Talk is cheap--it's easy to say that you're the best. Being the best requires commitment and hard work. Many "talk the talk"; but few "walk the walk."
Monday, June 13, 2022
Sunday, April 24, 2022
Samsung, Toyota, etc.
Tuesday, April 12, 2022
food lyin' apples
Saturday, March 5, 2022
tracfone, consumer cellular, sprint/boost mobile, 5Gs
No, 4G LTE shutdown will not be happening for at least a decade. Therefore, the thing to remember is that 4G will not be going away anytime soon, regardless of how fast the 5G network grows. The plan is for existing 4G LTE networks to be used by carriers well into 2030. 5G networks are not being designed to replace 4G, rather they are designed to work in conjunction with 4G networks. Therefore, no one really knows when 4G will be phased out because cell phones that are 5G-capable will still be using 4G technology for quite some time to come."
Sunday, January 16, 2022
shentel
Friday, December 17, 2021
Wednesday, October 27, 2021
cell phones
Tuesday, August 10, 2021
youtube/youtube tv movies
Thursday, June 24, 2021
goodwill
Friday, May 14, 2021
GE dishwasher
our less-than-four-years-old GE dishwasher stopped starting. we researched the problem online. we followed the "start" instructions to a T. no help. it would halt the start process and beep every time. it has power. nothing with the way that it was loaded with dishes that indicated a problem. it wouldn't even start when the dishwasher was empty.
Friday, August 21, 2020
Trend Micro Inc.
I was billed twice for subscription renewal. in the second billing TM placed an unauthorized purchase on my credit card--more than the renewal fee that I had authorized 5 days earlier--despite the fact that I removed auto-renewal from my account more than a year ago. I wasted 80 minutes on "chat" trying to get TM's mistake straightened out.
Wednesday, March 25, 2020
strasburg VA is stuck in the 1950s
hotlink
- is this how towns communicate important information to their citizens?
- posted on the town's FB page less than 24 hours before regular pick up?
- does the town think that every resident of the town checks the town's pathetic FB page daily?
- c'mon people! it's 2020--NOT 1950!
- can't you figure out a better way?
- robo call?
- email?
- cell phone message?
- something more 21st century?
- Paul Revere was more effective "spreading the word" in 1775 than the town of strasburg is in 2020.
Sunday, March 15, 2020
princess cruises
Saturday, February 29, 2020
customer ratings and reviews: businesses who put their fingers on the scale
answer: because businesses pay for customer reviews.
there are other ways that businesses put their fingers on the scale:
- when owners rate their own business
- when the owners' relatives and friends rate their business
- when the owner's employees rate their employer
- when owners offer incentives to employees for good reviews
- should the minimum score on a customer rating be 1 star?
- should owners or their relatives or employees be allowed to put their fingers on the scale?
Monday, February 3, 2020
j and l green farm, edinburg, va
yes, but this was a painful lesson.
j and l green farm is a "mom and pop" operation in edinburg, va. https://www.jlgreenfarm.com/ they sell pasture-raised pork, chicken, turkey and beef. we've been customers for more than a year. their "store" is located on their farm. customers pay for their purchases. the electronic receipt comes later.
after we received our electronic receipt for a purchase that we made on 11/21/2019, I noticed an error.
we bought a single "meat snack pack" that contained 10 cut-up meat sticks that normally sell for $2.50/each. the invoice mistakenly says that we purchased 10 snack packs. the total for the 10 cut-up meat sticks in the snack pack was $77.50. WOW!!! when I informed the owner of the mistake, she stiffed us.
we're out $52.50. the worst part is that we were cheated by people that we trusted.
oh well, live and learn.
Thursday, January 23, 2020
strasburg va business closings
not to worry--state, county and town governments are on it.
yeah, right.
the good news is that strasburg got a tattoo parlor last year.
https://www.nvdaily.com/nvdaily/strasburg-council-approves-tattoo-parlor/article_91393dd6-3eca-52a0-ac75-f8e9dd7062dc.html
Friday, January 17, 2020
Thursday, December 12, 2019
shentel cable tv company: expensive, lousy tv, charges customer to replace their defective equipment
Friday, December 6, 2019
VOIPO: snail calls
"VOIPo
Dec 5, 2019, 10:44 AM (20 hours ago)
to me
Hello,
Okay just to clarify, the ata is the adapter, the equipment. Failover is a name of the feature, like call forwarding, call waiting. You can see that when you login to your online account, it is also under features tab.
