ISP horror stories

[lucasbytegenius]

Let's rant about our terrible, monopolistic ISPs, shall we?

Alright, here's mine:

I use Grande Communications down in San Marcos. They cover around 7 cities across Texas, but their rates are all complete bullcrap.

So yes, that's $30 for the crappiest speed available, around $40 with modem rental for the next crappy speed, $50 for decent speeds, $70 for what the national average should be, and a grand $110 for the top speed.

These are speeds of 2003. Come on, idiots.

The best part? Their upload speeds cap out at 5 mpbs, even on the top tier. Fantastic.
So if you wanted to become a YouTuber of some sort and upload vids and stuff, like I did at one point, you'd have to be willing to spend hours, even days, waiting for your video to upload, thanks to Grande's terrible upload speeds.

Of course, that's not the worst ISP in my area. They have their network hiccups occasionally and I hate their prices and speeds, but the other companies aren't much better.

Time Warner Cable is even more ridiculous:

Of course, they don't show upload speeds for some stupid reason. And TWC is known for tattling on you to media companies for anything.

I really hope Google Fiber expands outside of Austin at some point soon, I'm so sick of the bullcrap.

My ISP rant is probably not as bad as some of what you guys might have, but imo it's pretty bad.

 

[Cromewell]

This won't help any non-Canadians, but I use TekSavvy, They are pretty good. I pay 32.99/mo for 15Mbps down 1Mbps up and a 300GB cap. Getting the same from a first party provider would be impossible.

 

[tech explorer]

Well here's mine (Cricket) for comparison: http://www.mycricket.com/broadband/mobile-broadband-plan-guide

Luke already knows this so I'm repeating for the others here. Used to have Metro PCS. Was already having some problems with them. The strawbreaker was this: discovered one day I couldn't access my emails. At the store discovered Metro deliberately deactivated my email service and the only way of getting it back was to spend another $100 for a different phone plus whatever the service was. That's when I switched to Cricket.

 

[voyagerfan99]

Charter Communications user her

Back when I was in late middle school early high school I'd be home all summer because at that point in time I didn't have a job. I would want to sleep late, get up, watch TV, and use the internet. Well I couldn't. The cable would be fuzzy for HOURS and the modem would not connect to the internet (the send and receive lights would just flash instead of connecting and staying solid). Multiple times we had a service tech come over and look at it. They would always come in the house and find no issue. Finally we told them "Go check the pole. It's not in the house."

Sure enough the tech went out to the pole and saw a squirrel had chewed on the line, causing issues with the connection.

 

[tech explorer]

This happened a long time ago and I don't remember the name of the service. The problem was whenever it rained, it crapped up the tv picture.

 

[JasonPDK]

My ISP charges €20 a month for 5mbps max download and a 40GB allowance. But as soon as you go over the 40GB allowance they charge €0.05 per mb and that adds up pretty fast if you let it

 

[lucasbytegenius]

My ISP charges €20 a month for 5mbps max download and a 40GB allowance. But as soon as you go over the 40GB allowance they charge €0.05 per mb and that adds up pretty fast if you let it

Wow. That's insane.

 

[tech explorer]

My ISP charges €20 a month for 5mbps max download and a 40GB allowance. But as soon as you go over the 40GB allowance they charge €0.05 per mb and that adds up pretty fast if you let it

Almost sounds like bait and switch.

 

[TrainTrackHack]

My parents pay ~$100 (includes land line rental) for 1.5Mb plan capped at 50GB. These prices aren't even out of ordinary around where we live.

It's a short story but a horror story nonetheless.

 

[tech explorer]

My parents pay ~$100 (includes land line rental) for 1.5Mb plan capped at 50GB. These prices aren't even out of ordinary around where we live.

It's a short story but a horror story nonetheless.

I pay $77 a month for my smartphone/internet service. Can your parents switch to someone else?

 

[voyagerfan99]

My parents pay ~$100 (includes land line rental) for 1.5Mb plan capped at 50GB. These prices aren't even out of ordinary around where we live.

It's a short story but a horror story nonetheless.

Ours is about $120 for HDTV, DVR, and 25mbps internet with 2mbps upload.

 

[tech explorer]

Used to do customer service and selling for a cable company that transferred ownership from one cable company to another. This in effect created two sets of cable packages so when I saw a customer in an old cable package that could benefit in both channels and price from a new cable package, I would propose it to them.

When you think about all the money customers were losing (-$20 to $30 a month), that caused me to shake my head.

 

[lucasbytegenius]

Used to do customer service and selling for a cable company that transferred ownership from one cable company to another. This in effect created two sets of cable packages so when I saw a customer in an old cable package that could benefit in both channels and price from a new cable package, I would propose it to them.

When you think about all the money customers were losing (-$20 to $30 a month), that caused me to shake my head.

I assume the cable company you worked for also provided Internet? Otherwise, this is irrelevant, but thank god for people like you trying to save customers money.

