I should have listened to my wife's warning when I decided to sign up to Telstra NBN, moving over from Optus. She doesn't trust Telstra. I didn't realise the problems I was letting myself in for. Once the problems with Telstra started, they seemed to breed like bunnies.
One problem which still has not been resolved was Telstra's assurance, when I signed a 2 year contract in mid December, that my old number would be ported over to them. Keeping the same phone number was important to me as my wife has serious health problems and with lots of health services all over the place she has some contact with I didn't want to try and be phoning around and updating records. But I was foolish and believed when Telstra told me I would have the same number. But first they had to give me a temporary number.
In the past three months, I have lost count of the number of times Telstra has phoned to confirm that I wanted the old number ported over. I even asked them why they kept calling me to ask the same things time and again but they just got huffy with me.
What would happen was a Telstra call centre worker would confirm with me I wanted my old number back then give me a date when it would be reinstated. The date would come and go with nothing happening. So I would be in contact with them. They would confirm I wanted the old number and give me another date. And so it went on. My stress levels started going up and up, dealing with Telstra on and on was becoming toxic.
There were many other Telstra problems going on at the same time adding to the stress. I complained to the Telecomunnication Industry Ombudsman. It is 3 months since I signed the contract and through the Ombudsman's intervervention, Telstra has just told me that I can't have my number ported over. It was never possible Telstra says. What! Did Telstra initially tell me a lie just to get me to sign the contract? Certainly seems that way.
Out of every 7 promises Telstra has made me, approximately one was somehow achieved. I guess the other six promises being broken are due to errors, stupidity or lying. I suspect lying. I found that over the months as the lies kept on and on, it was like some kind of bullying and I started to hate having any contact with Telstra. Very distressing.
Problems seemed endless. Keeping the phone service connected (as in not getting disconnected) was critically important to me. So, I had specifically asked Telstra about it. I asked because my father-in-law was about to have a serious quadrouple heart bypass surgery thing and my wife was to have her own comparitively minor surgery. My father-in-law lives by himself and my wife provides essental support for him by phone. So, what with her calling him about his surgery and medical people calling my wife about her surgery, I would have postponed the connection if the service was going to be disconnected. I was very glad of Telstra's assurance that we would not lose our phone service during the change over. I was a fool to believe Telstra. The phone was disconnected for two weeks.
There were other problems with Telstra as well, but to cut a long story short, I will be moving to another provider. My initial patriotic feeling of supporting an Australian company has been trashed as has my initial happiness of moving to the NBN. I guess you could say I am feeling very negative about Telstra.
In my opinion, while some Telstra workers seemed honest, too many were quick to tell lies, perhaps to make a sale or avoid problems for themselves. Unbelievably bad service. And extremely stressful the longer it went on. Telstra has apologised and offered some compensation although I was neither happy with the offer not the apologies coming after months of my trying to get them to solve the problems.
One side effect of my Telstra experience is that lots of people have been sharing with me their own Telstra problems. Their stories shock me. I am now recommending for people to contact the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman earlier rather than later. If you delay putting in a complaint, the problems can just keep on going. I also recommend for people to start early with keeping notes. The assurances by Telstra of the problem being fixed can lull one into a false sense of everything being okay when it may not be at all. Taking notes allows for tracking of what Telstra says, better than trying to remember it all, especially when it gets messy and complex.
I really need to get out on the water and de-stress! I guess that is a good reason to buy another boat.
troppo
