Intermission: Brought to you by Romtelecom
Gentle readers, the move was successful and all but we’ve hit something of a snag regarding internet service. Romtelecom has me feeling a bit like I’m fenced into a corner.
Essentially, it took a few visits to the local Romtelecom office near Hotel Aro Palace and the parcul central for a period of a week just to establish telephone service. That’s up and running now, but apparently getting internet service is something more complicated. There’s a lot of finger pointing going on between the Braşov techs, the Bucureşti internet department, and the national 930 customer service group. Bottomline: they’re taking me for a magic carpet ride.
After a couple dozen phone calls and nine separate faxes, the call came in late Friday that finally someone would assume personal responsibility to see my situation through to a solution. For you see, they finally found one of the faxes I’ve been repeatedly sending after receiving instructions from various people to submit a written request to clear up whatever confusion was going on. Frankly, it’s a bit like a circus act… only without the peanuts or music.
Not only do I not know what is going on, but I can guarantee you that not a single person working at Romtelecom has a clue either. Despite the use of a central database of customer managements (like any modern giant), each time you call Romtelecom results in a new story different from the last, the direction to call someone else (or possibly call the person you just spoke to a moment ago who told you to call this person), and/or yet another request for written authority to transfer service.
Asking for a supervisor gets you nowhere because the incompentent “leadership” at Romtelecom is afraid to pick up the phone and talk to customers. That is true regardless of the department. The folks on the frontline straight up tell you that managers will not talk to customers. It’s indicative of a disease that remains inside Romtelecom despite their fancy Americanesque branding campaigns that have recently proliferated everywhere. I predict Romtelecom will dwindle in the face of competition as the telecom market slowly cracks open here to VoIP companies and international competitors.
MBA 101 for the Romtelecom executives: Deer in the headlights is a failure of leadership. That’ll get you bought out, into bankruptcy, or replaced by the shareholders.
May 6th, 2006 at 10:56 pm
I had also some kind if internet blackout this week. Called my provider in Montreal and within 20-30 minutes the whole problem was solved. That’s comletely different from your story, unfortunately!
May 7th, 2006 at 2:05 pm
More than half of the phonecalls to other countries are already through third-party VoIP.
Romtelecom’s cell phone service, Cosmote already has more than a billion in losses and despite heavy advertising, it has a market share of only around 0.8%.
In 2005, there were more minutes spoken on cell-phones than on landlines.
They’re going down! Only a few years and they’ll be in the red. :-)
–bogdan
May 7th, 2006 at 3:58 pm
We switched to Astral for our land line/ISP and it has been much better (and cheaper). Ciuc being a small town, though, I suspect we get advantages through everyone knowing someone at the company.
May 7th, 2006 at 5:44 pm
Cherolex – So, give me the number to your guy in Montreal and maybe he can fix my connection in 30 minutes and… Oh. Oh, yeah. =P
Bogdan – Interesting facts! I’m never quite sure why, but I do like learning about these telecom structures. Interestingly, after six months of friends’ constant suggestion that I get a mobile (although I’ve had literally no need for one and even those friends wouldn’t spend the few cents to call me, if I did), the time finally came to sign up for cellular service. And whom did I choose? Cosmote. So far, so good for me, but general opinion of them seems to be poor.
Andy – I would think about switching to Astral when my contract runs out, but apparently they are barred from providing service in Brasov. I haven’t read the legislation first hand, but in a previous thread here it was explained to me. Here we have only two choices: RDS (no thanks) and Romtelecom (previously tolerable).
May 8th, 2006 at 7:18 pm
sounds very similar to the issues we had getting “specialized” (out of the loop of the mentality) services when we were dealing with “da kine”….technology is not a priority, you know? best wishes….
May 8th, 2006 at 9:15 pm
the race is on…good luck :-)
May 9th, 2006 at 12:11 am
Shadow – I am definitely the haole in this situation. Trying to ‘talk story’ has gotten no where.
Kyah – I believe I’ve just cheated my way to victory!
June 28th, 2006 at 4:38 pm
Telecoms in Italy are not so bad after all. But the biggest one company has a funny call service. Low paid youngsters on a temporary contract may give the poor customer a reply chosen at random. The unlucky customer may go to sleep reassured that -The problem will be solved within tomorrow- (in case he picked customer-carer Mary)- , or commit suicide being asked hi wife’s zip code (in case he picked Juliet). -
strudel
August 6th, 2006 at 3:23 pm
I recently waited only 2 weeks to receive my internet service in Poiana Brasov, & was Romtelecom’s first client for the entire building.. In Ro, as in many other countries, it’s WHO you know..