how-to block ads
|
Review by Chilli  - Location: Chilliwack,BC
- Cost: $70 per month
Good "The product works generally quite well, but you never ever get the advertised 25 Mbps, it's always less."
Bad "The company's problem are their people and their questionable advertising."
Overall "This is the thing. There's nothing wrong with their product, but their people irritate you to the point that you leave forever"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
It's a wonder to me that Shaw has any customers at all. When I order a new service on line and get a visual confirmation that my order is going to be attended to, then get a call from someone wondering if I even want the service because she is not going to give me the promotional pricing, then I say this is a company with a disconnect between their website advertising and order placement fulfillment. The trouble here is this isn't isolated. Every time I've ever attempted to upgrade a service with this company, some desk bound apparatchik has brought me to the point of hysteria.
Today, I attempted to order Shaw's Internet 50. They have a promotion for one month free if you order on line, and two months at 30 dollars off the regular price. At 80 dollars a month regular price, with this incentive, I thought to myself, "I will go with this for a year and see how it goes." But at Shaw, as I am an existing customer this apparently means none of their promotional plans apply to me. That fact is buried two pages deeper in fine print you still need a magnifying glass to read. That's right. They put out promotions that apply to only potential customers that do not currently deal with them and then when an existing customer tries to avail themselves of the promotional price to upgrade, Shaw treats them like they don't matter and they quit and go elsewhere to then become a legitimate target for their promotional schemes. The forums online are peppered with horrific anecdotes of Shaw and Telus driving their customers back and forth between them in a never ending cycle of "let's see how quickly we can tick our customers off".
I think Shaw is technically competent and their products reliable and functional. But as far as dealing with them, at the most, their advertising and product promotion schemes are bush league, illogical, confusing full of fine print and likely drawn up by a marketing manager who got her diploma from a correspondence course. At worst, I find their approach to their customers to be deliberately deceptive and classic examples of bait and switch.
I wouldn't waste my time advising anyone one way or the other whether they should avail themselves of Shaw's services, but if you want something once you are their customer, God help you then! As for me, I'm going to scope out a new ISP and leave Shaw on the ash heap of history.
Fair warning: reviewer joined this week
updated a few minutes ago
Comments:
| Review by zod5000 - Location: Victoria,BC
- Cost: $80 per month
- Install: about 15 days
Good "Fast Connection. Smooth Installation Process. Good Tech Support."
Bad "Constant Price Increases."
Overall "Shaw offers a solid internet service but it's getting very expensive."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I've been using Shaw's bb50 package for about two years now. Prior to that I had been on various Telus (and Teksavvy) DSL packages. The Shaw connection has been rock solid for the entire two years. The original installation was quick and painless. The tech came over, installed the modem, made sure it was working, ran a speed test, and left. It was a much better experience than I had the few times I got a DSL install.
My only real complaint with Shaw is how often they've been raising prices. BB50 was $59/month when I first signed up for it two years ago. It is now $80 /month. That's a 35% increase over two years. That's pretty insane. They also haven't modified the caps in a few years. I usually go 100 to 200gb's over the cap and Shaw lets it slide, but every year there's more and more things to watch on the Internet, and more cap space would be nice (I don't really need faster speeds).
member for 9.9 years, 4145 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 11 days ago
Comments:
| Review by Connor M - Location: Whistler,BC
- Cost: $100 per month
Good "Bridgeable modem with upto 2 IP's, High download speed"
Bad "unclear information about when internet upgrades come, some issues with tech support, and not the greatest east coast routing"
Overall "im on shaw because i have to be just to get higher upload speeds, and i am still not very happy with my upload"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I started off on Shaw BB50 for $49.99+tax for 3 months, once the promotion was over it went back to $75+tax so i switched to BB100 for $85+tax which was recently bumped to $90+tax which comes out to $100.80 after tax
When i signed up i was told the DNU would be completed in my area in march and i would be getting my upload speeds bumped up as-well as have BB250 available. Its now 6 months after when they said the upgrade was scheduled and I'm still without my increased upload. I have had one bad experience with the tech who installed the service, but other then that, techs haven't been bad, and although connection reliability isn't bad by any means, its nowhere near as consistent as my Telus. Having multiple outages in just the few months I've been with them.
