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Review by qworster See Profile

  • Location: Tucson, Pima, AZ, USA
  • Cost: $48 per month
  • Telco party Qwest
Finally!!! after 2 months of nightmares it's working ok!
They've TRIPLE BILLED me the past two months!
A class action suit looks better all the time!
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

Update: December 30, 2001

Finally, after two months and over 25 calls to MSN tech support, MSN DSL seems to be working okay. I'm not getting quite the speed I got with Qwest, but it's close (540 down, 212 up on average on a 640/256 DSL circuit) and reasonably reliable.

Yesterday I got my Qwest phone bill....today I opened it....
The monthly charge to MSN there is:$143.70 or exactly THREE TIMES the proper charge of $47.90. Last month I was away and my roommate paid the bill...I went and looked at that one..SAME THING!! I just assumed that she had made a bunch of LD calls.....

THESE BASTARDS HAVE BILLED ME $287.40 FOR TWO MONTHS OF DSL SERVICE!!!!

To make things worse, Qwest has overcharged me 100 bucks on the Cisco modem. They never gave me the credit for a second modem I returned to them MONTHS AGO (I have their RMA number to prove it..and they acknolowlege that it got sent back...they just REFUSE to credit it...apparently shipping and billing "don't talk").
Is anyone planning a class action suit? I've heard this bantered around... If so, I'm THERE!!!!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------

I migrated from Qwest DSL to MSN DSL two weeks ago..

No , let me rephrase that...

I was one of the suckers who bought MSN and Qwest's bullsiht that nothing would change concerning my (former) Qwest DSL circuit. Everything has changed!
Before I migrated, I called MSN and was assured by them that the only difference I would see is that they (MSN) don't support VPN just yet. Otherwise, my connection (640/256) would be identical and might even be a bit faster then with Qwest (average 560k).

Let me put this as succinctly as I can: THEY LIE!!!

First of all, their Usenet is filtered to death. Qwest didn't filter a single one, MSN filters out over half of them! Plus along with the obvious (porno) ones are the not so obvious such as alt.microsoftsucks.

Of course, they do have their own usenet that has virtually nothing useful on it.

At five past midnight on Thanksgiving, my DSL quit. I went to bed. Ten hours later it still wasn't working so I called MSN support, where I was informed that they were having a system wide outage. "OK" I thought. Equipment fails. I can wait.
Near as I can tell, DSL came back about 6 PM, 18 hours later. Problem was, it had very poor speed. In fact, a dial up connection was faster. I called MSN support again and they told me: "Give it a day to come back up to full speed". Fair enough.
I waited another day. No difference. Called them back and got the same spiel. I asked for escalation. They refused. I asked for a ticket number. They refused. They said it was probably Qwest and gave me a number for them. I called it and a recording said they were closed until Monday. In desperation, I called my old Qwest DSL support number and told the person there my tale of woe. He said he believed I was being given the run around by MSN, and gave me the inside Qwest wire line number. I called it and got a real nice guy on the phone. After telling me that I had reached an inside number and he shouldn't even be talking to me he agreed to check out my line. He said it was working fine but that he could see very slow throughput from MSN. I hung up and went to bed.
Now it's Sunday night....almost four days after the DSL failed. My speed is now up to about 210k (1/3 of what I pay for). I called the MSN number again and they tried to go through the same BS they always do (flush your cache, etc.) I'm a radio and network engineer. I know what I'm doing. Don't patronize me, MSN.
Finally...they admitted that the number I had been given was usually for dial up and gave me a broadband number. I called it up and here's what I found:

First of all, unlike Qwest (who guarantee you 80% of the speed you pay for), MSN only guarantees 56k(!!!!) speed on DSL lines!!!! I was stunned when the guy told me that My 200k throughput (1/3 0f what I'm paying for) met their minimum bandwidth for a 640k line!! (now rememember what I was told by them in the first place). So, I asked him: "Why then do you offer (cheaper) 256k service then. It would seem to me that I should at least get service on my 640k line that's faster then 256k!" His reply: "I don't know".

Finally, I managed to get them to escalate my problem (that he claims is no problem). I'll keep you updated as to what happens, though I'm now most certainly going to change over to cable (yes, I know that I can get another ISP, but I really feel like hitting Qwest in their pocketbook for getting me into this nightmare!)..

