Availability?!?!

[StreetChariot]

I live in a suburb in Columbus, OH. About a month ago, an AT&T U-verse rep was out walking through the neigborhood talking to my neighbors regarding U-verse. I was on my way to work, so I didn't have a chance to talk to him. The next day, I went online to att.com to look about getting U-verse (I had just cancelled the horrible DishNetwork service on the way to work), only to find that "Service is currently not available at this location". As it stands today, my neighbor to the left has U-verse, two neighbors behind me have U-verse, and the neighbor across the street has U-verse, but the website still says "Service is currently not available at this location" when I input my address or phone number. I called 877-U-ASK-ATT also and they said they are also confused, as all of the addresses surrounding mine either have it, or are able to have it.

Has anyone else run into the same problem when trying to signup for U-verse?

Football season is coming up and I want to get U-verse in before the rush for installation happens. (The Buckeyes are the greatest thing since sliced bread here.)

Thanks,
StreetChariot

[randyl]

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StreetChariot wrote:

I live in a suburb in Columbus, OH. About a month ago, an AT&T U-verse rep was out walking through the neigborhood talking to my neighbors regarding U-verse. I was on my way to work, so I didn't have a chance to talk to him. The next day, I went online to att.com to look about getting U-verse (I had just cancelled the horrible DishNetwork service on the way to work), only to find that "Service is currently not available at this location". As it stands today, my neighbor to the left has U-verse, two neighbors behind me have U-verse, and the neighbor across the street has U-verse, but the website still says "Service is currently not available at this location" when I input my address or phone number. I called 877-U-ASK-ATT also and they said they are also confused, as all of the addresses surrounding mine either have it, or are able to have it.

Has anyone else run into the same problem when trying to signup for U-verse?

Football season is coming up and I want to get U-verse in before the rush for installation happens. (The Buckeyes are the greatest thing since sliced bread here.)

Thanks,
StreetChariot

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              yep yep ben posted about this a few times...   did they kick it up to engineering to check it out ??

               if not call back and ask them to write up a (their term here) for engineering...

              my take

              randy

[StreetChariot]

Thanks for the heads up randy. I'll call them and have them look into it with their engineers. The worst part (on ATT's part) is that there was a FST out in my backyard today (at the term point) hooking up my neighbor behind me for U-verse. I told him my story and he said "Well your line terminates to this box I'm in now, and I don't see how you should be any different than your neigbor behind you."

He was who informed me of the 877-U-ASK-ATT number. They seem to know more about U-verse than the ATT-2020 phone reps.

Thanks,

StreetChariot

[randyl]

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StreetChariot wrote:

Thanks for the heads up randy. I'll call them and have them look into it with their engineers. The worst part (on ATT's part) is that there was a FST out in my backyard today (at the term point) hooking up my neighbor behind me for U-verse. I told him my story and he said "Well your line terminates to this box I'm in now, and I don't see how you should be any different than your neigbor behind you."

He was who informed me of the 877-U-ASK-ATT number. They seem to know more about U-verse than the ATT-2020 phone reps.

Thanks,

StreetChariot

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         my my he should of given  u his employee #  for a spiff his way    (u can turn it in as a ref)

[StreetChariot]

I asked him if he could get a bonus from AT&T, and he gave me a card with a code on it. 
The code was two letters and four numbers. Not sure if that is what it was for but I told the rep on the phone the code when I called in about the engineering thing.

Thanks for your help Randy, hopefully pretty soon I'll be a U-verse customer. I cannot wait to see what HD channels I've been missing out on, as well as having a view of my Yahoo! Fantasy teams on the U-Bar.

Thanks,

StreetChariot

[StreetChariot]

A question for anyone who has gone through the same issue I'm having:

How long should I wait before I call AT&T back to see what is going on about my house not being able to get U-Verse?

I called in (877-U-ASK-ATT) on Friday (08-08-08).

The lady I spoke to said she'd call me back later on, but did not....

I am really itching to get cable back, as the local ATSC broadcasts just don't offer enough programming.

[randyl]

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StreetChariot wrote:

A question for anyone who has gone through the same issue I'm having:

How long should I wait before I call AT&T back to see what is going on about my house not being able to get U-Verse?

I called in (877-U-ASK-ATT) on Friday (08-08-08).

The lady I spoke to said she'd call me back later on, but did not....

