Fido Cellular - Ridiculously bad customer service

Author

Ridiculously bad customer service

Steve Sicherman

2005-06-15, 4:55 pm

Anybody know what the new voicemail number is in Toronto? I've been
using *456 but it no longer works, neither does holding "1" that
fido.ca suggests.

I attempted to call Fido and reach a human being, so much for that.
Their customer service line sends you on a neverending journey through
automated prompts. I called the Fido new customer line and ask my
question, the guy tells me this is the wrong number, obviously, and
says he's going to forward me along. I ask him to assure me I will be
forwarded to a human being, he says yes, but sure enough I'm sent back
into the jungle of automated prompts that lead nowhere.

tfortony@yahoo.com

2005-06-15, 4:55 pm

Pressing and holding "1" still works for me, but all that does it tie
it back to the voicemail number (which I haven't had to change since
I've been with Fido).

I don't have to call their 611 often, but when I do, I go through a
little call tree and then get a person pretty quickly. The call tree is
something all companies do, even competitive mobile services. This way
the call can be prioritized, routed to the proper dept., and/or logged
to look for a certain pattern of calls.

Good luck.

JF Mezei

2005-06-15, 10:55 pm

tfortony@yahoo.com wrote:

quote:

> I don't have to call their 611 often, but when I do, I go through a
> little call tree and then get a person pretty quickly. The call tree is
> something all companies do, even competitive mobile services.

It is something to please some manager because he can *claim* he's
offloaded some load from humans and gets nice statistical reports of
what keys customers have pressed. Except for account balance/payment
which can be done fully automatically, any other information inevitably
ends up with the customer pressing 0 at some point.

Personally, I find I can press 0 right after I have entered my phone
number and get to a human fairly quickly without any stupid menus. I
don't bother with the menus anyumore.

quote:

> This way
> the call can be prioritized, routed to the proper dept., and/or logged
> to look for a certain pattern of calls.

Calls all end up in the same pool of 4 legged furry reps when you're in
the standard 611 system. The standard 4 legged furry reps can then
transfer you to approriate people (or more l;ikely simply relay your
question to the appropriate person and come back to you wit the answer.

One difference is at night where , except for a few hours, you can still
reach a human in case of network problems or stolen handset despite
offices being closed. (but you need to know how to navigate menus to get
to it).

sbdot

2005-06-15, 10:55 pm

I was in Quebec City on Monday and had a question for customer service
about SMS. I got *by far THE worst* voice activated menu system ever
implemented by any company anywhere when I tried dialing *611. I
couldn't even get past the first prompt, constantly getting,"I'm sorry.
I did not get your response. Please repeat...". I finally had to
give up and go to a payphone and dial 1-888-481-FIDO to get a normal
numerical menu. When I finally reached someone, I made it a point to
mention that horrible experience and asked them to note it before I got
the SMS question I was originally calling about. It looks like Rogers
is planning on doing what Ted said in maintaining the Rogers brand as
the premium service by actually continuing to offer customer service on
it, whereas Fido subscribers can look forward to, well, the shit I had
to put up with on Monday.

For what it's worth, the XXX on the other end of the line told me that
it was the first day of that new system's trial and that it *only* has
issues when there's background noise. I was sarcastic and said,"You
mean like when people are calling while, say, on the street, driving or
in a mall, where almost every cell phone call originates from?"

Basically, if you plan on hanging around with Fido, prepare to bend over
and take a big shaft.

tfortony@yahoo.com wrote:

quote:

> Pressing and holding "1" still works for me, but all that does it tie
> it back to the voicemail number (which I haven't had to change since
> I've been with Fido).
>
> I don't have to call their 611 often, but when I do, I go through a
> little call tree and then get a person pretty quickly. The call tree is
> something all companies do, even competitive mobile services. This way
> the call can be prioritized, routed to the proper dept., and/or logged
> to look for a certain pattern of calls.
>
> Good luck.
>

Joseph

2005-06-15, 10:55 pm

On Wed, 15 Jun 2005 16:22:05 -0400, sbdot <sbdot@mailandnews.com>
wrote:

quote:

>For what it's worth, the XXX on the other end of the line told me that
>it was the first day of that new system's trial and that it *only* has
>issues when there's background noise. I was sarcastic and said,"You
>mean like when people are calling while, say, on the street, driving or
>in a mall, where almost every cell phone call originates from?"

Did you try pressing 0 from the automated system? Did you try saying
the word customer service or operator?

- -

JF Mezei

2005-06-15, 10:55 pm

BTW, the phone system in montreal /french is unchanged. No voice recog junk.

Since Fido is now a Toronto company, I suspect that the Rogers features
being foisted upon Fido customers will first appear in toronto where
Rogers has its major facilities. (It has little presence in québec).

tfortony@yahoo.com

2005-06-15, 10:55 pm

I use to manage a call centre, and those stats helped us determine
where to prioritize callers (so they can jump to the top of the queue),
what topics needed extra staffing, and what options should be made 7x24
as opposed to 5x12. I'm not saying Fido/Rogers takes advantage of this,
but I'm just saying many companies do.

Although ultimately it all goes into one call centre, its still good
the have the stats for other companies. Esp those that don't bother
training their CRMs to log calls properly.

Personally, I prefer emailing Fido and getting a response in my in-box
in a day or so. Saves me time and I don't have to deal with attitude.

Cheers,
tony.

Jeff Bamford

2005-06-16, 4:55 pm

In article <1118856211.191951.34450@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,
Steve Sicherman < stevesicherman@gmail
.com> wrote:

quote:

>Anybody know what the new voicemail number is in Toronto? I've been
>using *456 but it no longer works, neither does holding "1" that
>fido.ca suggests.
>

[Just realized I sent the original response by e-mail, here it is for the
group]

There is no new number, it has been 416-822-1123 for as long as
I've been with Fido (1998). The complete list is available here:

http://www.fido.ca/portal/en/support/coverage.shtml#ten

Jeff Bamford

2005-06-16, 4:55 pm

In article < d8s3ca$7he$1@netserv
er. EngineeringHarmonics
.com>,
Jeff Bamford < jbamford@Engineering
Harmonics.com> wrote:

quote:

>
> There is no new number, it has been 416-822-1123 for as long as
>I've been with Fido (1998). The complete list is available here:
>

It appears that all of the shortcuts for voicemail access have
been removed.

repatch

2005-06-16, 4:55 pm

On Thu, 16 Jun 2005 10:47:37 -0400, Jeff Bamford wrote:

quote:

> In article < d8s3ca$7he$1@netserv
er. EngineeringHarmonics
.com>, Jeff Bamford
> < jbamford@Engineering
Harmonics.com> wrote:
> It appears that all of the shortcuts for voicemail access have
> been removed.

Just tried it, worked fine.

johnwolmer@hotmail.com

2005-06-22, 4:55 pm

To reach a live person at Fido CSR, call 611 on your Fido cellphone, wait
for the recording to announce the options, then press zero ("0").

quote:

> From: "Steve Sicherman" < stevesicherman@gmail
.com>
> Organization: http://groups.google.com
> Newsgroups: alt.cellular.fido
> Date: 15 Jun 2005 10:23:31 -0700
> Subject: Ridiculously bad customer service
>
>
> I attempted to call Fido and reach a human being, so much for that.
> Their customer service line sends you on a neverending journey through
> automated prompts.
>

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