There are few areas in Irish life where a State service is visibly superior to private service; but in no other area but Telecom does the semi-State seem so determined to make the inferiority and arrogance of its service a matter of political and economic dogma. I do not speak of the individual operators, most of whom are helpful, courteous and patient; but I speak of Telecom as a system, Telecom as a culture, Telecom as a national ailment, Telecom as a form of disordered and predatory arrogance which was called into existence when the State turned Ireland into a communications game reserve with many large and slow moving herbivores, and one big telemonopolistic cat, Telemon.
Only a big-cat monopoly could possibly justify the billing system now in operation in which there is a no-warning disconnection in the event of non-payment. That kind of conduct would be inconceivable in any area of commercial activity where there was real competition and where a customer's loyalty was regarded as worth fighting for rather than treating with Pavlovian reflex punishment. But of course it is not inconceivable in Telemon. Telemon knows that there is nobody else to go to; Telemon knows that, for the time being anyway, it is the only cat in the safari park; and it can sink its teeth into our neck and we can do nothing about it.
P & T culture
The most extraordinary feature of Telemon is that it does not function by using the service which it alone provides. Part of it remains mired in the P & T culture of evil memory, in which an entire government department existed to give employment to civil servants, regardless of the service they provided, or in reality didn't. Naturally the T part of that wretched, slumbrous creature assumed it would communicate with the paying public by means of the P part, so all bills, all notifications, all reminders were sent through the post.
The old posts and the old telegraphs now have nothing in common; they are separate and distinct organisations. Yet Telemon still insists on communicating with its customers through the post - but nowadays, just as briefly as possible. It sends a bill, and if the bill is not paid by a certain date, the customer's phone is cut off, without warning.
Even credit companies don't behave like this. If their customers - members of the species which keeps them alive, as it keeps Telemon alive - fall behind in a payment, they telephone them and urge them to disgorge the readies. But not Telecom Eireann. If I overlook a bill or do not receive one, Telemon will not employ its own means of communication to inform me that it is looking for money. It will not attempt to communicate with me at all, by letter, smoke-signal or hierograph; it will simply disconnect me.
No reminder
As you might have gathered, this happened to me recently. I will accept Telemon's word that my telephone bill was sent to the correct address; and I am happy to accept for the sake of argument that I am an incompetent fool who lost the bill. But even incompetent fools are entitled to certain fundamental courtesies from a public service with which they are generally in good standing; the least, the very least, I am entitled to is a telephoned reminder that my bill has not been paid, and would I care to attend to the matter soon? Credit card companies do that. Why not Telemon?
Because it doesn't need to. It has me where it wants me. There is no competition. It is alone in the park, surrounding by mooing, stupid ruminants. It does not need to care about customer relations. The rules known to the purveyors of other services are unknown to Telemon. For example, if I go to a restaurant where I am known, as I and all customers are known to Telemon, and to which I regularly give business, as I do to Telemon, and I find I have forgotten my wallet, I do not expect that restaurant, upon discovering half-way through the meal that I cannot pay at the end, to refuse me further service.
That is what Telemon does; and then it charges a £15 reconnection fee, the easiest money it can make. Reconnection is simple - my phone was reconnected within a couple of minutes of my settling my outstanding bill recently. I can only conclude that the £15 fee is a revenue-raising stunt, which of course would not be possible if Telemon tipped off its monopolised, predatorised customers that disconnection was about to happen.
Business customers
But though private subscribers are disconnected without warning, business customers are informed, by that miraculous invention devised by Mr Bell, the far-speaking telephone, if their service is to be discontinued for non-payment. Why them and not us? Because, says Telemon customer-service, Telemon hasn't got enough operators to provide that service to the ordinary public.
Now that I can well believe, for it is often impossible to get an operator from Telemon the Telenoncom: the phone is automatically answered, an automatic voice assures you repeatedly that an operator is poised to come to your assistance, and after several minutes, you are automatically disconnected, after which you have a far-from automatic stroke. Mary O'Rourke has assured us that the days of Telecom's monopoly will end this year, to which I can only raise a Hosanna. Roll on 1999.