I am really itching to get cable back, as the local ATSC broadcasts just don't offer enough programming.

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        thats a variable i bet for diff situations for sure ??   dunno  (if it went to engineering for the answer i have seen some long waits posted)

        got to think 7 to 10 days is fair wait to me  but thats just a seat of the pants answer from me ......

        hindsight 20/20  how long do i give u before i call u back again ?  your name and ext please ?  etc

       my thoughts

       randy

[Pip_2]

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StreetChariot wrote:

A question for anyone who has gone through the same issue I'm having:

How long should I wait before I call AT&T back to see what is going on about my house not being able to get U-Verse?

I called in (877-U-ASK-ATT) on Friday (08-08-08).

The lady I spoke to said she'd call me back later on, but did not....

I am really itching to get cable back, as the local ATSC broadcasts just don't offer enough programming.

---

You waited long enough. Call now or first thing tomorrow.

When high speed internet was first coming to our area (east of Cleveland Oh), I had Ameritech for my phone service and AT&T for my cable. I called them every single week, telling them the first one to get the HSI service to me, would be the one to get my business.

Ameritech won and I was never sorry with that choice, so don't be afraid to call and bug them about it.

[StreetChariot]

OK. I just called and bugged them. They said that they were still looking into it and it usually takes 5 business days before the engineers can determine why I cannot get U-verse. I will call them again on Friday morning to see if they have any good news for me. I'm dissapointed in how long i've gone without cable/sat (since I cancelled my Dish thinking I could get U-verse) and to boot, I am missing out on additional Olympics coverage on Universal, USA, MSNBC, etc.

Luckily the local NBC station (WCMH-DT 4) has an excellent tower and I get high quality 1080i HD signals from them 99.9% of the time.

GO USA!

[StreetChariot]

OK. I called the U-ASK-ATT number again not even two minutes ago. I told the rep about the "Engineering Ticket" that was opened on the 8th, and that I was calling back since it was 5 days from the date I opened the ticket. She asked me all the usual identity stuff then asked me for my address and phone number... After about 3 minutes she said, "I'm showing that service is unavailable for your location at this time, using your address or your phone number". I told her I was able to do that as well (using the website) which she informed me was how she was looking it up. I asked her if anyone had made any notes in my file regarding the engineering ticket and she said "No, it doesn't look like anyone has even started to work on your ticket, it takes 5 business days to complete your ticket". I asked her if she could ask engineering to see what was taking so long (since it had been 5 days), and she said she didn't have any contact numbers for engineering, and offered me AT&T Dish Network again. I told her no thanks and hung up.

I have NEVER in my life had to fight so hard to spend money on something.
Not even my wife makes it this hard on me to get something.
I have NEVER in my life (aside from when I got my AT&T POTS service) had a company work so slowly to accomplish something to try and attract a perspective customer or keep a current customer.

What is even more angering is that I even had a U-verse installer check my line at the box (The green service box in the easement) last Friday (08-08-08) and he said there wouldn't be a problem getting service and that the line strength was good enough from the Fiber box to the service box. Distance less than 2000 Ft Fiber box to service box.  Distance from service box to house box 80 Ft. My next door neighbor (who has U-verse) is 300+ Ft from the same service box so I know it can't be distance....

I can find no email addresses for any kind of customer support with U-verse. Does anyone have any customer service email addresses?


Sorry to rant and rave, it's just frustrating to have to do so much work just to get service from AT&T.

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

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StreetChariot wrote:

OK. I called the U-ASK-ATT number again not even two minutes ago. I told the rep about the "Engineering Ticket" that was opened on the 8th, and that I was calling back since it was 5 days from the date I opened the ticket. She asked me all the usual identity stuff then asked me for my address and phone number... After about 3 minutes she said, "I'm showing that service is unavailable for your location at this time, using your address or your phone number". I told her I was able to do that as well (using the website) which she informed me was how she was looking it up. I asked her if anyone had made any notes in my file regarding the engineering ticket and she said "No, it doesn't look like anyone has even started to work on your ticket, it takes 5 business days to complete your ticket". I asked her if she could ask engineering to see what was taking so long (since it had been 5 days), and she said she didn't have any contact numbers for engineering, and offered me AT&T Dish Network again. I told her no thanks and hung up.

