Review by VolRath217 
UPDATED: 1.8 years ago
member for 4 years, 33 visits, last login: 205 days ago
 Benton,Saline,AR
 $150 per month (12 month contract)
 about 34 days
 AT&T
 "Generally Reliable Service up until now"
 "No one knows what they're doing except Level 2 support."
 "I don't really have a choice either way if I want high speed."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
An upgrade story. I'll update this as things change.
Some time between Sept-Oct 2007
Our DSL margins were terrible and we were dropping connection a lot. We had them send us a new modem, which we had to sign a contract for even though we had already had service for a year and half. That wasn't the problem though so they eventually came and replaced our drop (another story all together) and everything is fine. While we were talking to them, they said we could upgrade from 1.5 to 6 meg and that if we did, we would be down for 10 days but we could use dial up. We couldn't be down for 10 days (and we made a point to make sure they meant no DSL for 10 days. They said that was correct), so we put it off.
Now to preface this, we are about 18,000 feet from the CO. Our margins are always in the low teens and our attenuation generally fluctuates between 60 and 63.5 depending on when you check it. A few months ago they put a DSLAM in the RT about 4000ft from our house. Our DSL has always come out of the CO. Also, I'm a Network Analyst for another company that doesn't offer service where I live, and I troubleshoot DSL all day, so I have a pretty large knowledge base for this.
Friday, Dec 28th, 2007
My wife and I decide to upgrade, even if we'll be down. She calls AT&T and they say that we can upgrade immediately, but the lady on the phone can't place the order so she'll have to send it to an order specialist. This will be processed by 5pm on the 29th.
Monday, Dec 31st, 2007
I look at our account online and there are no pending orders. So my wife calls AT&T and the guy there says, "well, I don't know who you spoke with on Friday, but they didn't put in an order request, and we don't have to send this to a specialist, I'll take care of it. Your order is due on the 3rd.
Thursday, Jan 3rd, 2008
Our speed is turned up to 6meg, but the margin on the down side was 2 and we are only training at around 3 meg speeds. Our attenuation is 62... they didn't move us out of the CO. I call tech support and explain to him what's wrong. I tell him point blank, "They upgraded us to 6meg, but they didn't move us out of the CO to the RT, it's not going to work unless you cut me to the new DSLAM." I told him this about 3 times, but still I'm on the phone for TWO HOURS while he runs tests on my modem, has me plug the modem into the computer to test it, calls this person and that person. And I'm telling him the whole time that it's not a bad modem, it's not my router... If it were slow speeds and my modem was trained with good margins, then yes, that is a possibility, I understand he's going by a script, but he doesn't need it. Finally he says "I'll have to get you to Tier 2, please hold". I hold for 10 minutes, he comes back and says "Tier 2 says you need to talk to the Line Department, please hold". Another 10 minutes (and that's not an exaggeration). "Sir, the Line Department is closed, someone will contact you within 24 hours." This really gets on my nerves, the "24 hour" person... So, I come to dslreports and find the AT&T forums, I post about what the problem is, and the guy on here responds just a few minutes later saying that I'm right, we weren't moved, he turned us back down to 1.5 and he put in an order to have us moved, it will take 10 days to process, but we will only be out of service for an hour or so, probably in the middle of the day so it doesn't matter to me anyway.
Wednesday, Jan 9th, 2008
No one has posted anything else to my dslreports post so I stopped checking it after one last check at lunch. Also I get a call on my answering machine asking me to call someone back about my account. I call and the guy says that my cut has been approved and that everything will be done on the 14th. I ask him specifically, "So the cut will be on the 14th and we'll be getting 6 meg on that day?" He says yes.
Monday, Jan 14th, 2008
I come home and check my modem. Speed 1536/384, margins 12 down 15 up, attenuation 60.. It's after 5 and I know that's when the field techs go home, so we wait and call on Tuesday.
Tuesday, Jan 15th, 2008
Still no change, so my wife calls about 3:30. The lady says that we have been disconnected from the CO and that's all she can see, she'll escalate the issue and someone will call us within 24 hours. There's that 24 hour guy again... The thing is, we can't have been disconnected from the CO, when I get home at 5, I look and see that I've been pulling an IP address for 4 days and my attenuation is still 60. We wait.
Wednesday, Jan 16th, 2008
I go home for lunch and nothing is changed. Also no one has called my wife back, and no messages on the answering machine. The 24 hour guy never called either phone by 11pm that night.
Thursday, Jan 17th, 2008
I found my old post on dslreports and saw that someone had responded on the 9th at 5:00pm saying that the order was due on the 14th, but that wasn't the actual cut. It would be 2-5 days after the 14th, that they'd even be able to see the due date of the actual cut. So now I'm just going to wait to see when that will be.
