Since my move to Ohio, I haven't had internet because I've been too busy to sit down and investigate my options. I had a major internet carrier before my move and it was far too expensive, so this time I thought I would look for a smaller company to hopefully help cut down my costs. For that reason, I wanted to chexk out Optimum which I heard piggybacks off a major carrier but offers more affordable plans. With that in mind, I figured the easiest way to sign up was just to call.
I was hoping this wouldn't take me too long, since you can easily spend forever waiting to talk to someone at an internet company. Between outages and billing questions, and then business clients, there are a lot of reasons why people could be calling Optimum. In fact, it turns out that Optimum's 888-276-5255 phone number went straight to its business service department, but I was able to choose residential service, so it all worked anyway. Unfortunately, Optimum wasn't an option for my address, but for anyone else, this line will help you sign up for internet even if you aren't calling about business service.
When I called, an automated voice answered the phone call and said, "Thank you for calling Optimum Business. To get started, please enter or say the 10-digit phone number that is on your account. You can also say, use my account number. You can also say, become a customer." Obviously, I didn't have a number linked to an account, so I just said that I wanted to become a customer. The next question was whether I was a home or business customer. I chose home, and then it asked me for the Zip code where I would like to have service.
It told me that, unfortunately, Optimum doesn't offer service in my area yet, but to hold because it does have a partner that offers internet service to my Zip code. That was a little disappointing, but I figured that the partner company would be about the same if Optimum was referring me straight to it. I was transferred to the SmartMove customer service line where I had to answer similar questions before a customer service agent picked up. It took me about five minutes to talk to someone there.
I'd recommend calling this line to anyone because it seems that even if Optimum can't offer service to you, it can find another company that can. That's more helpful than attempting to figure it out on your own.