Ditching the Man for Two Other Men

We’re getting ready to stick it to The Man*, and I couldn’t be more nervous.

I mean, I used to work for The Man. Trained in its tactics. Scared by its customers. Tired of its bag-the-new-while-poop-on-the-current customer service plan. I did enjoy the health insurance, though.

And we’re really leaving The Man to throw ourselves at other iterations of The Man, but perhaps in combinations that will save us a little bit of money and perhaps a lot of frustration.

Still can’t think, though, that they’ll send their hired goons out after me when they find out.

We’re ditching Centurylink.

For those who don’t know this iteration of The Man, Centurylink is one of the leftover Baby Bells – landlines, broadband internet, truculent customer service and such. We’ve been with them since forever on the landline, and off and on for broadband internet for several years. We’ve played the cheap broadband game with them for about three years now, and they’ve finally decided we’re loyal enough customers that they can stop offering the deals, jack up the prices and all will be right with the world.

They don’t know my wife very well.

If it were me, yeah, I’d not bother. But my wife pays the bills. And she’s ready to stick it to The Man.

So we’re dropping the landline in favor of our cell phones (upgrading my wife’s cell phone plan in the bargain). And we’re switching broadband providers.

But I’m the one who has to call Centurylink to break the relationship and persuade them (perhaps) to let us keep the phone number my wife has had since 1997. And they’re not going to take it well, given the experience I had working in the call center I know I’m going to have to call. And maybe they’ll try to wheel some deal to try to keep us. Well, I’ll say y’all should have tried that when I went online to chat with y’all earlier this month about our prices shooting up to nearly $100 a month  -- and then insisting there’s nothing you could do to lower prices but let’s see how we can save you money by seeing who your TV provider is.**

Maddening.

I’m glad I don’t work there anymore.

And soon, we’ll have other Men to complain about.

*If you don’t know what “The Man” means, I offer you the definition They Might Be Giants offered at a concert I attended in Utah many moons ago: “The Man is a euphemism for The Man.”

**They took it better than I thought. I found their special “We’ve Given Up Hope Retaining Customers” line and called it. Was done in less than three minutes. Our last day is today.