I have NEVER in my life had to fight so hard to spend money on something.
Not even my wife makes it this hard on me to get something.
I have NEVER in my life (aside from when I got my AT&T POTS service) had a company work so slowly to accomplish something to try and attract a perspective customer or keep a current customer.

What is even more angering is that I even had a U-verse installer check my line at the box (The green service box in the easement) last Friday (08-08-08) and he said there wouldn't be a problem getting service and that the line strength was good enough from the Fiber box to the service box. Distance less than 2000 Ft Fiber box to service box.  Distance from service box to house box 80 Ft. My next door neighbor (who has U-verse) is 300+ Ft from the same service box so I know it can't be distance....

I can find no email addresses for any kind of customer support with U-verse. Does anyone have any customer service email addresses?


Sorry to rant and rave, it's just frustrating to have to do so much work just to get service from AT&T.

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Try contacting David here.  You can send him an email and he will get to you when he can.  A lot of people send him emails so it may not be really fast.

[showtime48 ACE - Guru]

sweetchariot did you put your neighbors addresses yourself into the address checker to see what came up?...

[StreetChariot]

Yeah, and I've been over there to watch U-verse TV a couple of times

The neighbor on my left has it, the neighbor on my right it says "Can get U-verse" the neighbor across the street can get it, and two of the three people behind me have it. (I have a pie shaped lot).

[showtime48 ACE - Guru]

no, i believe you i was just curious what the address checker said when you put in their info...

[StreetChariot]

Right on, that was a little attempt at humor in regards to the whole situation.

I asked them the other day if they could just get another STB box, and I'd run a wire across the yard to my house since AT&T was taking so long  LOL

[tstorm_1]

normally an "f" case ticket is needed to begin this process. I can tell you from lots of experience this process is not a 5 day process it more likely to be a 10 to 14 day process.  I know of over 30 people i have spoken with all of which would like the service -- but at this point is really not available to them.  It sounds like yours is a database error which needs to be corrected.   I know it's  han frustrating but in the end it is worth it.  Hang in there

[Sick_Puppy]

I've had seven "Case Number: #F#########" dispatches recently as they were strugling to get my new, 8-2-08, installation's problems solved. (It was finally fixed today with a LOT of time consuming work on their part.)

They have always been able to be here by the next day, and one time, when I called about the problem in the morning, they were out the same day.

I had two Techs out two times, and three Techs out once. Today there was a Tech, two Supervisors, and a guy from AT&T that works on the lines from the house to the VRAD here. There was only one of all of these people, who happened to be a Tech that was here twice, who I thought was doing less than his best, and everything he could do, to fix my problems.

One of the Supervisors gave me his personal phone number today, in case I was unhappy with any Tech in the future, or if the quality of my U-verse was ever anything less than exceptionally good, but I now doubt that I'll ever have to use it.

Were are you located, tstorm?

Message Edited by Sick_Puppy on 08-21-2008 10:11 AM

[dannyt_1]

It's very possible that your cable pair failed the VDSL test (some minor fault on the line possibly) and therefore is listed in the database as unavailable.

If it were a database error then more than likely it would have been cleared already. A neighbor of mine has been waiting 3 weeks for their line to get cleared for service but it was because their line had a fault on it that has to be repaired.

[Sick_Puppy]

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dannyt wrote:

It's very possible that your cable pair failed the VDSL test (some minor fault on the line possibly) and therefore is listed in the database as unavailable.

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If you are talking to me, dannyt, nope. That wasn't the reason for all my U-verse problems. I had the Elite DSL service for 1½ years with AT&T before the U-verse was installed.

My problem was mostly the coax (actually 33-year-old Channel Master antenna wire), with lots of barrel connectors and splitters, that was buried in my attic under 14" of blown insulation. You couldn't see it up there. That round, unshielded antenna wire was trying to carry the U-verse signal to a few of my TVs. You couldn't spot the problem from outside my house at the cable box either, as the coax out there was up to snuff. OFC, it's hard to believe that that old wire allowed the installation to pass any inside-the-premises tests, too, but apparently it did.

