It might be hard to remember, but before Facebook existed, people would call each other on the phone to wish them a happy birthday. A woman who lives near Boston and was turning 84 waited for friends and family to call her, but the calls never came. [More]
landlines
NJ Regulators: Verizon Landline Service Has “Systemic Problems,” Fixes Are “Haphazard”
By 10.3.16
The state of Verizon landline service in New Jersey has been a sordid saga for several years now, with customers and mayors repeatedly claiming that the telecom behemoth is neglecting their needs. The latest act in this messy play now sees one state regulator all but begging another to do something already about the way Verizon leaves customers hanging with crappy service. [More]
New Jersey Customers Complain To Utility Board For Hours About Crappy Verizon Service
By 8.5.16
In recent years, the relationship between Verizon and its legacy, copper-wire, landline-using customers in New Jersey has gotten… well, let’s politely call it “contentious.” Residents of the Garden State and the descendant of Ma Bell have found themselves at odds over everything from pricing to fiber rollout to disintegrating connections. So when the state gave those customers a chance to come out and have their say, well, they said a lot. [More]
What The Big Verizon Worker Strike Means For Consumers
By 4.13.16
Tens of thousands of Verizon employees walked off the job this morning, when months of inconclusive contract negotiations between the company and the union representing those workers finally stalled out completely. [More]
Pennsylvania Investigating State Of Verizon’s Landline Service
By 2.23.16
Verizon is once again being accused of neglecting its copper-wire landline network. Following complaints from workers of damaged, sagging lines and unsafe utility poles, the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission has announced it will be looking into whether or not the telecom giant’s actions put employees and the public at risk. [More]
At Least 16 NJ Towns Left With Failing Phone Service While Verizon Dithers On Repairing Copper Wires
By 1.7.16
Verizon has made it very clear that they have no interest in maintaining or upgrading their aging, legacy copper-wire networks. If they were replacing them all with fiber that would be one thing, but according to residents and officials in at least 16 New Jersey towns, that’s not what’s happening. Instead, municipalities are just seeing their entire communications infrastructure left to rot, to the point where you can’t even make a phone call on a rainy day. [More]
AT&T, Verizon Must Pay To Investigate Landline Service Quality Problems In California
By 9.10.15
The California Public Utilities Commission plans to get to the bottom of why Verizon and AT&T phone service isn’t consistent in the state by making it clear that the state hasn’t forgotten a years-old order requiring that both providers conduct and finance investigations into their infrastructures. [More]
Verizon: “People Are Going To Look Back And Laugh” At NJ Customers Worried About Their Copper Landlines
By 8.11.15
Copper wire might seem old-fashioned now, but after a hundred-year run of it being the way to get telephone service, you can imagine why consumers are attached to it. But still, there are indeed many good reasons for upgrades to be taking place. There are good arguments to be made for explaining to anxious consumers how change can benefit them — but mocking them simply for wanting their needs met is not one of those. [More]
FCC Adopts Rule Saying Your Phone Company Actually Has To Tell You Before They Kill Your Copper Landline
By 8.6.15
The age of copper is over. Or at least, the nation’s biggest telephone legacy landline carriers really want it to be. And the FCC is okay with that — as long as companies stick to a few new consumer protection rules that the commission voted on today. [More]
Verizon’s Refusal To Repair Landline Service Leaves Elderly Man Without Phone For Months
By 7.30.15
While plenty of Americans rush to acquire the latest and greatest in new telecom technology, there are some that only need the basic phone service they’ve had for decades. But as we’ve seen on multiple occasions recently, a number of traditional landline users are being left out in the cold as Verizon tries to transition customers away from copper line service and to fiberoptic phone lines. And for one elderly New Yorker, Verizon’s apparent inflexibility resulted in months of having absolutely no service at all. [More]
Consumers Put Robocall-Blocking Devices To The Test
By 7.28.15
While we wait for phone companies to get around to offering services that help consumers block unwanted prerecorded robocalls, there are already several options available for people to use now, but not all of them may be up to the task. [More]
FCC Proposal: Phone Companies Need To Offer Backup Power, Actually Notify You If They Kill Off Your Copper-Wire Landline
By 7.10.15
FCC chairman Tom Wheeler is introducing a new proposal to the commission today that would attempt to protect consumers’ interests while advancing the transition away from plain old copper-wire service and onto IP data networks. [More]
Verizon Tells Another Customer To Switch To Fiber Or Lose Landline Service
By 7.9.15
Even though his landline service was working fine, a man in Virginia was recently told by Verizon that he had two weeks to switch to the company’s fiberoptic service or lose his account altogether. [More]
Verizon Threatens To Disconnect NJ Landline Customer Unless They Switch To Fiber
By 7.1.15
Copper wire is expensive and old-fashioned. Phone companies don’t want to maintain or use it anymore. Still, some customers like their reliable old land-lines, and the law creates certain obligations for phone companies to provide and maintain them. But Verizon is apparently so sick and tired of providing plain old telephone service that they’re threatening to disconnect customers who don’t “voluntarily” upgrade to fiber A.S.A.P. [More]
Telecom Union Says Verizon Is Neglecting Landlines
By 6.9.15
Though more than 40% of U.S. homes are now cellphone-only, many millions of Americans still have landline service. But a union representing 35,000 Verizon employees says the company is refusing to repair broken copper-line networks. [More]
New Comcast Customer Loses Old Phone Number
By 2.18.15
When people switch from one phone provider to another, even for landline service, they’re supposed to be able to port their phone number from their old phone company to their new one. That didn’t happen for one new Comcast customer, who lost her phone number of 15 years when she switched from AT&T. [More]
Verizon Fined $2 Million For Failing To Investigate Rural Calling Problems
By 1.27.15
Verizon and other operators of copper wire landline service have been accused in recent years of letting these old networks fall into disrepair in order to shift consumers over to wireless and fiberoptic services. It certainly doesn’t help Verizon’s case when the company spends months failing to investigate problems with rural phone service that its own data showed existed. [More]
FCC Proposes Some Consumer Protections As They Inch Closer To Killing Off Copper Landlines
By 11.21.14
Phones are wireless, consumers are cutting back, and copper is expensive: all are reasons why the big phone companies want permission from the FCC to walk away from old-fashioned landline networks and to keep moving toward an internet-based future. The FCC tentatively agrees, and voted 3-2 today to take another baby step in the process that will end up making the nation’s century-old copper landline network obsolete. [More]
