Maman Poulet

I now live in a land without broadband, its not a nice land! I moved house yesterday, a trial in itself (Moving companies are the business though - how they got that lot into their truck and did not break a thing even given our crap packing I will never know. I hope the lads enjoyed the few pints from the well deserved tip!)

Trying to order new broadband - now I just mean order not even wait for the order is a nightmare. However to cancel the old line was a delirious sweat inducing nightmare of another variety altogether.

Advised by estate agent that I should close the account altogether and leave new owners to open their own account. So I cancelled the call provider account on the old landline and the broadband and then went to Eircom and tried to close the account on the landline itself. No can do says Eircom as the Broadband is by another provider and we can't close. Well I did close it says I. Well we can't see that. So back to my BB provider I go. Confirm its closed and they say this should appear on Eircom's records fairly quickly.

Back to Eircom and 1901 and that silly voice prompt rubbish. It's not understanding me as I become more exasperated 'Are you still there' says the voice on the other end of the phone. Yes says I. Eventually get to the moving house section again. Explain to live voice at other end of phone that I want to close the line, have done everything that they asked me to do and please can you now close the line. 'Oh that will take 10 working days for the instruction from your broadband provider to come to us - this is why we advise you take two weeks to cancel the service before you move.'

But why should I do without broadband and a phone line for two weeks before I move? It is bad enough that I was not able and am still not able to order the service in my new address. We transferred the phone line into our names on Tuesday. However we cannot get an account number - it can only be sent by post. No account number and no broadband. If we go for a provider other than Eircom they will stall the process even further. Well Eircom will be losing all the business from my house very speedily when they eventually deign to send me the account number by post.

This is competition? This is customer service? This is Ireland of the modern technology, digital era etc. etc.? My arse it is.