 

[tech explorer]

I assume the cable company you worked for also provided Internet? Otherwise, this is irrelevant, but thank god for people like you trying to save customers money.

Makes me wonder why the new cable company (that did do the internet) didn't automatically set up customers with the new packages? In case anyone wonders, that company paid reps a commission whenever a customer switched so the new company wasn't losing money (I figure they did this to keep a customer's goodwill to help keep them from leaving).

 

[G80FTW]

I had TWC for years. Until they kept increasing my bill. Then started a new account with them fresh. Told them I wanted NO promotional prices, just the standard pricing. Paid $30 a month for 10mbps. Was fine with that, because I was getting close to 30mbps most of the time.

Then, after a year, they wanted to charge me $60 for 15mbps when they changed their plans over, and I said no. So I told them just cancel the internet I have now and upgrade me to the 50mbps which cost $80 a month. They did. And for the whole month I never got over 25mbps. Had them come out 3 times to try and fix it and they never could. So I told them I wasnt going to pay for it. I told them I would pay them the $30 I was before, but they wanted to charge me for 2 months of thee 50mbps ($160) PLUS a month of the 15mbps ($60) which I had canceled before the next bill cycle so I told them I certainly wasnt paying that.

After I cancelled them completely, they then decided to lower what I "owed" to $109 instead of the $200+ they wanted and I told them I still wasnt gonna pay them anything.

Luckily, a year later, it hasnt effected my credit. When I went to buy my car 3 months ago, they actually said I had great credit. So, it all worked out.

But now I am paying $70 a month for 10mbps (where I normally get 2-8mbps) but I would rather have a price that doesnt change.

EDIT: To the OP, your "what the national average should be" is way off. 30mbps is actually faster than what a good percentage of the USA has. I believe last time I ran speakeasy it said my 30mbps was faster than 80% of the USA. If the national average was 65mbps, we would be living in another world....

 

[lucasbytegenius]

EDIT: To the OP, your "what the national average should be" is way off. 30mbps is actually faster than what a good percentage of the USA has. I believe last time I ran speakeasy it said my 30mbps was faster than 80% of the USA. If the national average was 65mbps, we would be living in another world....

As I said, that's what it should be. 30 mbps is pitiful and it's painful that it's more than our national average is. We're way behind other countries if that's the case. It really sucks.

 

[G80FTW]

As I said, that's what it should be. 30 mbps is pitiful and it's painful that it's more than our national average is. We're way behind other countries if that's the case. It really sucks.

Whats wrong with 30mpbs? Its by no means slow. I could do anything on my 30mpbs connection without a hiccup. 10mpbs is pitiful. But 30mpbs is fast enough for pretty much anything you wanna do.

I can still stream HD movie from netflix, which watching HD videos on youtube, while downloading a game on steam with my 10mbps connection without a hiccup. Some of the time. The thing with DSL is the speed is never consistent. But anyway.

 

[tech explorer]

I had TWC for years. Until they kept increasing my bill. Then started a new account with them fresh. Told them I wanted NO promotional prices, just the standard pricing. Paid $30 a month for 10mbps. Was fine with that, because I was getting close to 30mbps most of the time.

Then, after a year, they wanted to charge me $60 for 15mbps when they changed their plans over, and I said no. So I told them just cancel the internet I have now and upgrade me to the 50mbps which cost $80 a month. They did. And for the whole month I never got over 25mbps. Had them come out 3 times to try and fix it and they never could. So I told them I wasnt going to pay for it. I told them I would pay them the $30 I was before, but they wanted to charge me for 2 months of thee 50mbps ($160) PLUS a month of the 15mbps ($60) which I had canceled before the next bill cycle so I told them I certainly wasnt paying that.

After I cancelled them completely, they then decided to lower what I "owed" to $109 instead of the $200+ they wanted and I told them I still wasnt gonna pay them anything.

Luckily, a year later, it hasnt effected my credit. When I went to buy my car 3 months ago, they actually said I had great credit. So, it all worked out.

But now I am paying $70 a month for 10mbps (where I normally get 2-8mbps) but I would rather have a price that doesnt change.

EDIT: To the OP, your "what the national average should be" is way off. 30mbps is actually faster than what a good percentage of the USA has. I believe last time I ran speakeasy it said my 30mbps was faster than 80% of the USA. If the national average was 65mbps, we would be living in another world....

Just a comment about car dealers. They often bend over backwards to get a sale so your credit rating makes little difference. BTW when's the last time you checked your credit rating?

 

[AntimatterAsh]

We barely get 1mbps download with TalkTalk. Upload is always 0.2mbps.

 

[Perkomate]

As I said, that's what it should be. 30 mbps is pitiful and it's painful that it's more than our national average is. We're way behind other countries if that's the case. It really sucks.

do you think 30 is shit?
do you really?
are you that ignorant that you think 30 is shit?
jesus christ this forum is getting worse and worse every time I'm on here

we're lucky to get 3.
3mb/s.
That's 10 times SLOWER than that, and you're complaining.

Jesus.