But when she received her June bill, nothing had changed. Now Frechette said she may have to drop her land line, even though she doesn't want to. The result would likely be a more expensive cell phone bill.
"I just don't want to lose my land phone that I've had for so long," she said.
Similar stories echo throughout Southern New Hampshire, some even from people who have never been FairPoint customers.
John Stevens of Plaistow said he switched his Internet service to Comcast in January because he didn't want a FairPoint e-mail address.
Although he paid his final bill to Verizon in December, he said he received a bill from FairPoint in March. He called FairPoint's customer service, and when he finally got someone on the phone, he said, the service representative hung up on him.
Even canceling service has proven tough for some FairPoint customers.
Gerri Corwin of Salem said she wanted to cancel Internet service.
"It took me a week to get through, calling every day," Corwin said.
She finally did and thought she was finished with FairPoint. Then, three weeks ago, she received a bill for Internet service. Another one came soon after that.
Now Corwin doesn't know what to do.
One option is to call the Public Utilities Commission's consumer affairs division, Noonan said.
The Public Utilities Commission will step in, contact FairPoint, and try to resolve a customer's billing or service problem, she said.
The number of complaints decreased as FairPoint became more familiar with its new system. There were fewer billing errors and it improved at answering customers calls, Noonan said.
But the number of calls to the Public Utilities Commission are still troubling.
"There's no question this is significantly higher than it should be," Noonan said.SClBBut there are still plenty of unhappy residential customers out there and FairPoint acknowledged it is experiencing problems with its business customers.
Their services are more complicated, but Wurm said the company is working to fix those problems by adding more staff to field calls.
"There is still some room for improvement there," Wurm said.
Since the switch in January, FairPoint has had to report to the Public Utilities Commission on a weekly basis on a series of milestones that gauge the transition, Noonan said.
That reporting period has ended and the Public Utilities Commission is reviewing FairPoint's final report.
The Public Utilities Commission could recommend changes that range from fining FairPoint for failing to provide adequate service to requiring the company to change its management, Noonan said.
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