Friday, March 04, 2005

Vonage is about to lose a customer (part 3)


No response (ever) via email. I suppose Vonage customers should just abandon that access method. That's a shame, since one would expect that a good email response could lower the amount of phone help traffic.

At the airport, on my way our of the country, I had some time to kill and called the support line again. (The number of buttons required to get to a real person is smaller if you choose a billing option - I may try that again next time.) I had just connected, when a fire alarm went off at Vonage central and they had to hang up and shut down for 30 minutes. OK, that one wasn't really their fault.

When I finally got a real person, they discovered that my ATA had not shipped overnight - and not via UPS. It was shipped via DHL ground. That explains why it didn't show up on the UPS tracking system, and why it didn't arrive before I left town. It does not explain how Vonage so royally screwed up, and the person that I talked to had no explanation.

In Vonage's defense, they credited me for the overnight shipping and even included a Vonage baseball cap in the box with the ATA. So, I suppose I'll stick with them a bit longer.

My advice to anyone considering Vonage is to go in with your eyes open. They're growing faster than their help system can handle, and you will need a lot of patience and the ability to go for up to a week without phone service if something untoward happens.

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Vonage is the worst. They lie on their commercials. They have very poor customer service. They will not cancel your account, you have to cancel your credit card to get them to stop charging it.

Anonymous said...

we hate vonage, too