Tech Olive

Earlier today we posted about how a Verizon rep told an existing customer that if he were to upgrade his DSL plan, it would “burn his house down.” We just received word from a Verizon spokesman by the name of Bill Kula who commented on the situation. See what he had to say after the break.

This is Bill Kula, a Verizon national media spokesman commenting on Laura Northrup’s original story about our customer Michael trying to increase his DSL-based Internet speed with us that you have posted here.

First, our DSL service introduced 11 years ago (and our fastest DSL service of up-to 7.1 Mbps offered two years ago and now available to 10 million households) is very safe. I can’t speak for the alleged words of the Verizon sales reps with whom Michael spoke, but do not take their comments literally. When you use our 7.1 Mbps service, you don’t need to call out the fire department for heaven’s sake.

Michael got poor service over the phone and should not have had to spend so much time simply trying to get information on our dry loop DSL service. We owe him better and we will use this case as an exercise in serious coaching of our members of our team.

We’d like to continue providing Michael his high-speed Internet service and we have personally spoken with him today in order for us to confirm if he can in fact receive our up to 7.1 Mbps DSL service, or not, based on engineering stats that show how far his residence is from our nearest DSL-enabled central office.

Customers can get lower dry loop DSL pricing when ordering online as compared to speaking to a rep at a center. That’s one reason the rates provided to Michael are higher than what you will see in the following URL about our DSL pricing:

http://www22.verizon.com/Residential/HighSpeedInternet/Plans/Plans.htm

As you can see, online pricing for dry loop DSL is $19.99 for our up-to 1 Mbps service; $29.99 for our up-to 3 Mbps service; and $42.99 for our up to 7.1 Mbps service. Some related links on this site provide additional info. about our free modem offer for online orders, plus our free Wi-Fi service for our 3 and 7.1 Mbps customers.

For all readers of the Consumerist and Tech Olive, rest assured, our DSL-based service provides great value for the speed as compared to our competitors. And when you use it, your house won’t look like the over-the-top photo that supports the original story or the even more over-the-top one here on Tech Olive.