racoma.com.phJ. Angelo Racoma on technology, economics, writing, problogging, and getting things done

Let’s see how far a little search-optimized blog ranting goes (I hope we get to reach front page for queries on my metropolis’ power distribution utility, “Meralco”).

Don’t believe that crap Meralco gives you in their television, newspaper and billboard advertisements. They say they have an efficient customer service desk you can always count on for help, but it turns out they’re not so great after all.

It’s been four days since we lost power at our place in the heart of Quezon City, Metro Manila, due to typhoon Milenyo and up to now we’re still in the dark ages. I thought yesterday’s power restoration was already permanent, but boy was I wrong. Just thirty minutes of getting home, the power went out again. And that was while I was taking a shower! Very timely, indeed.

I called the local barangay office (the local equivalent of the town deputies) and they told me they got reports of a step-down transformer exploding along our street near the corner of the Mini Stop convenience store, plunging the vicinity into darkness. Yes, just our short strip of Maginhawa Street. So you can imagine our frustration when the neighbors a few houses down the street are already shining in all their bright electric glory.

I’ve been trying to contact Meralco’s 16211 customer service number to no avail–it was always unreachable or I get one ring and then a busy signal. In fact, the barangay operatives had also been trying to call the Meralco call center and they didn’t have any luck with getting through, either.

I even tried caling the 117 emergency number to see if they have a direct line to Meralco, but it turns out they also use the Meralco hotline for cases like these. They did give me a Globe mobile number to send SMS to, though (0917-5592824). I’ve sent a handful of SMS messages but I haven’t had any responses.

So in the end, I don’t think anyone was able to report that incident. Things like these should take only about 30 minutes to an hour to fix! Now it’s been almost 20 hours and we still have no power!

Meralco customer service sucks!

A little backgrounder. Typhoon Milenyo hit Metro Manila quite hard that a lot of power lines were brought down (some by collapsed trees and billboards, perhaps). This brought power in much of the metropolis and neighboring provinces down in the morning of Thursday, September 28th. One can understand the difficulty in getting through to the Meralco help desk on that day due to the volume of calls, but would you believe it–I was able to get in touch with them to ask for information when the power would be restored.

Friday and Saturday were bright, sunny days, so we thought the infrastructure damage would already be fixed by then, but it seems we were wrong. No power still! By this time, we had to contend with the heat and humidity (compared to the cool, rainy and windy night the day the storm passed) and the kids slept quite restlessly. And guess what, calls to 16211 could no longer come through.

Count on a little force majeure to bring a big company’s communication systems down.

Disappointing

Now why am I so pissed with Meralco? Well, I think almost everyone is. While it is understandable for them to experience difficulties at a time like this, I would expect a company of its stature to at least enforce some measures to ensure its clients can at least get in touch with the helpdesk, especially during these difficult times.

It seems to me, though, that Meralco just disconnected their phone lines at the height of the demand and the ensuing days after. Talk about customer service! I can’t even send a complaint or any feedback thru their website. All I get is an Error 500 message!

Result from Meralco’s feedback form. I can’t even send a complaint!

I understand if their call center staff also have to go home to their families. But couldn’t Meralco also set up–or outsource–call center desks away from their service areas, say, in other provinces, too, so there would be redundancy in case disaster strikes in the vicininty of their main office?

It’s a monopoly!

If this were just any regular service company I would’ve stopped dealing with them because of crappy customer service. But this is a utility. And it’s the sole power distributor in the metropolis–so it’s a monopoly! It’s not like I could just switch providers at will. I have no other choice because they’re the only distributor here.

Yes, my Bayantel phone service also went down, but I’m not ranting much about it since it was my choice to go for Bayantel (cheap DSL+phone). I knew Bayantel service goes down when the relay stations run out of battery power during extended power interruptions, but I still stuck to the service. I could’ve opted for PLDT, but I decided otherwise. (Incidentally, Bayantel is also owned by the same company that owns majority shares of Meralco.)

I hope you’re reading this.

So there. I hope you get to read this, Meralco! I couldn’t get in touch with you guys over the phone, thru your website, and not even thru SMS, so I’m writing my complaint here.

I pay my (expensive) bills on time (it’s not like I have a choice–you disconnect power only a few days after the due date). So I expect quality customer service in return. I know it’s hard to fix collapsed power lines and damaged circuitry. But the simple fact that I can’t even get through to your helpdesk a full four days after the actual calamity struck tells me that you suck at customer service.

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