The Lies.<\/em><\/strong> So why did I cancel the handset order?\u00a0 Well, when I ordered my iPhone 6<\/a> I was told that the delivery time would be two weeks.\u00a0 That\u2019s fine.\u00a0 It\u2019s a new handset, and very popular too, so I expected to wait.\u00a0 After two and a half weeks, I got in touch with O2 to find out where my iPhone was – and I was told that they were very sorry and that my iPhone would be in my hands by the next Wednesday at the very latest.\u00a0 On the next Tuesday I received something else instead – I received a text telling me that because the iPhone is really popular, I wouldn\u2019t be getting it on Wednesday after all.\u00a0 I spoke to O2 again and was faithfully promised by the O2 rep, and his manager no less, that they were very sorry for the issues that I\u2019d been experiencing and that I\u2019d have my phone on Friday.\u00a0 On Friday I got\u2026 No iPhone.\u00a0 O2 tell me that it\u2019s all \u201cApple\u2019s fault\u201d (their words), but that won\u2019t wash.\u00a0 Apple might not be able to meet demand, but I doubt that Apple told O2 to lie to customers about the delivery time.\u00a0 I also suspect that Apple has been able to deliver some iPhones to O2, and that O2 has been slipshod in shipping them out, rather than working on a strictly first-come, first-served basis.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t mind delays.\u00a0 Delays I can cope with.\u00a0 But I won\u2019t tolerate being lied to, and especially not repeatedly.\u00a0 I have no doubt that by cancelling my order with O2 and opening a new one with EE<\/a> I will have more than doubled my wait time.\u00a0 I don\u2019t mind that.\u00a0 EE have been honest, so far, in telling me that the average wait time is 21 days – but that I could be waiting for a month for my phone.<\/p>\n The Software.<\/strong><\/em> Adding to the stress, I moved house recently.\u00a0 BT managed to make a mess of our Broadband setup but they provided good customer support and paid for us to have a broadband dongle.\u00a0 I unwisely chose to have a dongle from O2.\u00a0 The hardware for the dongle might be excellent, but I didn\u2019t really get to play with it because the software is probably the worst that I\u2019ve ever used. For Mac OS X, at least, it\u2019s amateurish in the extreme. Perhaps O2 doesn’t consider the Mac to be a very important market – but, if so, this would be a grave error since the Mac is growing in market share as Windows declines, and the domination of high end computing (where users spend significantly) by Apple is almost total.\u00a0 In any event, providing untested software that looks as if it was cobbled together by an intern in their spare time is not the best way of delighting customers.<\/p>\n Enjoy the following screenshots and you\u2019ll see what I mean.\u00a0 If you can work out what\u2019s going on please let me know.<\/p>\n This software wouldn’t be forgivable even if the development tools provided by Apple were poor – but they’re not.\u00a0 Apple provides world class development tools, well documented, with well understood and stable APIs.\u00a0 It does everything that it can to make developing software pleasurable and easy – and it leaves no excuse for lazy, badly written, software like this.\u00a0 Naturally, O2 claimed that these problems weren\u2019t their fault.<\/p>\n The\u00a0Support.\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>Actually getting customer support with O2 is a trial too.\u00a0 They\u2019ve \u2018upgraded\u2019 to a funky new instant messenger model that doesn\u2019t actually work for more complex issues.\u00a0 I imagine that their support staff aren\u2019t based in the UK either because, whilst their English is excellent, they have a somewhat condescending schoolmarmish manner \u201cAllow me to explain this simply for you\u201d.\u00a0 To save you the bother of calling them, the explanation is invariably \u201cIt\u2019s not our fault\u201d.\u00a0 From speaking to O2 the problem has variously been \u201cYour fault\u201d, \u201cApple\u2019s fault\u201d and (amazingly, since I\u2019ve never knowingly bought a service from them) \u201cSky\u2019s fault\u201d.\u00a0 O2 are expert at passing the buck, but not very skilled at taking responsibility.<\/p>\n Email is no longer an option, which is a pity because sometimes email is exactly the right tool for the job.\u00a0 Especially for customers who aren\u2019t quite as young and funky as they might like to be. O2 can do telephone support but by god they\u2019ll make you wait for it.\u00a0 I had to wait for forty minutes to get support.\u00a0 I imagine that the phone only got answered because the chap had finished his tea-break and was bored of hearing the phone ringing.<\/p>\n So what do I take away from this unpleasant experience?\u00a0 Well, O2 are going in the right direction with O2 Refresh but, for me, it\u2019s too little, too late.\u00a0 I hope that EE and the other providers sit up, take note, and provide a similar tariff (but without the lacklustre support).\u00a0 For that matter, I hope that the other providers up their game and provide full support for the iPhone – because, without custom service provider support for functions like Visual Voicemail and Handoff, there isn\u2019t much to choose between iPhone and Android.\u00a0 In the UK today, only O2 and EE fully support iPhone functionality.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cBe more dog\u201d, O2 say.\u00a0 What they mean, I suspect, is roll over and let us kick you for a while. As you might have guessed, I\u2019m not entirely happy with O2 customer service – and so I\u2019m moving back to a supplier that I\u2019ve learned to trust. It\u2019s not one problem, it\u2019s many – … <\/p>\n![\"MainWindow\"](\"http:\/\/www.45rpmsoftware.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/MainWindow-1024x99.png\")
<\/a>The main window for O2 Connection Manager. \u00a0Not very Mac like – and not much of it makes sense either.<\/h5>\n![\"Bad](\"http:\/\/www.45rpmsoftware.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Bad-Dialogue-300x110.png\")
<\/a>Something happened. \u00a0Something important, probably. \u00a0Nobody is any the wiser though!<\/h5>\n![\"Dock\"](\"http:\/\/www.45rpmsoftware.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Dock-300x273.png\")
<\/a>Sadly the dock menu isn’t anymore sensible. I’d argue that software of this nature shouldn’t be cluttering up the dock anyway – but that’s a different issue.<\/h5>\nConclusion<\/h3>\n