Verizon FiOS support to customers: plug it in, dummy

I was looking at a FAQ today on Verizon FiOS’s website on 3D TV (which is, apparently, prematurely dead) when I ran across this ditty in the sidebar.

Yes, thank you, I did know that plugging the STB, router and DVRs into a power source could fix the problem of them being unplugged in less than five minutes. But I wasn’t quite sure that I’d ever had the helpful hint to make sure that power is available elsewhere in my home before calling you about the FiOS devices that won’t power up when I finally figure out how to plug them in.

I’ve blasted Verizon here before for a number of things. As long ago as 2007, I took FiOS to task for the kludge of technology inside the home, in contrast to the elegant fiber network just on the other side of the ONT. It’s as if their engineers exhausted themselves designing the network to the home and left it to the doofs to design the in-home technology.

I’ve whined about their stealing bandwidth from the Internet to deliver HD streams to coax devices. And, in 2011, I called FiOS websites and apps among the worst ever foisted onto customers. (Believe it or not, they’ve actually made things worse. While everyone else — even Microsoft is producing lovely apps today — FiOS still promotes an early Soviet-style look and lack of functionality that one day might be quaint.)

But this little snippet from their “support” website sums it up. They’re still the “phone company,” with its impenetrable, plodding ways. What FiOS has managed to do is combine that ethos with the very worst of the cable TV industry’s “support” processes (including, apparently, a healthy disdain for the intelligence of their customers) resulting in a new low of respect for their customers.