Frustrated clients tell AT&T to raise the bars

By Matt Rupel

AT&T may have more bars in more places, but you'd never guess if you're an AT&T user at Santa Clara. Raising a new structure on top of Swig may change that.

Students at Santa Clara were so fed up with AT&T's spotty service on campus that they organized themselves and faculty to call in to AT&T and complain about service, all on the same day. This calling storm occurred last Monday.

The complaints were noticed, and AT&T is in the process of negotiating with Santa Clara to install an antenna on campus to boost cellular service in the surrounding area.

For student customers, some of the most common complaints about AT&T's service include the troubles with making phone calls in the basement floors of many buildings. There are areas in Market Square and several dorms where there is little to no reception.

In some areas, students can't even send and receive text messages.

Not only are students unable to use their phones regularly, but also, in the event of an emergency, many students would be unable to call for help or receive a Connect-ED emergency text or phone call -- a program that Santa Clara has to inform people of any type of emergency situation.

Sophomore Nhu-Nguyen Le is a student senator and a customer of AT&T.

"It's really frustrating," said Le. "Sometimes I need the phone to call classmates about homework and that kind of stuff. It's something I have to plan for. I can't make a phone call if I'm going to Benson."

This was a problem that every campus AT&T user was familiar with.

The event labeled Call AT&T and Complain Day took place all over campus on Feb. 8. Sponsored by Associated Students, the event generated between 300 to 400 complaints to AT&T's customer service.

The problem was brought to the attention of the Current University Issues Committee of the Student Senate by a former senator, junior Kelsey Houlihan.

Houlihan had to resign due to conflicting school duties, but since fixing the AT&T problem was a main part of her platform, she wanted to see the issue through.

"We knew that there was a lot of frustration around campus," said Houlihan. "Since Santa Clara itself isn't a customer of AT&T, we needed to approach it individually. So if we were able to call as individual customers, but let them know that collectively we were from Santa Clara, we would be able to affect change."

Houlihan is an AT&T user herself.

"When I'm in Benson, I don't get service," said Houlihan, "I live off campus, and I only get service when I'm outside the house."

According to an article on CNN.com, AT&T's Chief Operating Officer John Stankey reported that the company plans to invest an additional $2 billion in 2010 to upgrade the wireless network.

AT&T plans to add 2,000 new cell sites and upgrade existing sites with three times the fiber links it had in 2009.

"A lot of network traffic has occurred due to the recent advance in the popularity of smart phones," said AT&T executive Leon Beauchman. "AT&T is investing a total of $18 billion this year in order to relieve some of the data backup."

According to Beauchman, the plan to install an antenna on the Santa Clara campus is part of this plan.

According to an e-mail sent out to AS members by Todd Schmitzer, manager of networking and communications for Information Technology, AT&T approached Santa Clara about the lackluster coverage on campus.

The telecommunications giant has proposed the construction of a cell tower on campus by the end of 2010.

"(The) university is trying to solve the problems on behalf of the student AT&T customers," said Schmitzer.

"AT&T has made a proposal to put antennas on campus," said Joe Sugg, the assistant vice president of University Operations. "We haven't accepted that proposal yet because there are some problems with it structurally, operationally and aesthetically."

Sugg said that the current proposal involved mounting equipment onto the four corners on the roof of Swig.

"It's a great solution as far as AT&T is concerned, but it's not a great solution as far as Santa Clara University is concerned."

According to Sugg, AT&T has yet to provide other possible solutions to the problem.

As an alternative, AT&T could possibly look into other buildings not owned by Santa Clara but would still provide better reception to the campus.

Once the details of the plan are finalized, students can expect improved AT&T service around campus, thanks to the efforts of AS and the individual student customers of AT&T who called.

Contact Matt Rupel at mrupel@scu.edu.