The bottom line: AVOID MSN DSL LIKE THE PLAGUE!!!

member for 22.3 years, 4037 visits, last login: 1.8 years ago
updated 12.4 years ago


needforspeed59
Cruise Ship Just Passing Through
join:2001-05-02
La Place, LA

needforspeed59

Member

Check out Cable Modem service

Have you checked to see if you can get cable modem service? Mine was running slow last night... only 1.8Mbps!

ITGeekMonkey
Orbis Hirsutis
Premium Member
join:2001-11-06
Wylie, TX

ITGeekMonkey

Premium Member

DON'T GET BURNED!

I'm sure you've read the numerous complaints about DTVDSL. I'd just like to warn you to not give them the chance to steal your precious life force. Please see my comments directly under your review.

Good Luck My Friend

SMCinAZ
Premium Member
join:2000-11-29
Glendale, AZ

SMCinAZ

Premium Member

I'd dume 'em

That stuff is non-sense. MSN is like AOL...sometimes they are ok but you can do a Hell of a lot better, easily.
warnlot
join:1999-11-20
Minneapolis, MN

warnlot

Member

Said it before, switch to cable!

In an earlier posting, mentioned how MSN and QWest had totally messed up my conversion to MSN after over two years excellent service by QWest DSL. Have now had RoadRunner service in the Minneapolis area for two weeks and download times are averaging over four times faster than QWest DSL.
andy2lisa
join:2001-11-26
Peoria, AZ

andy2lisa

Member

Just another Fed Up MSN/Qwest Broadband user!!

I am sooo sick of fighting w/ my MSN Broadband connection/account - I have had Qwest Deluxe 640 service for approx. 2 years and I loved it - never went down, always 640, easy to administer etc. Ever since I foolishly switched to MSN it has been a nightmare. Once I ran the install CD for MSN, my "deluxe" always on connection started timing out after 20 minutes of non-use, like the 256 service does, and would close after 2 hours of use. But that was small potatoes compared to the crap I've been putting up with since. My connection has gotten slower and slower, even though I am paying for 640. I have had lots of other glitchy problems, and have called them a number of times - I either get the runaround from person to person, or I get a down-right lie about how to resolve - I'm a MCSE certified Network Security administrator, and when I challenge them on how their recommended "fix" will do anything, I just get a bunch of hems and haws, I've actually had someone hang up once. They also use a bunch of techno-babble that I have never heard like "connectoids", frankly I know my way around an IP stack, and any of my co-workers would laugh at this reference. Like so many who have posted here, the last series of straws have been the last week or so - 3-10 connection attempts, sometime getting on sometimes not. Reported speed of 256 maximum etc. Today I get home, and try to connect, and my connection trains and authenticates almost immediately, and reports 640K. I'm thinking that maybe some problems have been resolved. Then the bottom falls out - the home page take 4 1/2 minutes to load. My line is reporting 16db when it usually is 28-31. I then try to connect to a few other sites - they all time out. I ping and tracert to qwest.msn.com - no return on many pings, and the tracert dies out after 14 hops, them just time outs. I call MSN, 1/2 hour wait, and then I finally get a tech. I tried to be cooperative, went through all of their silly procedures like blowing away cookies, cache, history etc. Then she has me go to the dslreports speed test site, it times out, and she says she has to have a test result to elevate!! At this point I explained my background and told her the problem was clearly on their end, and in any instance how could I get a test result, without a connection? She put me on hold, and 5 minutes later she said she could "elevate" this because of my 16db line quality. She then told me "we are kind of sort of backed up at the next level, so it may be 5-7 days - backed up -DUH!!! I hate to move to cable, not because of the service, but because I already have a router for DSL, and I don't want to rent one (or buy one) from COX. I know I can go w/ another ISP and that's probably what I'll do, but I am so fed up that I may make the move to cable just to put this disaster behind. I spend all day working on Networking issues, when I get home I want to have fun, not fight with my ISP. THIS IS NOT FUN, IT'S AGONY!!

Post Script: I was disconnected while I was writing this, and when I reconnected I had 27db and 512K - but still absolutely no throughput, have tried to get to the dialup number so I can simply get a dialup number but this times out as well - the review page for dslreports took about 5 minutes to load, but by god I'm gonna get this posted - this just sucks!!!
qworster
join:2001-11-25
Bryn Mawr, PA

qworster

Member

You should post this as a review....

It's another MSN/Qwest Horror story waiting to make the list...

jglasma$
I Love The Mods Here
join:2001-09-03
Boise, ID

jglasma$ to andy2lisa

Member

to andy2lisa

Re: Just another Fed Up MSN/Qwest Broadband user!!

Hey Andy, changing ISP's wont improve line quality. Do what I told you in the instant message I sent you!

