Groundhog Day.

By this stage my partner is ready to go postal. Frustration levels are high.

He calls Telstra again in an attempt to sort out the authorisation issue. He's passed around again and eventually speaks to someone who checks the account and states that he cannot understand why Bigpond won't speak to my partner as he is most definitely listed as an authorised operator of the account.

Hurrah!

Notes are added to our file and he transfers my partner to Bigpond Activations.

The Bigpond Activations person read the notes on the file and advises my partner that the Bigpond account hadn't been configured correctly. No apology for the inconvenience caused, but we are past caring at this point, we just want to log a fault!

My partner gives the Activations person a brief overview of what has transpired in the previous call. He explains that he was the one that set up both the second phone line and the ADSL service. She tells him that she finds it highly unlikely that he was able to do that.

Yes, you read that correctly - Telstra accused my partner of being a liar.

By this stage, he is beyond frustrated.

Eventually the system is updated (as she apparently is one of only a few people that can see both systems - clearly she holds a position of power in the organisation) and transfers the call to Technical Support.

It's now approximately 6pm.

And we're back to where we were 2 hours ago.