Why it was that we started getting a line failure at one point, I'm not sure. The failure wasn't there at the end of the initial installation. However, when I got U-verse, we started off with two pairs coming into my house -- one for the old DSL, and the other for the phone. When the DSL was initially installed we were having trouble getting a clean line (even with phone filters). Having two pairs appeared to solve the problem, and AT&T wasn't billing me for actually having two lines. The third tech from U-verse disconnected the pair for my phone line, at the phone box on my house, thinking it may be causing problems. He asked me if I had two phone lines and I said, "No." I was thinking "phone numbers," not lines, and I had forgotten about that second line for DSL. (DOH! I'm an idiot.) Later on that night, several hours after the Tech left, I realized we had no phone dial tone. I called Tier 2 and a new dispatch was issued. It wasn't wasted as we were still getting pixelation anyway. The next morning someone from AT&T (I&M I guess... they use to be called I&R) fixed the no-dial-tone problem at a box somewhere. Maybe changes in this area are what started the line failure problem. Maybe my line got moved to a pair that was junk.

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There have been so many strange things with this install. Not all AT&T's fault, but it sure seemed like if it could go wrong, it did.

(It's hard to believe things can get THIS convoluted,

but keep reading if you want a laugh.)

For instance, once, when one STB stopped working entirely, we thought the box was bad. Actually, it wasn't bad. Here is what happened.

After we ran the Cat 5 cable to our two digital TVs through the attic, to get rid of the pixelation (probably actually caused by the antenna wire we couldn't see), the tech took the 1-input-4-output splitter out of the cable box and replaced it with a 1-input-2-output splitter. We checked that EVERYTHING was working before he left that afternoon. EVERYTHING was.

After the Tech left, I sent my son into the attic to spread out and "fluff up" the blown insulation where it had been disturbed. Apparently my son slightly moved one of the round, Cable Master antenna wires and it became almost disconnected. (Once we found that antenna wire a couple days later when the supervisors were here, they said the fittings attached to the barrel connectors and splitters were falling off the wire into their hands as they went to unscrew them, in order to replace the wire with their own, U-verse coax.) Anyway, when my son went to turn on his TV that first day's night, it didn't work. But remember, it had been working before the Tech left that afternoon. Weird I thought, and I called Tier 2 again. We couldn't get the STB to come up. New dispatch.

When the same Tech came back the next day he suspected that the STB or the splitter he put in had gone bad. After all, the previous afternoon we had a working STB/TV. The Tech didn't know my son had been in the attic after left, and it never dawned on me that my son's being up there could cause any problem. (He's not a kid, he's 32.) We've been up there many times over the years, and no TV cable wires had ever come apart. Also, the insulation had been blown up there by two guys moving around all day long one day, and there were never any problems with TV disconnections then, either. When the Tech asked if WE had changed anything, I just said, "No." So, he replaced the STB. But, as he was trying to get it registered with Tier 2, the computers at Tier 2 went down. When the computers at Tier 2 came back up an hour later, the guy there told us that his computer showed that he "owned" the information for my account, but the system would not let him register the new box, or change any of the information for my account. No one else could get into my account either, because the first Tier 2 guy still "owned" the information on the AT&T server. Apparently, when the Tier 2 computers went down, the software got stuck for my data, and my account information was locked. He was working on it with his supervisor. Finally, he said they needed to call in the AT&T computer IT professionals to fix the problem and allow him to get access and change my information to register the STB. Things were taking a LONG time. We decided that I could plug the power cord into the box later on when Tier 2 got their server fixed. (Plugging in the STB wasn't too technically challenging for me. -- LOL) So, the Tech wasn't needed to do that and he could leave.

When the Tier 2 guy could finally get into my account and called me back, the new STB wouldn't work either. OK, so another dispatch was scheduled, and this was the dispatch with the two supervisors and all (that I mentioned above), and when we found the bad antenna wiring to the TVs, in the U-verse lines in the attic. But, once the coax was totally replaced, the new STB would still not work, nor register with Tier 2. OK, another couple hours of testing an octopus of lines, working with Tier 2, and trying to figure out the problem. Finally, we took the new STB we were trying to register to a TV where there was another working STB. We plugged it in there. It wouldn't work there, either. AH HA! What had happened was that the previous Tech had replaced what probably was a good STB (because the problem was actually the coax), with an STB that happened to be bad right out of the box.

I'm not making this stuff up. LOL

But like I said, though I've only had U-verse since August 2, 2008, and only just got it working totally right on August 19th, I LOVE MY U-verse!!!  Even with the problems getting it going and the things I still don't like about the Program Guide, it now is the best, fastest TV/Internet service with the clearest pictures on the TV, and the fastest channel changing, I have ever had!!

