Alice Coster: Why breaking up with Telstra is so hard

I want to leave Telstra and our 20-year on-again, off-again relationship. The only problem is my ex is far worse.

Where can Telstra’s heartbroken customers turn?

With bated breath I wait for the phone to ring. It’s already been a long time. A familiar feeling of dread has again taken hold.

Because we have been here before. Many times. A fractious, fraught and at times volatile relationship.

We have been together for so long. It’s just too hard to break up all over again. The ex has even come to mind.

The seven stages of grief and then some have already taken hold. Shock. Denial. Anger. Bargaining. Depression. Fury. Blame.

What of hope?

There has to be hope at the end of the line. But last time we battled it took forever to even pick up. We cried. We battled some more. He hung up on me. Frustrated I hit the bottle, only to regret it.

I resorted to going over there just now, in spite of knowing it would be a mistake. We blame each other.

I contemplated conjuring tears, but worse batted eyelids. And now here we are again. Waiting. Hoping. Battling. Bottling.

Telstra and I have been in an on-again, off-again relationship for more than two decades. In the good times, I’m showered with points, flattered with platitudes and then left to my own devices.

Telco stores have replaced Centelink as the new versions of hell. Picture: Nicki Connolly

In the bad times, like right about now, I’m disconnected. Kaput. Ghosted. Broken up.

I know I am not alone.

This had become immediately apparent after walking into the local Telstra store. With Centrelink all but vanished and moved online, there is a new version of hell.

Welcome to your local telco!

Admittedly, the nearby Optus was worse. Lines of the frayed and frenzied were banked up. Cursing. Harried. Hungry.

They looked as if their identities had all but gone. In a way they had. Just like any angry mob, they had one common enemy. It wasn’t the hacker.

Telstra looked less painful. But looks can be deceiving.

“She is a 92-year-old woman, how am I meant to get her in here? Do you want me to (expletive) wheel her in?”

“It’s just policy, sir.”

“But I have every type of documentation here. I know her date of birth, have her birth certificate and passport. How can I even get her on the phone when the poor woman is stone-cold deaf?”

Fury had quickly escalated to exacerbation. Zero to 100. I’d been there.

“You must understand it’s policy sir. All it takes is one bad apple.”

This somewhat passive-aggressive choice of words from the heavily inked-up and skinny-jean wearing store manager, Ryan, did not have the desired outcome.

What had once looked like a nine-to-fiver in predictable Gazman T-shirt and white sneakers was now giving off major Ivan-Milaty vibes.

Could anything be worse than dealing with Telstra? Picture: Gaye Gerard

“Oh for (expletive) god’s (expletive) sake, just (EXPLETIVE) forget about it,” and out Milaty stormed.

Dante’s inferno just claimed another victim.

Next!

A grey-rinse, worrying a plastic folder choc-a-bloc with bills was next. She had more than a few questions for Ryan. They had been pencilled-in and at-the-ready in spidery scrawl.

“It keeps asking me for my password?”

I was going to be in hell’s waiting room for some time.

The age of technology might have given us access to abundant information and improved our ability to connect with others like never before. But where in the fine print is the part about the stress of having to constantly combat tech demons?

Passwords to remember. There are only so many pets, postcodes and dates of births and one-time user codes to find.

Verification after verification. And now the added, but very real fear of identity theft.

Tech wars at home can reduce grown men and women to weep and cause even the most alphas of alphas to crumple in a defeated heap like moronic doofuses.

We have become so reliant on reaching for our phones there is even a term for the fear of being disconnected: Nomophobia.

First coined in 2008 in a study by the UK Postal Office, the condition is characterised by feelings of anxiety when people lose their phone, run out of battery life, have no cellular coverage, or are disconnected.

As I sit and wait like a jilted wallflower for Ryan to call, I realise Telstra and my phone and I need to create some healthy boundaries.

I didn’t have an appointment Ryan told me after the hours-long line waiting in Telstra purgatory. “It’s policy” he said, sending me Milaty.

But, where else is there to turn? Because my ex is far worse: Optus.

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