AT&T promises new Homeowner Broadband Connection At Address They Won’t Actually Serve

[pstokely]

http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/04/28/when-att-promises-broadband-but-delivers-only-300kbps/

"Mortimer also plugged the address into AT&T's U-verse availability checker. The system reported that the home could get the service he wanted, Mortimer said.

But Mortimer learned the truth after moving into the house in Lowell, Michigan, a city of about 4,000 residents. Instead of AT&’s U-verse fiber-to-the-node service, which could have provided up to 45Mbps, the best AT&T could actually offer him was up to 768Kbps download speeds over DSL lines.

Since it was the only wired Internet option available, Mortimer subscribed. He soon found that the "up to" in AT&T's description was there for a reason; Mortimer said he could only get about 300 to 400Kbps, a fraction of the 25Mbps download speed that meets the US definition of "broadband."

“Half the time, websites won’t even load,” he said. At those speeds, streaming video is out. Downloading files was difficult not only because of the low bit rate but also because the connection was often unstable, dropping many times a day."

[hobbit709]

1. A few years back a friend's neighbor wanted to get DSL

AT&T insisted it was not available at his house. He went around with them for a month before cancelling all service with AT&T. He told them his neighbors on either side of him had DSL, the people behind his house on the next street had DSL, the people across the street from him had DSL. The computer said his house couldn't have it and not even the supervisors he talked to could do anything because the computer said so.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

6. The computer is all powerful, humans not so much.

Last year, I got double-charged for the major league baseball package (well, my housemate did - the bill is in my name, but she's the one who watches baseball and orders the extra 'add-on' package each year) each of the four months the payments were split over. I had to call them up and have credits put on my bill four months in a row, because no one at Time Warner could override the billing, or remove one of the two sets of charges. No matter who I talked to, they proclaimed it was 'impossible' to remove a package after it had been added to a bill, and that all they could do was credit me each time the next payment came due (and not automatically, either, I had to sit on the phone with them for 20 minutes or so each month for the four months.)

[jeff47]

12. DSL is available at a variety of speeds and conditions

Often the main carrier (AT&T in this case) will not offer it if it's too slow or too spotty. But other people can provide DSL over AT&T's lines. They will offer the slow, spotty service.

[hobbit709]

13. Point was that all his neighbors had AT&T DSL. They just told him it wasn't available at his address

[jeff47]

15. Which can actually happen.

If the neighbor's signal is barely good enough, and he has crappy lines from the pole to his house, then he'd fall below AT&T's standards.

[hobbit709]

19. 25 year old subdivision. His neighbors all get 6Mbps.

For some reason the computer got told his phone number wasn't on the list of DSL availability and no one could or would override the computer. We're talking a suburban area with all other services available to him and all his neighbors. His neighbors are a standard city lot away from him so it's not like there's a real distance problem.

It's just the usual standard of AT&T customer service.

[Archae]

2. I have cable broadband, but my Mom has DSL.

Since I spend a lot more time online than she does, it works out ok for us both.

I can see though how many people would get flustered dealing with AT & T.

I've heard they are to DSL, what Comcast is to broadband.

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. Stories abound about Comcast doing the exact same thing.

New Homeowner Has To Sell House Because Of Comcast’s Incompetence, Lack Of Competition

Only months after moving into his new home in Washington state, Consumerist reader Seth is already looking to sell his house. He didn’t lose his job or discover that the property is haunted. No, Seth can’t stay much longer because no one can provide broadband service to his address; even though Comcast and CenturyLink both misled him into thinking he’d be connected to their networks and in spite of the fact that his county runs a high-speed fiberoptic network that goes very near to his property.

Like an increasing number of Americans, Seth works from home, meaning that it’s vital that he have a reliable high-speed Internet connection at all times. That’s why before he even put an offer on the house in Kitsap County, WA, he contacted Comcast to confirm that he could get service to his potential new address.

According to Seth, who has kept a detailed timeline of events, one Comcast sales rep even said that a previous resident at this address had been a Comcast customer. Seth says he tried to get it in writing that the house was serviceable, but Comcast said they simply do not do that.

Then, on Jan. 31, a Comcast tech came out to perform what should have been a quick installation, only to find that there was no cable infrastructure leading to Seth’s property. Thus began a months-long saga of pointless appointments before Seth ultimately hit a dead end last week.
http://consumerist.com/2015/03/25/new-homeowner-has-to-sell-house-because-of-comcasts-incompetence-lack-of-competition/

[madokie]

4. We're paying 70 bucks a month

for up to 7 mbps where it is in the 3 to 4 hundred range most times, unless I'm up at two in the morning maybe and thats not always a given even then.
I'm at 5.22 mbps right now. up is .76 mbps. The thing is I have cable and satelite only as options as fairpoint.net won't allow AT&T or google, for that matter, who are about 2 miles from me to sell me service.

[PeaceNikki]

5. Time Warner has been delivering me 50 down and 5 up for a decade. I got mad at them a couple

years ago over the showtime blackout and AT&T had been courting me for some time. I had U-verse installed and, despite their claims of comparable service, they couldn't give me 10 down/2 up. Plus I had two boxes replaced and numerous system resets in TWO WEEKS. So, I returned all the equipment and canceled. Despite the hours on the phone and multiple service calls they tried to hit me with a $300 cancelation fee. I fought with their customer service for months, let them send me to collections and just settled with them last month.

Fuck AT&T. I'm so glad the Comcast deal fell through. I didn't realize how stable and great the TW service was until I dealt with that BS.

