TPC - The Phone Company

Last Friday morning, 07/23, my mother called me to tell me her phone was not working. A neighbor had come over and said he'd tried to call but got no answer. I then tired and got a busy signal.

Since she has a phone company administered answering service, there should never be a busy signal. If the phone is engaged, you should be directed to voice mail.

She had had a similar problem at the beginning of the week and I'd called the repair number, and the problem appeared to be fixed. But obviously, not so.

I again called the repair service and explained the problem. Later in the morning, the phone company called her and said the problem was fixed. Around 4, she again called me and said the problem was still there.

From then until Saturday evening, I made around six calls to the repair service. Saturday morning, I realized there was something seriously wrong with the phone company's system. I discovered that the first thing they do is to "check" the line; if it works, the problem is "solved."

Several times I was told the problem was inside the house. Since I'd been through something like this at my house several years ago, I knew it was not.

I explained that my mother was elderly and needed to be able to receive incoming calls. I was then told that the repair would be catgorized as a medical emergency. But, once the technicians "checked" the line, we were back to square one.

Finally, Saturday afternoon, I talked with someone who said that a technician would be on-site Monday.

In the midst of all this, I decided to buy a cell phone for her and me. I hit the first place, T-Mobile, I could think of and walked out with two Samsungs and a pre-paid plan.

I spent part of Saturday afternoon trying to understand all the options. Of course, I did everything wrong. And I realized I was confusing momsy. So I took the phones away with me and looked at the options later that evening.

It took me a while to realize that the phone must be on to work. Duhhhhh! Oh, me! Oh, my!

Early Monday morning, the technician showed up. Mother called me at work to let me know. She handed the phone over to him, and we talked. He said the junction box was at least 30 years old and badly corroded.

I'm planning on setting up a coop filled with homing pigeons in mother's back yard.

PAX!