Verizon’s Aging Copper Lines Leave Customers Hung Up With Frustration (New York: home, neighborhood)

[Aeran]

I didn't know this was a problem. I have T-Mobile and ever since it merged with Sprint, can't complain.

https://www.thecity.nyc/2022/2/3/229...rs-frustration

Dr. Ida Messana, a Queens internist specializing in geriatric medicine, started experiencing internet, fax and landline phone issues in her Forest Hills office last summer and noticed a concerning side effect.

Many of her elderly patients, who depend on phone calls and faxes, as opposed to emails and texts, stopped coming because they could not reach her.

“We lost dial tone on my fax line, so I couldn’t receive or send any faxes. Imagine my patients waiting for their CAT scans, X-rays, their reports of blood, all different kinds of things,“ she explained.

Turned out her fax machine was working, but the line was out. She also relied on the line for DSL internet service to her office.

While her connectivity problems were resolved five months later, Messana fears future service outages. A Verizon technician told Messana that her phone lines are copper, which the company phased out in favor of fiber optic wires.

Most telecommunications companies these days tout their high-speed fiber optic lines, which send light down thin filaments of glass, but copper wires are still in use for some households.

When those metal wires corrode without proper upkeep, New Yorkers who rely on them are left without service.

Out With the Old

[Lillie767]

Copper phone lines work even in most power outages.

[BlakeJones]

The previous stuff was called POTS, "Plain Old Telephone Service" which is analogue. All the new stuff is digital fiber.

But people still have fax machines, DSL lines, and dial up modems for things like electrical and medical equipment and all those require an analog POTS line

So the solution is a Fiber Optic modem with an analogue telephone output port. It converts the digital signal to analog for the customer and vice versa.

No power? No service. Unlike traditional copper that had a small voltage on the line that survived outages

[pierrepont7731]

Switch to FiOS. Problem solved. We actually had a similar issue in our office with Verizon, but the building didn't have FiOS, so we switched to I think Spectrum. Not great, but ok. I've been using Verizon for well over 10 years and have Verizon Wireless for all of my mobile devices and FiOS 1GB at home. Everything works well.

[Interlude]

I thought we got $1.5 trillion for infrastructure? Or is that all going to Big Democrat Donor Black Owned Solar Co. like usual?

[martinjsxx]

Three years ago Verizon ended copper wire service in my Queens neighborhood. You either switched to Fios or switched to Spectrum, which I did rather than stay with Verizon. There was no choice to stay on copper wire, and the Public Service Commission approved them ending copper wire service.

[sojourn traveller]

If Fios is not available, she's the fool for not switching to Spectrum and leaving an over 100 year technology behind. Does she still drive home in a Model T, and have to shovel coal for heat? And this is a doctor's office?

[BBMW]

It's obsolete technology that's hard to maintain. They're trying to phase it out.

[BBMW]

Any federal money spent on public communications infrastructure will got to expanding access to high speed data services, not obsolete analog systems.

Originally Posted by Interlude

I thought we got $1.5 trillion for infrastructure? Or is that all going to Big Democrat Donor Black Owned Solar Co. like usual?

[Tencent]

Originally Posted by sojourn traveller

If Fios is not available, she's the fool for not switching to Spectrum and leaving an over 100 year technology behind. Does she still drive home in a Model T, and have to shovel coal for heat? And this is a doctor's office?

Many Doctors are terrible at anything outside of Medicine. They can't run a business to save their life. It's why so many hire administrators and join practices that handle all the overhead.