Keeping your customers in the dark

Oh, it pains me when a company doesn't see fit to keep their front-line
employees informed. (It's the same situation at my company.)


So I'm out of town with my new LG VX8300, and the mobile web has stopped
working. I also notice I'm in an EV-DO area, which isn't the case at
home. Since I have a few minutes, I call tech support from a landline,
and am pleasantly surprised to be only hold for all of about five
seconds. I explain what's going on, and she found and corrected the
issue (EV-DO-related) very quickly.

While she had me, she asked if I'd like to try out their "V-Pack" for a
month free -- unlimited mobile web, videos, and get-it-now traffic.
Sure, why not? She reminded me twice to cancel by the end of my month
if I didn't want to get charged for future months; I appreciate that. I
asked her if she knew when EV-DO would be hitting my area (Albany, NY),
and she said it should be "any time now, it's already in north Jersey
and spreading." Cool.

Well, my month came up a few days ago, so I called up to cancel the
V-Pack. He asked why, and I told him because it doesn't work in my home
area. (The truth is that I don't see the attraction to watching video
in a 1-inch screen, but this explanation was easier. The unlimited
airtime for mobile web was the real reason I did the free month.)

He processed the cancellation, and while we were waiting for it to go
through, I asked him if he knew when Albany would be getting EV-DO. He
said he had no idea; they never give him that information. Nice.

And what do I see when I get home the VERY NEXT DAY? EV-DO service in
Albany. Nice going, Verizon -- by not keeping your people informed, you
gave away a huge revenue stream. Wouldn't it have been nice if your
employee had known about it, and could have told me, "It should be going
live in Albany this week. Do you want to keep the service?"
.