For the failover feature you can either set it to voicemail or forward the call. When the adapter stops working, the failover activates. Example: you set your failover feature to call forward to your cell number. When your Voipo adapter stops working, it will forward the call to that number you place on the failover feature.
For the forwarding, it doesn't depend on wether your adapter is working or not. Once you enable call forward, anyone who calls your Voipo number will forward to the number you set under the call forwarding feature.
As of the moment, the call forwarding has been fixed as well just for an update.
Regards,
Clark A"
so, if VOIPO's device is down (it happens a lot), and you get an urgent phone call, not to worry. with "failover", you'll get the call eventually--a day or two or more later--when you go to make a call and realize that the VOIPO device is down AGAIN, or when someone tells you that they've been calling you for days and can't get through.
such a deal!!!

Tuesday, December 3, 2019
voipo: desperate ramblings
Founder/CEO
VOIPO.com
Previous VOIPO Update:
Ticket ID #TOT-116-30907
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-12-03 08:02
Message:
what is your "failover call forwarding feature"? please explain clearly how this works. if we have to activate a feature that "alarms you that your adapter is offline or internet is our (out) when you receive calls automatically to your cell phone", then please explain clearly how we do that. if you're suggesting that we forward all of our voipo phone calls to our smart phone, then what's the point of having a voipo phone?
Author: Gerardo R
Time: 2019-12-03 12:12
Message: Hello, Thanks for the email The only time that we would know that you cannot receive calls it is when the time you check on your end and reported the issue to us. But automatically inform you by our system unfortunately it is not yet being develop. Maybe in the future we can have that program so it would be easier to detect and notify our customer if in case there's a trouble. However our failover call forwarding feature also alarms you that your adapter is offline or internet is our when you receive the calls automatically to your cell phone. This feature activates when the network, or device is offline. Should you need further assistance. Please let us know. Regards, Gerardo R.
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-12-02 09:07
Message: computers perform thousands of operations in a second. it seems odd that an internet telephone service company doesn't have the ability to perform hourly the same operation as us (call the internet phone from our cell phone) to check whether or not all of its customers can receive calls.
Author: Gerardo R
Time: 2019-12-01 08:59
Message: Hello, Thanks for the email. Glad to know that it works now. Our server migration is finished already so there should have no interruptions with your service. We can't tell if there would be issues with your service unless you check it on your end as we have no ways to do that since we also rely on your internet connection. However future updates and maintenance our customer will be notify Should you need further assistance. Please let us know/ Regards, Gerardo R.
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-30 12:46
Message: that seems to have fixed the problem--for now. our questions are: 1) is this a permanent fix? 2) if no, then how often will we have to reboot? 3) daily? 4) or when someone tells us that they tried to call us and couldn't get through? the point is that we don't know when the phone isn't receiving or making calls until we try to make a call or someone tells us that they tried to call us and couldn't get through.
Author: Faith A
Time: 2019-11-29 09:44
Message: Hello, Before we enable port forwarding, I have cleared your adapter's registration. Kindly unplug the adapter for a minute and plug it back in. Wait for 3-5 minutes then test. Let us know if the issue persists. Best regards, Faith A
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-29 02:56
Message: we tried the "Live Chat" button. "VOIPo Live Chat is currently unavailable due to high volume." rather than us trying to contact you, why don't you call us: 540 212-7622 (voipo) or 571 208-5427 (cell). our first question to you will be: will the steps that you will be making (if we approve) mess up anything else? internet? apps? settings? etc.?
Author: Gerardo R
Time: 2019-11-29 12:02
Message: Hello, Thanks for the email We are very sorry to hear that you're experiencing issues with your service. We have reviewed your account and it looks like possible it is NAT affecting your service. If you are familiar with port forwarding, we strongly recommend forwarding UDP ports 5004-65000 to the internal IP address of the VOIPo ATA device. Disabling any unusual firewall restrictions such as SIP ALG or SPI filtering is also highly recommended. If you are unable or unfamiliar to take the steps mentioned above; a VOIPo Support Specialist is available to remotely make these adjustments for you at your convenience. Simply give us a call or open a live chat, and we'll be happy to assist you further. Please contact us by phone at: 949-829-4200 or 877-99-VOIPo (86476) You can also reach us through Live Chat: http://voipo.com/ (the live chat button is in the top right corner) We are open Monday - Friday from 6:00am - 8:00pm PST. Except Holidays Thank you for your time. Regards, Gerardo R.
