> test results from every line before the trouble ticket is cleared.
> They brought out a fisher price box and tried to tell me that was line
> testing equipment and I laughed at them, since it only tested at one
> frequency, and performed a 300 - 3200 hz noise test (coming back at
> '4.9'.... 4.9 WHAT?) but no signal strength test (my signal sucks
> hard here)..
>
> This is destroying my business, but word from the other side says no
> one is able to connect to my competition (running v.everything USR
> 33.6k) at more than 4800 baud with their V.32 and v.34 modems.
>
> I got my $1400 (woopie shit), but I got a $50,000 investment here just
> in hardware, and not to mention tens of thousands of hours I have not
> been paid for, because of GTE's quality. Also, they've blown two
> modems by cutting the ground the day before anything was actually
> done... the ground for my box was never attached, and the box itself
> is on a wood home - no ground there.
>
> Right now the line I send people IE3 on (the courier on my workstation)
> is so low (22.5 db S/N or less) that I can't get new customers on, and
> 5 disks per customer is costing me a fortune, considering I already
> made a $300 investment in my Courier..
>
> If this is happening anywhere else, I'd like to hear. I'm going to go
> lawyer shopping today and see what I can find...
>
> Good luck guys - its a tough world.
> JS
>
>