Some TSA's are really good, while some are just terrible, as for services, i like the bandwidth counter and the fact they have email, but i would prefer they upgraded my internet before wasting tonnes of money on Shaw Go Wifi, at $100.80 a month after tax ($95 before) and with no one willing to cut me any type of deal, i will be very happy to switch to Telus 50/10 service for 75$ a month when it becomes available in my area, to sum up Shaw is not a bad company and they are providing me with a service i am happy with but they need to improve many things
1. Tech support, every day wait times are 20 mins or more ,never like this with Telus ,and not very cool if u ask me.
2. Loyalty teams ability to make deals or give promotions
3. Upload speeds must rise, having to get 100 down just for 5 up is painful
on the positive side no contracts and free truck rolls are nice when your service isn't working like it is suppose to
if i was getting 100/10 the $100.80 with tax would be totally justified and i would be happy to stay with Shaw. but until im getting that im ready to switch back to Telus or TSI
Attachments:
member for 245 days, 370 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 26 days ago
Comments:
| Review by jtl999 - Location: Vancouver,BC
- Cost: $155 per month
- Install: about 10 days
Good "Moderately good speeds 400GB Data Cap. Cisco DOCSIS 3.0 bridged at install time."
Bad "Speeds drop from 50mbps to around 15-48 during times of day."
Overall "meh"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
Update Feb 13 2013
Planning on switching to either Nucleus Lightspeed or TekSavvy. Whatever one can get me 50/10 first. So far it is looking towards Lightspeed.
Speedtest »www.speedtest.net/result/2507444835.png
2012Review
I have a bundle with Shaw TV (HD) Phone and Internet.
I ordered around August 10th and it took ten days for them to transfer numbers and stuff. They replaced the Motorola Surfboard modem with a Cisco. It works flawlessly (other then speeds) as long as you have it in bridge mode. The tech was very polite. Sadly it is crippled by node congestion.
I don't watch TV or use the phone that much so I cannot speak for those services.
I would rate this service a 7.5/10
I have high hopes with TELUS Optik 50.
Speedtest as of 10 minutes ago.
»www.speedtest.net/result/2328197229.png
member for 315 days, 253 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 30 days ago
Comments:
| Review by tablo - Location: Edmonton,AB
- Cost: $120 per month
Good "Fast speeds, good PQ, fair prices, modem easily bridged,"
Bad "Some rude CSRs, mediocre ping, shared nodes, bandwidth limit"
Overall "Can be expensive, service quality is subjective"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
These rate increases are too much. I have been a Shaw customer for 5 years now. I had BB50/PTV/Home Phone Basic for around $110, but few months ago the grandfathered rate increased $10. On top of that, they called in and bumped me up to BB100+ because of my usage this month. That cost me $30 more each month. So I had to pay $190 this month in total because of the rate increases. That's almost twice as more compared to last month. (Looks like the current rate is around $50 more than my grandfathered rate too)
I called into Shaw customer service and asked if there was anything wrong with the bill. Guess there wasn't anything wrong. I then asked to cancel, and was transferred to retentions. I compared the price with Telus. Negotiations aside, the CSR was straight up bashing Telus and even trying to give me a lesson why Shaw is better than Telus. It was to the point where I had to ask her if she was gonna cancel my plan or not, because she was clearly trying to tell me BS. I finally got to cancel with a month's notice. I didn't appreciate these CSRs' b**chy and rude attitude.
I called retentions before too (more than a year ago), to see if there's anything they can do. I told the CSR about the Telus 15/15/15 promotion. The guy yelled at me how I'm not getting a deal. I posted it about it on dslreports and shawsean asked for my number. I got phone calls by customer service but didn't feel like answering it because they weren't going to negotiate anything anyway.
Other than that, I was pretty satisfied with Shaw.
TV: Got a free DCX3200 (HD STB) as part of the Personal TV promotion when Shaw was trying to get people to switch to that. Select specialty channels (HGTV, History, Food) and sports channels (TSN, SNW, SN1) on basic cable. SD time shift. HD PQ compared to telus: more MPEG2 blocking, but "sharper". Overall more detailed due to the higher bandwidth. I prefer Optik's UI but Shaw's UI is easier to navigate with less options. Also has a clock on the STB which is nice.
Internet: I got mediocre pings, 40-50ms. I had BB100+ but I think I only got 70mbps max, even wiring in directly to the bridged Cisco modem with a gigabit network card of course. Never really had luck with speeds over 50mbps. Speed does fluctuate. They might call you for usage. I never got contacted for bandwidth usage before. But in June I got a call because I was using almost 900GB on BB50 which has 450GB (50GB extra from Shaw Friends). Maybe my node was saturated. They then bumped me up to BB100+. Turns out they didn't bother to actually bump the speed, so I had to chat with tech support to actually get 100/5 instead of 50/3. It's nice that the modem can be easily bridged by customer support compared to Telus. I bridged the DPC3825 and used my RT-N16 instead.
Telephone: Nothing special. Audio quality is worse than Telus of course. Rarely got noise and indiscernible "ghosty" voice when calling internationally to South Korea. Other than that pretty reliable. Long distance rate is a cent cheaper than Telus for landline.
member for 2.2 years, 241 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 68 days ago
Comments:
 | | rate increases The only way ISP’s can increase revenue is by either UBB or rate increases. Even if a corporation makes record profits one year if the next year it makes less then the previous year its seen as zero growth. This doesn’t keep share holders happy.
