Review by williemach 
UPDATED: 15 days ago
member for 16 days, 7 visits, last login: 8 days ago
 San Francisco,San Francisco,CA
 $49 per month
 AT&T
 "I can still login to the member page!"
 "They do not follow on promises or provide disclaimers"
 "Do not use this service if you plan to move!"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings well below consensus)
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I have been using Sonic.net service for about 8 months or so and have had pretty good success despite small outages here and there. I was in the middle of moving and thats when things went terribly wrong.
The first step I did to ensure I did not have a long lapse in internet service was transfer my ATT phone line from my existing residence to my new one. This occurred on 4/9. I allowed about 2 days for the phone line to settle in. I even went to my new residence to check that a dial-tone was working. Success.
I proceeded to use Sonic's online moving service, which was quite simple. Too simple. I simply entered the phone number and placed the order. The very next day (4/11) I see that the information I placed is in Sonic's system. Keep in mind at this time, I have not been warned about any provisioning that needs to take place etc. Fair enough, I call Sonic.net not knowing what to expect. The first technical rep. tells me theres an existing order on this phone line with another ISP. Shame on ATT, I believe. I call ATT and they claim that there are no holds on the phone line and it should be clear to allow a third-party carrier installation.
On 4/11, I call Sonic.net and explain the situation. They claim that the phone line should be provisioned any moment now, without any hard ETAs since the phone line needs to be established in a database. Technical support person tells me that Sonic.net tries to connect services 3 times a day. Fair enough, I wait some more.
Around 4/16, I call them again explaining that my service is still down. I even ask them, what can I do to escalate the situation with ATT, if in fact they are the problem. They explain to me that it takes some time to get in the database.
On 4/18, service is still out. Phone seems to be fine. I even call it to make sure it's the right number. I do the reverse with it, looks good. I call Sonic.net and request to have my account canceled. I ordered service back in December, but the sales representative fails to tell me this and slams a nice $149 early termination fee. Am I being unfair? Why am I getting slammed an early termination fee for waiting for over a week for no clear ETA on service availability? Billing was nice enough to waive this fee and remediate the situation. They compromised by signing me up for month to month service. I was told that my service order should be ready on April 28th, but that does not mean my service will be up. It could take up to May 3rd for the DSL to actually work. Understood.
On April 30th, I receive an e-mail from Sonic stating that my line is now active, but I have not taken the time to use it since it shows no data usage. Success? No. I hook up my modem to the good phone line (tried and true with a dial-tone). It's late, I go to bed.
I call in the A.M. today and was told by the technical support person that my line is active. He asks me if all lines are good in the house and if I used any DSL filters. I explain none are installed and I only have the modem connect. I realized that this could be a glitch and I tell him i'd go home and try the different jacks and maybe even the phone box. I've never been told to check the phone box in my life with any service, by the way. I go home, check all jacks, same results. Blinking DSL, no activity.
I call technical support and tell the technical support representative how clearly upset and frustrated I am. The e-mail I received from Sonic tells me my service is active, but I haven't used it. The support rep tells me that they could do a "truckroll". That would make sense if I didn't already tell her that the phone box is fine and i've even connected a phone to it. All jacks receive a dial tone in my house, even the phone box that shouldn't be tampered with by customers (stated on the box). She goes further to tell me that shes here to help. I become disturbing frustrated by her comments. She claims that I am yelling, which I agree. I am clearly upset.
I ask to be transferred to a supervisor or someone who can investigate on this account or provide details on the situation and what a truckroll really can do. She never transfers me, explaining that they are on lunch! The shift starts from 2pm - 11pm and i've called at 5pm. This is a warning to anyone who works normal 9-5pm jobs to use a service that can help you during after hours. I explain that this situation is really confusing and easily angers anyone since there is never a disclaimer or a phone call about the consequences of moving your service. It fails to say so online and the support representatives fail to pull these elements in as a possibility on each phone call I make to them.
I rely on Internet to provide on-call support for my company and have stated that over a dozen times. Sonic doesn't seem to mind and clearly believes I can take as much time off as I need to troubleshoot DSL with them and allow "truckrolls" or whatever other games they'd like to offer. I'm sitting here taking the time to write this review to expel my frustration and also warn others who may possibly be moving with Sonic service. I personally believe that they provide the moving feature with serious caveat emptors to it that are not outlined. Further, I was never told of an early termination fee when canceling and the billing rep seemed more than happy to push it through. I sit here, 9:45pm, still waiting on a call back from a support supervisor. In the meantime, i've opened an account with ATT until I can find another static IP provider.
I'm perplexed as to why Sonic receives such high reviews because every phone call I make never receives the attention to detail it clearly needs. This service is probably good for anyone who isn't moving. BTW, if ATT is a Sonic partner, why is this such a pain to clear up?
Followup comments:  
DaneJasper
Sonic.Net
Premium,VIP
join:2001-08-20
Santa Rosa, CA
clubs:
| Line loss I've passed your comments on to both the support manager and order provisioning manager to give them a chance to see what we can learn and change.
quote:
The first step I did to ensure I did not have a long lapse in internet service was transfer my ATT phone line from my existing residence to my new one. This occurred on 4/9. I allowed about 2 days for the phone line to settle in. I even went to my new residence to check that a dial-tone was working. Success.
So this first step is where it fell down.