Message Edited by Sick_Puppy on 08-21-2008 11:44 AM

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

I'm glad you were patient and stuck with the service.  I have never seen that kind of problem, it is one for the books.  Glad you love the service.  Enjoy!

[dannyt_1]

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Sick_Puppy wrote:

If you are talking to me, dannyt, nope. That wasn't the reason for all my U-verse problems. I had the Elite DSL service for 1½ years with AT&T before the U-verse was installed.

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Wow that was a long message. LOL. I was referring to the initial F ticket created to attempt to make the service available.

[Sick_Puppy]

Yeah.

[doctorisham]

I don't think anyone mentioned this, but I've used it in MI for several locations that are having the same issue.

Try calling 888-544-4805 and asking the people there to open a VSA case. I have had 5 friends/neighbors call them and get service. I don't know that VSA stands for, but I'm guessing it's a "verification of service address". According to sales, it opens a case to verify that your service address exists, and is able to get service; when the availabilty checker says no, and a neighbor has it.

[eulers]

There are no email addresses I can find.  I just spent 6.5 hours helping a Uverse installer and an AT&T telephone technician try to get Uverse up and running at my house.  I had signed up on line and it indicated that Uverse would be available at my phone number and service address (it has been advertised as such with great fanfare in our community).  They concluded that I was too far from the fiber optic box to get service (I understand this problem, as my DSL service from AT&T delivers only 375kbps as I am more than 15000 ft from the CO).

My local newspapers will hear about this. 

[RaptorFox]

I am actually having the same problem here, every single apartment in our complex left right and below me are showing as available but not my own.

Our VRAD is right around the corner from the apartment complex I live in, less than 200 ft. I actually spoke with a premises tech 3 days ago while he was finishing up with another call, he was nice enough to come to my apartment and do a line test and confirmed I received more than enough bandwidth for TV and Max Internet. (I should have asked him the line length, but forgot). I am currently waiting for a infamous "engineer" to come out and test my line - because aparently what the tech did dosent mean ANYTHING and "techs cant test lines".Come again?!?

Did I mention this will take "no less than 10 days"? I have been calling ATT every day to check on some kind of status update for my F ticket and all i can get is "noone has looked at it so far, call tommarow".I also called the 888-544-4805 number and the line has been disconnected. Aparently ATT dosent like people taking backroutes to establish service.

I swore I would never go with DirecTV again but at least they take my money willingly!

Message Edited by shawnmc on 09-04-2008 07:13 PM

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

Did you use the online checker?  If so all I can suggest is keep trying because that is what I did.

[doctorisham]

So if the backroute isn't working, try asking someone on the sales floor to open a VSA case. We did it just a few months ago for another install, and they had the same database issue everyone here is having.

Worth a shot.

[ruovr21]

I have the same problem here.  All the houses around my house either have the service or show service available except my house.  The funny thing is that when I do an availability search on AT&T, it showed me different results.  Here is what I searched for and got back.

Search 1.

### Street Name AV

City, State, Zip

Result 1:

### Street Name DR  (There is no streen name end with DR in my city/zip code)

City, State, Zip

Available

Search 2:

### Street Name DR

City, State, Zip

Result 2:

### Street Name AV

City,State, Zip

No service

Search 3:

### Street Name AVE

City, State, Zip

Result 3:

### Street Name AVE

City, State, Zip

No service.

Looks like their system is all mess up.

[Lukjolo]

I just stopped into my local AT&T Store and spoke with a very nice guy who was an "HSC"...He told me (regarding the status of my F-Ticket) that there was only ONE place they can call to check those statuses and the people on the other line don't even work for AT&T...He told me there is a ray of hope though as they are currently testing a new ordering system that will eventually phase out these "call center" reps. 

I metioned this thread to him and he told me that alot of the cases where service is available at an address are a result of the addresses not being in AT&T's "Street Address Guide."  He told me that most stores should have access to that department and it's about a 5 minute call and your service available within 48 hours.  I asked him if my address was in the "Street Address Guide" and he said yes, it was in from the beginning, so my 'flip' will take longer" 

i hope this info helps out...

[liontigerbear]

My whole neighborhood, with the exception of 8 houses have UVerse.  They came out in Oct 07, same story as yours.  13 months later, and numerous calls, still no Uverse.  So, been jerked off for 13 months now by ATT.  The can stick it up their **bleep** - wouldn't have it on a bet now.