Friday, Jan 18th, 2008
Nothing changed until 6:45 tonight, when I got an automated call from AT&T saying that our new DSL order would be complete on the 23rd and we'd get a welcome package in the mail.... Anyway, 30 seconds later, my connection drops and my modem trains back at 1152/384 with down margin 6.5. I turn it off and back on with no change. Then the modem goes down and it comes back up at 384/384 with a margin of 24.. for some reason someone has apparently decided to turn my speed down.. Jesus....
Saturday, Jan 19, 2008
Sometime overnight they turned my speed back up. Running fine for now.
Monday, Jan 21, 2008
I get a call at 4:45 saying they can't find an RT to move me to. And my order will be delayed 5 more days. I call tech support to get the number to who I need to call about this. They get me to the orders department. I'm on hold 7 minutes, someone picks up the phone, I hear background noise, I hear someone mess with their headset, the call ends. I call back, 10 minutes on hold, the lady says everything looks fine for the 23rd, I tell her about the call, she gets me to maintenance. I talk to maintenance, she says "please hold while I look at your account" and instantly I'm back in a queue that's playing christmas music. Someone at Broadband customer care answers, I tell her the problem, she says someone will call me in 24 hours. I ask for a manger. The manager gets on the phone, says that her department can't help me and that the department that can help me doesn't take calls, they just call people back. She says all the notes on the account say everything is fixed and that the order will be done on the 23rd. Now I wait some more.
Wednesday, Jan 23, 2008
Ok, here we are, the big day right? Nope... I call the Orders department about 6:30pm, she says that the ticket is in the field and I'll get a call before 8:00, and if I don't get a call by 8:00 to call them back and they'll check. So at 9:00 I call back.... their office closes at 7... so how was I suppos.... whatever. I get in the online chat with tech support just to see if there's anything on my account about it, all she can see is my original order that was due on the 3rd. I tell her all they have to do is call and say "There's a problem, it will take a little longer, it will be done no later than ______, and if it's not done by that day, then we'll cancel your order." That's all they have to do...
Thursday, Jan 24, 2008
I call Orders at 7:30am, the lady says my account is active.... I tell her that that's not the problem and I explain everything to her and she puts me on hold for a little while she goes to look. About 3 minutes later she comes back and says that there was a problem with the wiring. But she sees no reason why it won't be done today. But if it's not, to call back tonight before 7. When I get home I check and my margins are up to 25 on 1.5 and we're now in Fast instead of Interleave, I check with tech support and we have been moved to the RT and our order for 6 meg was cancelled so now I have to call sales.
Friday, Jan 25, 2008
I call Sales and the lady sets up my order in under 3 minutes. She says it will be done by the 31st.
Thursday, Jan 31, 2008
I get home and pull up my modem interface. Trained @ 6014/768, good margins, good attenuation. Speed test time. 1.311/660 ..... ok, it's a fluke, restart modem, trains back up good, speed test to a different website this time 1.310/659... you gotta be kidding me... I get in online chat, the guy tells me "This speed falls under your speed profile of 384-1536" I tell him I have an order due today, and my modem is trained at 6, so I'm capped at 1.5 somewhere. He tells me to wait a few hours and then reset my modem and maybe it will be ok. Really? Really? So I ask him if I can talk to anyone else, he says to call in. Fair enough. I call in, I go through the same thing with the level 1 guy, then he tells me there's something wrong with my line and he needs to get me to the Line Equipment department. I stop him at that and tell him that there's nothing wrong with my line, everything everywhere is fine, I just need my speed cap (probably in the BRAS) moved up to 6M, and ask to talk to level 2. He sounded really happy when I asked, he was like "Yes! I'll get you to them right away!" So I talk to Michael in Level 2, he looks at it and I tell him exactly what I think it is, he puts me on hold, says he had to get senior tech to look at it, but to reset my modem, and BAM 5004kbps down. Complete.
For anyone that ever needs to call tech support, Level 1 tech support has absolutely no clue what they are doing. I'm sure that script they read from is handy, but I can see how people who aren't technically-inclined could get really fed up with script-reading tech support people, and I dont' mean just AT&T. But I mean, if I hadn't stopped him and asked for Level 2, I would be on the phone with the Line Equipment department right now so they could make a ticket to send a tech out to my house.... Matthew on the AT&T Direct forums and then Michael that I talked to tonight are the only 2 people over the last month that would go, "ok, ok, ok, ok, yeah, fixed". I appreciate it.
Oh, and while I'm thinking about it, we never got our rebate for our modem they sent us back in September or October. My wife escalated that too back on the 28th of December and they said it would take 4-8 weeks for them to get back to us on that as well.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of AT&T Southwest |
|
AT&T Southwest