LOL, has an MSN tech said "sir, I believe we have to change the dilythium crystal in the central office." LOL I'm not laughing at you, I'm laughing with you. (stress may cause hair loss and ulcers!)

BTW, when I had MSN DSL it worked fine but apparently there was a password issue, so I called MSN tech support and was talking to young girl that sounded like she was 12 (literally) so, I politely asked "ma'am how old are you?" and she said 16...

Oh I dumped my MSN DSL because pings to the gateway werent good for gaming so I went with cable. (which isnt very reliable at all! At least here anyways!)

good luck Andy!
jglasma$

jglasma$

Member

I can try to help

OK I work for Qwest, so IM me your phone number and I'll look for open tickets.

BTW, I just fixed this lady in your area today in AZ (480 area code) She said that she had been down for 3 MONTHS!! Come to find out there was an order error and she wasnt even provisioned, had to build the circuit from the ground up (yet MSN was billing her!)...translations, assignments and DSLAM wiring. Had her fixed in like 4 hours. I cant believe we treat our customers like this!!! Honestly folks...the problem is: ALL THE RED TAPE!! Supervisors tell us that we cant talk to MSN customers even if it is a line problem (which we deal with at Qwest) MSN has to call us. The tricky part is narrowing it down to whether it is a line problem or not. The ARESCOM modems wont train (WAN link light will blink) if MSN does not have their username and password set up correctly, unlike the Cisco external modems 675/678 the WAN light will be solid even if the username and password are incorrect. The WAN light will be solid if it talks to our DSLAM. We here at Qwest though dont know a thing about troubleshooting those ARESCOM's though. But I sure try!
Onegen
join:2001-12-16
Chilliwack, BC

Onegen

Member

Re: I can try to help

What is scary.At our location,we only have three people (three!) who are willing to call Qwest on a daily basis to follow through.
The rest clock in,do their jobs and go home.
I'm proudly one of those who will follow through.
~The MSN Insider.
"What we have here is what we call an ID10T."
System

Anon

more msn woes - dsl disconnected

Here is a message I posted to MSN today. I had similar migration woes. Now after a month my DSL service has been disconnected. Apparently this is happening to a number of people as the call center rep had a script to read from on it. In addition to the appalingly bad migration and start up experience and lack of control over their system, now I am getting next to no information. Avoid MSN
***
My DSL was disconnected without my authorization and from the snippets of information I get from 'customer service', without anyone on your end recording why. Now I am told it will take a month to reconnect. This is outrageous. I can get no one with any authority or information to talk to me, as your reps just read from their scripts and say they have no way to tell me anything else. I have yet to receive any communication from MSN as to why my service was disconnected, when it will be reestablished, or what steps you are taking to keep something similar from happening again.
I am an instructor for Univeristy of Phoenix in Telecommunications and this will be an excellent case study for my classes on why customer service is important in their jobs as IT professionals.
I will be forwarding my experiences to DSL Reports, Robert Cringely, and anyone else who can help publicize the atrocious lack of quality in your service, with the hope that others will not be duped by your failure to provide decent service.
DUDE5X
join:2001-12-24
Norfolk, NE

DUDE5X

Member

Re: more msn woes - dsl disconnected

Same problem I had.

got_f_ed
@hsmnet.com

got_f_ed

Anon

I just migrated Last Wed night

I just migrated to MSN from Qwest.net last week. I've only had DSL for about 5 months but in that time I only had one small connectivity problem. In the last 5 days of being an MSN customer I've had 6 outages. on top of that, they filter and block non-MSN smtp traffic (meaning that I can't send email from my yahoo POP3 account). I decided to have my internet service pointed to black-hole.com (a local ISP that I've had great service with) but I came to find out that because of the deal between MSN and Qwest....I no longer have ANY control over what I do with my line. The only way is to call MSN and cancel my service (which will cancel my DSL line through Qwest) and place another order with Qwest for a new DSL line and point the service elsewhere. If we look at the breakdown that's 15 business days for DSL circuit deconstruction (Qwest can't touch it during that time) + 15 business days for DSL circuit reconstruction and I'm off. Thank god Roadrunner is coming out on Thursday morning.

Talking to one of the MSN techs I found out that MSN exec's have no plans to alter their strategy of deliberatly lying to customers and that a part of their strategy is control (odd behaviour from Microsoft), and a major point of control is making it as hard as possible for people to change their service. I mentioned that someone will probably file a class-action lawsuit in the next 6 months over this one and the tech agreed.