![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
We finally decided it was apparent we're never going to get out of our shoebox till we move back to the midwest and we should just go ahead and get a landline phone and Internet service at home. Coincidentally, about the same time we decided this, the local (but new to the area - I think there might have been a buy-out or something) phone company was sending sales reps door to door to find new customers. Signed up for a nice package with phone service and high-speed Internet and waited to received a letter confirming our start date with our phone number, as well as a modem. We waited. Waited. Got the modem, finally. I ended up calling the phone company who called me back (at work) to give me my phone number and let me know our service started on October 31. Except we didn't have service - we had a completely dead line.
In the past week, I've called the phone company at least four times, spoken with a dozen people, and had repair out to the apartment three times. Apparently there's broken wiring somewhere between the main box outside and our phone jack, and apparently it's the apartment management's duty to fix it - but the apartment management not only won't fix it, they don't believe there's anything wrong. They keep saying that the phone company's not turning on the service correctly. The phone repair people have tested the jack and the main box twice, and both times determined it's broken wiring. The person who came out today was actually supposed to speak with our apartment manager and detail the problem but refused to do it. We didn't ask him to, it was part of the work order - but he refused to do it.
Meanwhile, the apartment management won't do anything and I'm literally afraid to push it because this isn't a regular apartment complex with leases and laws, it's a weekly. The manager can be vindictive and can - and has - evicted people for no reason with no warning. We can't lose our apartment; we don't have anywhere else to go. (Like I've been living in a 400 square-foot overpriced apartment in a crummy neighborhood because I just love it! It just costs too much to move, plus buy furniture - we don't own any.) So we can't press this issue. This is the same management who, a few months after we moved in, threatened to evict us for not paying a pet deposit and pet rent even though they weren't part of the deal when we moved it and called animal control on us when we balked. Yeah, we paid up.
Anyway, I canceled our service this afternoon. I can't afford to fight our apartment manager and I'm not paying for service I can't use. I didn't realize quite how excited I was about getting Internet access at home till I realized it's not going to happen right now.
The phone company keeps telling us that the apartment management is legally obligated to provide us with working phone lines. If that's really true (management insists they're only legally responsible for the inside jacks) I'd love to turn them in but don't know where to report them and, more importantly, cannot afford to have our name attached to anything.
We figured we'd move back to the midwest in May, once the weather's good again up there, but now we're beginning to look at late February/early March. I can sell back all but a week of my sick time this month and we can put that away, then in February, Irish has a huge event (the only one he made any real money at this year - hopefully he can do as well next year) and my final paycheck should have plenty of vacation pay on it. Altogether, it ought to be enough to get us out of here and have a little to start with when we get back. I know my mom really wants us to wait till she's ready to go in May but I'm just not up for that. We really have to go.
In the past week, I've called the phone company at least four times, spoken with a dozen people, and had repair out to the apartment three times. Apparently there's broken wiring somewhere between the main box outside and our phone jack, and apparently it's the apartment management's duty to fix it - but the apartment management not only won't fix it, they don't believe there's anything wrong. They keep saying that the phone company's not turning on the service correctly. The phone repair people have tested the jack and the main box twice, and both times determined it's broken wiring. The person who came out today was actually supposed to speak with our apartment manager and detail the problem but refused to do it. We didn't ask him to, it was part of the work order - but he refused to do it.
Meanwhile, the apartment management won't do anything and I'm literally afraid to push it because this isn't a regular apartment complex with leases and laws, it's a weekly. The manager can be vindictive and can - and has - evicted people for no reason with no warning. We can't lose our apartment; we don't have anywhere else to go. (Like I've been living in a 400 square-foot overpriced apartment in a crummy neighborhood because I just love it! It just costs too much to move, plus buy furniture - we don't own any.) So we can't press this issue. This is the same management who, a few months after we moved in, threatened to evict us for not paying a pet deposit and pet rent even though they weren't part of the deal when we moved it and called animal control on us when we balked. Yeah, we paid up.
Anyway, I canceled our service this afternoon. I can't afford to fight our apartment manager and I'm not paying for service I can't use. I didn't realize quite how excited I was about getting Internet access at home till I realized it's not going to happen right now.
The phone company keeps telling us that the apartment management is legally obligated to provide us with working phone lines. If that's really true (management insists they're only legally responsible for the inside jacks) I'd love to turn them in but don't know where to report them and, more importantly, cannot afford to have our name attached to anything.
We figured we'd move back to the midwest in May, once the weather's good again up there, but now we're beginning to look at late February/early March. I can sell back all but a week of my sick time this month and we can put that away, then in February, Irish has a huge event (the only one he made any real money at this year - hopefully he can do as well next year) and my final paycheck should have plenty of vacation pay on it. Altogether, it ought to be enough to get us out of here and have a little to start with when we get back. I know my mom really wants us to wait till she's ready to go in May but I'm just not up for that. We really have to go.