Swisscom password reset & Hotline gaga
Fortunately, I have had less and less professional dealings with Swisscom in recent years.
But today it hit me again and I was once again able to “enjoy” the great programme of failures.
Initial situation:
Customer (senior) can no longer access his webmail, wrong Swisscom login password. (He is sure it is correct - normally I would assume the customer is at fault in such a case - but in the end I was no longer sure).
He himself has tried several times via the hotline, but has not been able to get any results.
So first attempt: Password reset. There was also a mobile phone number stored as a recovery channel and the customer still had the number. Bingo? Not at all. We were able to receive the code and it was accepted, but Swisscom now wants additional “verification via identity card and selfie”.
Ok, that’s not possible because the contract is in the wife’s name and she is in a rehabilitation clinic for the next few months for health reasons. So call the hotline after all.
The hotline asks the usual questions (date of birth etc.) which the customer can of course answer. So now we get a one-time password by SMS.
After entering the one-time password, a new password must be set as usual. Problem: this does not work. No matter which password you try, you always get the error message “Username must not be part of the password”. (Of course, the user name was not even part of the password in any of the attempts. In the end, we even tried a password that didn’t have a single letter or character in common with the username. Nothing helps. Always the same absurd error message.
Hotline employee says: Yes, very strange, unfortunately she can’t help, she’ll have to pass it on to the “special department for Swisscom Login”.
We: Great, connect us!
Of course we can’t. The department can only be notified internally and then calls back.
When will the department call back? In the next few days. Certainly not today.
Super “in the next few days” but I’m no longer there.
“Yes, on which days are you there?”
“Not at all, I’m not the customer, remember?”
“Oh well, yes. But well, then Mrs X can try the specialists when they call.”
“Mrs X is 80 km from here in the rehabilitation clinic and is also barely responsive, remember?”
“Oh well, yes. But well, then Mr X can try the specialist when they call.”
“Mr X just can’t, otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”
“Yes, Mr X will just have to see the specialists somehow.”
…
We summarise:
- Recovery channel available, but of no use, because even if you provide the required SMS code, you still can’t get any further.
- Password reset via hotline does not work because the function for setting a new password after receiving the one-time password is apparently defective or at least issues a completely incorrect error message (hotline operator suspected that the account might be locked somehow in the background… but apparently cannot see it herself in the system).
- The archetypal example for 1st level support tasks (“password reset”) requires a “special department” at Swisscom, which cannot be contacted and which may be fully booked for days.
Once again, the premium service with premium support, for which the customer is happy to pay three times the price of the competition.
Oh, and because it’s so nice: While we were repeatedly switched “to music” because the hotline operator wanted to clarify something (without results), the customer also told me what he had recently experienced in the Swisscom shop. He had bought and paid for a mobile phone for his (adult) son.
The purchase price for the mobile phone was then demanded again on his next monthly bill. When he made a complaint, Swisscom could not find any payment in its systems and claimed that the device had not been paid for in the shop.
Fortunately, he paid by card so that he can prove via the bank that he paid. A cash payment would have made him look old. Where the money disappeared into the depths of Swisscom’s accounting department remains unexplained. Customers would be well advised to check their bills carefully.