Moving a line causes the DSL that's on it to be left behind by AT&T. Before we're able to create a new order, the old one must be disconnected, the database must be updated to show new order eligibility, then a new order must be placed.
This process, end to end, can take anywhere from ten to twenty days, in our experience.
For this reason, it's important that we place the move order for the DSL so that the DSL moves along with your phone line. When done this way, downtime is limited to a day in most cases.
Because this is NOT something that AT&T takes the time to point out when you call 'em to ask to have your line moved, we sent you an email on this topic about seven months ago.
It's really a shame that AT&T doesn't warn customers about this - we do, but sometimes people forget or don't real the warning.
Here's a fresh copy below. There are some land mines, your DSL does depend upon your voice line. This email was created to hopefully informing folks about them.
I'm sorry that you've had so much downtime related to moving your voice line. We'll talk about any ideas in addition to the warning email which we might implement here to try to prevent this for others! If you have any suggestions, please do pass them on.
-Dane
Subject: FYI: Sonic.net DSL line reminder
This is a courtesy notice, sent to all Sonic.net DSL customers. Please read it and let us know if you have any questions.
This is a reminder from Sonic.net that your DSL service is tied to your voice telephone line. There are some things that you might do with your phone service that could disrupt your DSL and Internet service for days or weeks, and that could cost you extra fees.
Read further to find out how you can help yourself avoid trouble!
Your DSL service requires a working SBC phone line in order to provide you with DSL service. Any of the following might cause a disruption in your DSL service:
• Failure to pay your SBC telephone bill.
• Switching your telephone line from SBC to another carrier
• Moving your telephone line to a different address
If SBC disconnects your phone service for non-payment, they will also disconnect your DSL service. This can trigger an early termination fee. After telephone service is re-established, DSL service can be re-ordered, and after downtime of two to three weeks, you would be back online. This requires a new one year term commitment. You would still be liable for the early term fee, so it is a bad situation all around. Please assure that you do not allow your telephone bill to become delinquent. SBC offers a number of online and automatic payment options for your convenience. For more information, please see »www.sbc.com/gen/general?pid=6179
If you switch your local telephone service from SBC to another carrier, SBC is required to relinquish the number upon receiving these instructions from the new carrier. This will cause a disconnection of the DSL service and will also trigger an early termination fee, and result in downtime of a few weeks. One situation where we have seen this occur is if a business moves their lines to another local telephone company to obtain a better price for outgoing calls. It is alright to move any other telephone lines you have, but NOT the line on which DSL is carried! Another common situation is customers who are interested in moving their number to a VoIP (Voice over IP) carrier such as Vonage. If you move your DSL line telephone number, DSL is disconnected, meaning that not only do you have no Internet access, but also the VoIP service which requires Internet access will not work! And, again it takes a few weeks to get re-established; the early term fee is applied. If you have any question about which of your voice lines carry the DSL service, please let us know and we will be happy to look this up for you.
Sonic.net can help coordinate moving your DSL service for you. Please contact us for assistance prior to contacting SBC. It’s a good idea to have orders one to two weeks before your move date. If you provide us with your new number and the date when it will be installed in advance, we can coordinate migration of your broadband service with a minimal amount of downtime. Also, to avoid potential early termination fees, it’s important that the new telephone service be established in the same name as the existing telephone service. Also note that if you move to a new location where SBC serves your voice (in the same name) and Sonic.net offers DSL, but DSL cannot be delivered, SBC will waive any early termination fee regardless of your DSL term commitment.
Thanks for reading, and please let us know if you have any questions on these items.
| |
|  | williemach
join:2008-05-01
 ·SONIC.NET
edit:
May 4th, @05:17PM
| Re: Line loss My major concern here is that your company should be experts in DSL and broadband connections. I felt like I was dealing with entry-level support individuals who knew less than I did after performing a Google search on how the phone company's provisioning works. Perhaps they were too much of an expert that they failed to tell me all the possible things that could go wrong. I'm not saying I am right here, I should have went back to my e-mail 7 months ago and pulled up the disclaimer... I'm not sure if I even have it anymore.
If you think about it, a possibility of having a lapse in service for 10-20 days (like you mentioned) can be pretty serious for some and perhaps an automated message should be attached to the DSL moving service on a users member page when performing this task. Simple enough, no?
However, the major flaws in this company is that lack of understanding of general customer service. Do not promise things you cannot keep. For instance, if you look up my technical support record, one support agent said they'd give me a call back after they find out what was going on with ATT. I gave them my mobile phone number and not a single call was made. These are such small things that could make customer service excel. Don't promise things you cannot deliver. I could've lived with, "I don't know what is going on, but if I find out something I will give you a call".
I personally believe that there are serious gaps in communications within departments and I experienced it first hand on my phone call on May 1st. If you work for a company, you don't blame another department for the failings of a situation. You collectively work together to resolve the issue and look for ways to improve in the future, but you NEVER blame another department/coworker/policy for it's failings.
I'm more than happy to voice what I feel what went wrong, but if you simply pull up my account and the ticket information, you can see the holes and the little information I received on the situation. Once again, I can't voice how important it is to relay information. Customers of an expert company of a broadband/DSL provider should never have to Google up information about how DSL works, otherwise they could just go to competitors and buy up a simple DSL package and hook it up themselves. | |
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