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-28 01:49
Message: no. whatever you did seems to have fixed the problem--again. is this a permanent fix?
Author: VOIPO Support
Time: 2019-11-28 08:03
Message: Hello, Are you still experiencing issues now?
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-27 07:21
Message: can't make or receive calls--again. same as the original message for this ticket--6 days ago.
Author: Jamil Z
Time: 2019-11-23 03:20
Message: Hello, We're happy to hear that phones have been restored for you. We are still working on finalizing the fixes. If any issues do arise please let us know. Thank you! -- Jamil Z VOIPo.com
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-22 10:43
Author: PE retired
Time: 2019-11-22 10:17
Message: what's "power cycle"? On Fri, Nov 22, 2019 at 4:56 PM Jenny Koenig wrote: > > fyi > ---------- Forwarded message --------- > From: VOIPo > Date: Fri, Nov 22, 2019 at 4:43 PM > Subject: [#TOT-116-30907]: can't hear caller. caller can't hear us > To: > > > Hello, > > Our dev team have rectified some parts of incoming and outgoin calls > residual issues impacting our users. Call Forwading and Simul Ring is still > a work in progress. Please disable both features for now. Please power > cycle your VoIP adapter, wait a few minutes for the adapter to register > online again, then test once more and let us know if you're still > experiencing issues with service. > > Best regards, > Wilmer J > > > > > Ticket Details > ------------------------------ > Ticket ID: TOT-116-30907 > Department: Customer Care > Type: Issue > Status: Pending Customer Response > Priority: Requests Handled in Order Received > > Helpdesk: https://helpdesk.voipo.com > >
Author: Wilmer J
Time: 2019-11-22 09:43
Message: Hello, Our dev team have rectified some parts of incoming and outgoin calls residual issues impacting our users. Call Forwading and Simul Ring is still a work in progress. Please disable both features for now. Please power cycle your VoIP adapter, wait a few minutes for the adapter to register online again, then test once more and let us know if you're still experiencing issues with service. Best regards, Wilmer J
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-22 03:57
Message: yes. same as original message for this ticket. can't receive calls. can't make calls. when we call our cell phone, we get a busy signal. SNAFU. FUBAR.
Author: VOIPO Support
Time: 2019-11-22 08:31
Message: Hello, Are you still experiencing issues at this time?
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-22 08:30
Message: Background: my wife and I are in our 70s. On 11/20 when she called me at home from her cell phone at 10:39 AM and 10:42 AM, she was driving alone to babysit our granddaughter 50 miles away. Our SOP is that she will call me at home if she has an emergency on the road. Needless to say, it was upsetting for me when her calls came in and I couldn’t hear her. Why wouldn’t I think that something bad had happened? How many other important calls aren’t getting through? We have given our home (voipo) telephone number to family, doctors, those who we do business with, etc. how long will it be before this problem gets fixed? Days? Weeks? More? In retrospect, we wish that we hadn’t given our voipo phone number out to so many people as our primary phone number. https://account.voipo.com/support shows “pending customer response” as the status for this ticket. Even though I’m retired, I don’t have the time or inclination to “follow developments and updates” on your twitter page. IMHO, the status for this ticket is “awaiting voipo response”. Let us know when the problem is fixed. In the meantime, status reports every few days will be appreciated. Some things about the “good old days” were better. We didn’t have these sorts of problems with land lines.
Author: Jamil Z
Time: 2019-11-21 01:56
Message: Hello, Voipo is currently experiencing some calling issues related to the final phase of the server migration that took place over the weekend. Our development team is aware of the issue and is working diligently to restore services. You can follow developments and updates at our Twitter page: https://twitter.com/voipo (You do not need an account to view the twitter page) Best Regards, -- Jamil Z VOIPo.com
Author: Jenny Koenig
Time: 2019-11-21 01:09
Message: This morning (11/20/2019) my wife called our voipo phone (540 212-7622) twice from her cell phone at 10:39 AM and 10:42 AM. She did not hear me and I did not hear her. After the second call I verified that the phone had a dial tone. Later today at 2:05 PM, our daughter called--same thing. For all intents and purposes, 540 212-7622 is useless. We can’t hear the caller and the caller can’t hear us.