By Shannon Lukens.
UPDATE: Wednesday, March 1, at 11:30 a.m. Husband’s phone works again. The agent did a Sim Card Swap and killed the phone for 24 hours on Tuesday. Works again today, after he called. Then Alero from the Executive Office for Verizon called me to make sure his phone was working. She said the media department is dealing with the other issues.
UPDATE: Wednesday March 1 at 8:48 a.m. Elizabeth “Liz” Maly, who is the Communications Manager for Local PR with Verizon Consumer Group in Denver, emailed the following at 8:48 a.m. March 1.
Hi, Shannon!
We strive to provide the world class customer experience our customers expect and deserve. While our network is engineered to handle voice and data traffic during peak times, the spike in visitors to the area during this ski season has created an unprecedented increase in network traffic in the Steamboat Springs area. This has, at times, led to congestion, which has impacted network performance for some customers.
While I’m not able to speak to future build plans, we are aware of the situation and we are aggressively working on several projects that will improve the experience in the short term. We are also working on numerous longer term projects that will come to fruition later this year and into 2024.
Cell site implementation must follow specific safety protocols, logistics and approval processes that ultimately require time and patience. I might suggest that you speak with city planning staff for more information on the local zoning and building approval process for new wireless facilities.
Thanks,
Liz Maly
(she/her/hers)
UPDATE: Tuesday, Feb. 28 Just found Karen Schulz with Verizon Wireless, for Media Inquiries on the link that Anjelica provided below. Called her and listened to her nice message and then heard, “The mailbox is full and cannot accept any messages at this time. Goodbye.” Maybe email will work.
Found six more emails for Verizon media requests and emailed all of them, asking for an update on outages and problems in Routt County. We’ll see what they say.
UPDATE: Tuesday, Feb. 28. After 24 minutes on hold, Anjelica answered and asked what the problem was so she could help. I asked to be escalated. She understands my frustration. She has put me on hold. I told her I don’t want to be transferred to a recording. Anjelica says, “Don’t worry. I’m not going to send you to anyone unless it’s a person.” On hold again. I know the theme song music by heart.
43:30 Anjelica is back. She asked to not be recorded. Only two agents of the nine with whom I have spoken have asked that. Anjelica recommends a Software Update to 16.3.1 (Settings – General – Software Update – Download and Install.) On hold again because her supervisor is trying to find someone at Verizon who works with media.
54:20 Just got a text with a link to Media Resources for Verizon, with a Twitter handle. @verizonnews Anjelica says she sent it. https://www.verizon.com/about/news-center
54:29 Anjelica is back. She said all I need to do is a software update on my phone and all my problems will be solved. I asked her what about the rest of Routt County that is having problems and she said she cannot comment on that because that is a media issue. But there isn’t anyone in media that any agent knows of.
55:57 Call ended. Just called my husband’s phone that Verizon tried to fix by downloading software and got this, “We’re sorry. You have reached a number that has been disconnected or is no longer in service. If you feel you have reached this number in error, please check the number and try your call again.” He is in a hotel room in San Diego without a phone.
UPDATE: Tuesday, Feb. 28. Just got a text that says, “How would you rate your overall experience with your representative. Please reply with a number from 1 to 5, where 1 is ‘Poor’ and 5 is ‘Excellent.’ I responded with 1 in :03 seconds and got this response, “We’re sorry, the time for responding to the survey has expired. We appreciate any future feedback.”
UPDATE: Tuesday, Feb. 28. On the call with Abraham, who keeps putting me on hold to talk to a supervisor which has not happened. Husband called separately to see why service isn’t working on his phone and they downloaded a software which has put his cell phone out of service for 24 hours. The agent told my husband that he doesn’t see any outages or problems in the area in the past month. A new agent just told him, “This switch issue is larger than Steamboat.” Told this to Abraham who just asked me if my “brother” dropped his phone and smashed it which might be why it is broken. I reminded Abraham of what I just said not three minutes before, that it isn’t my brother and the Verizon agent caused the problem. Abraham just transferred me to “Phone Claim” department, which is a series of recordings without an agent. They are now “accessing my account.” They just gave me an 800 number to call and are disconnecting me after 47 minutes on the other call. The automated service just said, “Goodbye.”
Here is just part of that conversation. You can hear at the beginning where I inform Abraham for a second time that the conversation is being recorded and he consents. The static is from the Verizon agent.
UPDATE: Monday, Feb. 27 On the call with Oscar for one hour. He said he would have someone from the media department call back. Hasn’t happened. Never happened.
ORIGINAL POST on Feb. 21, 2023.
Those with Verizon cell service may have been experiencing unreliable service or no service at all this month. After speaking with six Verizon agents on Tuesday, it was confirmed by Customer Service agent Sophia in Virginia.
“As I can see there has been an outage that has been happening since February 1. As I see here there is no exact date when will this be resolved but I can see here there is already a ticket. It’s already on the priority list and that means our technical team is already working on it.”
Then an agent named Rachel says Routt County has been escalated to the Network Bureau. There was no explanation of what that is. She also said that your bills may be able to be adjusted on a case-by-case basis because of the outages. Call *611 from your cell phone and ask for Customer Service and let them know about the outage here, to possibly get that adjustment. But there isn’t a guarantee.
Here is the list of agents with whom we spoke: Adriana, Carl, Sophia, Denise, Rachel, and then Vicky. Verizon does not have a direct contact for media inquiries.
One agent said to call 800-922-0204 to reach a Customer Service agent, or *611 from your phone.
Then another agent gave 866-271-7585, Option one and then Option two.
Photo courtesy Geoff Petis.
Thank you to Steamboat Radio listener Geoff Petis for bringing this to our attention.