Verizon is famous for having crappy outside plant records. For
> example, when I moved here in October, 2004 they swore up and down
> that service was hooked up. Plug in the phone and no dial-tone. No NID > either.
>
> the ANAC number on every pair. Not only did I find my pair, I found
> the NID for my apartment and the two weren't anywhere near each other,
> nor was the NID connected.
> Called Verizon and told em' it was pair 14 and I wanted it hooked to
> my NID. The tech that came out had a good laugh, he said I'd stirred
> up a hornets nest inside Verizon's install/repair depot. Customers are
> NOT supposed to open terminal boxes.
> But when said boxes are secured with 7/16" nuts, it isn't hard to get > in.
Exact same experience getting 2nd line into our house here in Freehold, NJ in 1996 when it was still Hell, errrrr. I mean Bell Atlantic.
Took them three tries to get me a working line with the number which they'd told me was assigned ... one time, they even managed to break some local business's service ... I started getting their calls instead of them.
Eventually they managed to make it work correctly.
Wrote a letter to president/CEO of Bell Atlantic at that time (Ray Smith, I think) along with copies to some other executives as well as the NJ PUC describing exactly what had happened. I ended up getting a phone call from some outside plant supervisor who said to call him directly if I ever had any other problems (I doubt he's even there anymore 10 years later) as well as 2 separate form letters from "Ray Smith" which promised me a service credit [they even screwed that up, instead of one month's free local service, I think I got 3 !]
No wonder they call them "Public Futilities".