It’s been several weeks since my first two encounters with CenturyTel, and there was still no sign of a DSL modem. Friday morning I took the initiative and called them up. “Oh, it’s been active since the first day you called, we just forgot to send the modem. We’ll overnight it. Just give us a call when it arrives and we’ll modify you’re activation date so you don’t get billed for service you didn’t receive”.

Of course in CenturyTel terms, overnighting it means it shows up Tuesday of the next week. I spent most of this evening trying to get it to work. Plugged it in with and without the line filter, at every outlet in my house. Opened a few up even to verify that all 4 wires are connected to the outlets. I bit the bullet and called tech support again. 24 minutes 52 seconds on hold before I finally got a real person. 2 innings in the game missed listening to hold music. Anyway, I fed the phone jockey the answers to her scripted questions before she even finished asking them, and get put on hold again. Tier 2 support picks up after 5 minutes. “You’re all on here, I’ll have to put in a repair ticket. They’ve got a 24-48 response time on repair calls, so you may be without DSL service for another day or two.”

Slow, overpriced DSL and no competent tech support! Yes sir may I have another?

Ugh. Why, oh why can’t I pick my local phone company? (rhetorical question, you don’t have to answer. I know why, but that doesn’t mean I have to like the local govt. regulated phone monopoly.)