Some Having Trouble Making Phone Switch on Home Services

Apr

Some Having Trouble Making Phone Switch

posted by admin in Home Phone Service

Since Time Warner Cable moved its own digital phone service to the area, taking the place of Adelphia’s cable offerings, people have had a choice between home phone companies.Home Phone Service It’s competition local provider Horizon Chillicothe Telephone and Time Warner agree is good for business.

But some local residents have found switching their phone line from one phone company to another isn’t quite as easy as changing cable or Internet providers,Home Phone Service because there are a few entities involved and new regulations that make it difficult for cable providers to talk openly with customers about their services.
The law guards against telephone companies soliciting customers after customers have made a decision to switch.

“We can’t directly communicate with people once they’ve started (using) Time Warner,” said Randy Davies, a spokesman for Horizon Chillicothe Telephone. “We can try to answer their questions, but it’s limited.”

Martin knows all about the frustration of switching telephone companies. In March, she switched from Horizon to Time Warner for her land-line phone service, only to find people attempting to call her using Horizon lines were unable to get through. Horizon President Bill McKell said the common mix-up occurs when people cancel their service themselves with Horizon instead of allowing Time Warner to cancel the service after they’ve activated the customer’s new service.

“If they cancel their services with us before Time Warner has completed what they need to do, they can get disconnected and error messages,” McKell said.

In effect, if someone cancels his or her Horizon line and then tries to sign up for Time Warner service, their phone number doesn’t get transferred to Time Warner. The same happens on a switch the other way.

“We had gotten numbers from Horizon, but the system was still recognizing them as Horizon numbers that were not in service, and so some of our customers were disconnected,” Home Phone Service said Mary Jo Green, vice president of public affairs for Time Warner Ohio.

And because the paperwork and steps can take a number of days, many customers sit baffled as repairmen cannot fix their disconnected line.

“The Time Warner repairman told me when you switch, Horizon can block people from calling Time Warner numbers,” Martin said, demonstrating the confusion that exists even among those doing the work. “The repairman said he did everything he could but couldn’t fix it.”

Tags: anc, business, company, customers, Home Phone Service, lt, provide, spokesman, vice president