[tammywammy]

14. I wish my TWC was stable

It goes out all the freaking time and I mean daily right now for a few hours. Or lately it's so slow I can't even look at anything online. It's awful, I'll be in the middle of doing homework and ready to email my team members and bam the Internet is out again. Grr.

I'm switching to AT&T soon, I don't know anyone that has the issues I do with UVerse

[PeaceNikki]

17. I've been rock solid for years with one exception.

Last year we had intermittent momentary drops that got really annoying. After several calls (their tier 1 support, like most, are atrocious) and a couple service calls, they found that a neighbor had electrical back-feed which was being sent through the coax. They shut down the neighbor until they could get them fixed and mine was back to aces.

I have friends in other nearby communities who are really happy with U-verse. I was not one of them.

[Quackers]

18. My Time Warner went out last year.

In all fairness, it wasn't their fault. I live in a duplex with garages separating my neighbor and I. It turns out my neighbor ordered DirecTV and the installer didn't like all of that Time Warner stuff being around. So he cut all my wires under the house flush with the walls and ripped out my service box and took it with him. I didn't have service for a week. Time Warner had to rewire the entire house. Needless to say, I was upset.

[PeaceNikki]

22. Similar happened to me when U-verse was installing in my neighbor's unit.

I am in a duplex as well, but only lost service in a couple rooms that time and they were very quick about fixing it.

[Firefishe]

26. Criminal Activities by Service Techs Should Be Reported

Just read your post.

As I see it, that service technician was engaged in illegal activity.

The only cables any technician has any authority to work on are their own.

Seriously! What was the idiot thinking?

[Quackers]

27. I called DirecTV and threatened to call the police.

Their response was they didn't have any service workers in my area. That was funny because I seen the service van parked out front.

[jeff47]

21. The way our TWC goes out

is whomever calculated the schedule for rotating their DNS servers didn't correctly handle the length of their DHCP leases.

So they take the DNS servers down (no idea why they do this all the time), and you can't get anywhere until you renew your DHCP lease. (Easiest way to do this is to unplug your cable modem, count to 20, and plug it back in)

We changed our systems to use Google's public DNS servers (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4), and haven't had a problem since.

[tammywammy]

24. I'll reset the modem and it'll still be out.

Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't. Super annoying and I think it's gotten worse the last two months.

[NV Whino]

7. In my rural area, I'm paying for "up to" 3Mbps download

Frequently it's .45, not even half. AT&T, of course. They just raised the rates for that terrific service, too.

[snooper2]

8. this is hugh lol....a lot of businesses still use just an old T1

be happy dude...


Or, I can sell him some DIA over Ethernet but he is going to pay $5-600 a month- business class

[Lonusca]

9. For the other "rural" folks here

While close to civilization, our area is "rural" as far as services. We are on wells for water, and no cable

This has been a EXCELLENT solution for us: http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/lte-internet-installed/

We average about 12-13 mbps.

[lpbk2713]

10. Gosh who would have thought a telco would lie to a customer.

Their guiding principle ...


Promise those rubes anything. Just make a sale.

[dembotoz]

11. this happens all the damn time. preqal programs are sorta educated guesses at best

And they want you to sign term contracts based on this guess.

Crooks
Liars
And thieves

As a rule I never lie to a customer...but often the direct company employees do
Customer gets sold an inferior service

Happens all the damn time

[CANDO]

16. Verizon DSL totally blows also

And the fucking greedy bastards have continually raised my monthly subscription. 4 years ago I started at 24.99, now they have me paying 40.99 for shitty service that isn't near broadband speeds. Fucking sick of it. Going to cable broadband soon. Will pay more, but at least it will be broadband speed.

[ileus]

20. I don't recommend buying a house based on website results.

[Lee-Lee]

23. I almost rented a house based on availability listed on the AT&T website

Luckily, I just happened to strike a conversation up with a neighbor who told me that while there was DSL, there were a limited number of slots available on the local server or whatever and you had to get on a waiting list to get service as people cancelled and a slot opened. He had been waiting 4 months.

I have a growing side business ding eBay and Etsy, and no internet would have killed that.

[Xithras]

25. I had the exact same problem.

I checked the website before we bought our current house. The AT&T website claimed that we could get their highest speed broadband, but when we actually went to hook it up, we learned that our line was only capable of getting a 768k connection that usually fell down to 384k. It was awful, and we shut it off after less than three months. Because cable modems weren't an option for us, we found a regional company that did microwave internet. They came out and put a little dish on the peak of our house. 6Mbs wasn't phenomenal, but it was a huge step up from AT&T.

About a year and a half ago AT&T notified us that the network in our neighborhood had been upgraded, and a guy came to our door suggesting that we give them another try. I worked out a deal that allowed me 30 days to disconnect again without any charges or fees, and told them to go for it. It worked great, and I'm now on 18Mbps Uverse. It took them three years, but I was eventually able to get the service they advertised.

[Firefishe]

28. Rural Solution

There is one solution fur rural customers that can work when done correctly, and that's Broadband Over Powerlines, or BPL.

This was suggested as one of the "Last Mile" solutions the FCC wanted to implement, so people in rural communities could also enjoy broadband.

The system has to be set up, correctly, or there can be bad interference to radio communications.

Amateur Radio Operators (Hams) will be the first to complain if a BPL system is causing interference in their areas, bus are also among the most technically qualified to assist in helping the BPL community solve problems, and often do.

Just a thought.