This morning the gas company arrived outside our home to install a gas line. Guys with shovels and heavy machinery went to work, and once they started, sleeping in was out of the question, so I went to work too, in the basement.
An hour or so later, as they were digging the trench running from the house to the road, the cable went off. High-speed Internet down to no-speed, the Weather Network simplified to pure white snow.
When asked, the guy from the gas company, who may at one time have been a member of ZZ Top, indicated that Rogers Cable had not “located” the line. I suggested that nevertheless THEY had certainly done that. Turns out, what he meant was that while the hydro and phone companies had come in advance and marked the location of their respective lines with colorful little flags, the cable company… not so much.
Rogers Cable, in contrast, paraphrasing the guy from ZZ Top, said “Go ahead dig, if you break a line I’m sure we’ll get a call…”. I guess they figure it’s cheaper to be reactive than proactive, and after all, it’s only cable, it’s not like anybody needs it or anything.
On the plus side, when they DID get the call, it took not much longer to send a technician out than it took me to navigate the Rogers voice recognition support phone system (turns out “the gas company chopped our cable in half” is not a phrase it recognizes).
The Rogers tech was as efficient as he was prompt, and we were back on the air in no time. But’s what’s with their corporate policy of not “locating” lines. “Call before you dig” becomes “call us if you hit something”? Can’t they afford the little flags?