Problem with Bell’s engineers: One year without internet for his company

What was supposed to be settled in a phone call turned into a series of canceled appointments. The owner of Marina Lacolle is being “tricked” by Bell’s engineers, to the point where he has had to run his business offline for 7 months.

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“It never, ever, never gets old,” says Paul Picard, of the Rose des Vents marina, south of Montérégie.

A Bell technician visited his company, located on the banks of the Richelieu River near the US border, on November 3.

The date was set to go online after Trango announced that its service would go down in the region in the spring of 2023.

That day, an employee of the telecommunications giant was unable to hook up Mr. Picard’s marina, even though fiber optics were available.

This is because the marina is located between the river and the railway. The Marina Reception is the only building on this side of the tracks.

“The technician needed a making machine to run the wire over the rail, but he didn’t have one,” says Paul Picard.

“it is not practical”

The Marina is still offline today, as the marine season has just begun. The owner has to unplug his computer every two days to bring it home.

In this way, he could send the payroll data of his three employees as well as the accounting data to his destination, to his office in Saint-Eustache.

His company’s payment terminal is chip-powered.

“Suppose this is impractical,” the man chuckles.

multiple calls

After the missed appointment in November, Paul Picard doubled down on steps with Bell to get his call in time for the season.

A new technician showed up at the beginning of May, but, again, he didn’t have a basket.

“We have to talk to Bell engineers, but even customer service or technical support agents can’t reach them,” notes Mr. Pickard.

And he adds, anticipating Bell’s reply, that the mooring telephone line—connected to… Bell—does indeed pass over the railroad, at the same place as the Hydro-Québec wires.

For her part, Bell notes that she ran into “engineering problems” near 204, chemin McGee, in Lacolle, where the marina is located.

The intervention of CN and Hydro-Québec will be necessary. “Our teams and those of our partners collaborate so that work is carried out as quickly as possible,” the spokesperson notes.

At the Rose des vents marina, the next visit of Bell’s technician is now scheduled for October. “We’ll see if they show up,” joked Paul Picard.