They thought their buddies in the CRTC would give them UBB. Usage based billing is much more lucrative. They almost got this until public backlash started demanding change and a serious look at the CRTC. That shut them up because it may threaten their monopoly.
They have fully penetrated the market so we can all look forward to never ending rate increases with little to no improvement in services. Until a significant portion of the population gets fed up and demands a serious overhaul of the communication industry and its supposed oversight we will be getting the shaft. So bend over and smile while you are being raped. | |
| | tablo
join:2011-06-30
Edmonton, AB Reviews:
 ·Shaw
| Re: rate increases Oh yes, UBB. I actually went and called in Shaw to get those data packages when they were trying to implement it. Went through several reps but of course they couldn't even add those data packages. I can see why Shaw is taking data usage more seriously now trying to bump people up, but I just had to take the 15/15/15 offer from Telus. | |
|
| |
| Review by MerinX - Location: undisclosed location
- Cost: $86 per month
Bad "Whiny about Bandwith Limits"
Overall "Go with Telus Novus Teksavvy sasktel if you use a lot and do not need the faster speeds"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings well below consensus)
|
Been with Shaw for years until they cut off my Internet right before the Alberta floods, Switched to Telus 50. So far so good, more updates to come.
member for 2.6 years, 274 visits, last login: 27 days ago
updated 71 days ago
Comments:
pinjas
join:2011-01-31
River Falls, WI | Yuck Most ISPs have fair usage regulations. I don't particularly love that concept, there are other options though, depending on where you love.
If I was in your situation, I would strongly consider doing what Monticello MN did. Their local ISP had some poor prices with poor service and the population became fed up so the town started their own fiber ISP. They didn't have it nearly as bad as you seem to in terms of prices, if you were on the moon or deep under the oceans surface, I might say those are acceptable prices. But I bet you are well within the reaches of fiber optic cables.
The mark up is kind of outrageous, but giving them a zero percent ranking is like they raped your mother or something. They just charge harsh pricing, everything else sounds likely to work well. Start up an ISP, or shop for another if it is an option. | |
| |  MerinXCrunching for CuresPremium
join:2011-02-03
kudos:1
·Shaw
| Re: Yuck It does not work like that in Canada anymore bro, it is a 2 party system like in the states where they can get away with anything.
Can you honestly say it is acceptable for an isp that has more market dominance then any American ISP can get away with 75gig limits on 100 dollars tiers?
We have cable or DSL from to providers that collude to lower limits and enforce these inflated fees. Heck our regulators where just about to enforce these limits on wholesale independent isps saying a 15% discount on them was more then fair because bell said so....
15% off a 10000% markup up per gig great...(especially when you can enforce it on customers that are not your own)
The system is broken so any isp that supports such actions should get a zero in scores regardless of how fast they install service etc. | |
| | | | said by pinjas:Most ISPs have fair usage regulations.
Those of you who are fortunate enough to be in TekSavvy's service area, it has increased its cap from 200G to 300G (while Bell & Shaw have dropped theirs). It also kept its price the same (while Bell & Shaw increased theirs). And on top of all that, for an additional $10 a month, you can get unlimited (no such option with Bell or Shaw). | |
|
| | Telus also has Draconian overage fees as well. As much as Shaws new crap is pissing me off, when looking into switching to Telus, I found that they also have caps, and $2 a Gig over regardless of what package. Their monthly limit is a little higher than Shaws but not by too much (their Extreme equivalent has an extra 10GB of bandwidth then $2/GB after) and they have no packages to buy either, you just pay the $2/GB over. | |
| | | | Re: Telus also has Draconian overage fees as well. Telus does not enforce their limits, their bandwidth monitors is not even working for most users. Plus those have been on the site for years with not one person being charged. Where as shaw's new site hides the limits they just added in December. | |
| | | | | Re: Telus also has Draconian overage fees as well. That is a fair point Telus has had those for years.
Haha I just went to look it up in the terms and conditions on Telus say it says limits are only enforced for a severe breach of contract and misuse of service and that Telus reserves the right to not monitor your usage, and has no obligation to do so. | |
| | | | | | Re: Telus also has Draconian overage fees as well. Telus has no bandwidth counter as putting one in place costs more money than the actual buying of bandwidth something Bell Canada out east never figured out. Telus can't track bandwidth useage therefore can't charge overuse fees. | |
|
| |
| Review by Finalitius - Location: undisclosed location
- Cost: $80 per month
Bad "Completely rude Chinese support, threaten to charge more upon discontinued service"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I've been a Shaw customer for more than 8 years. I switched from dial-up to the "high-speed lite" at 14 kilobytes/sec shaw service.
The service was great, customer support was awesome, I loved the service. Until a few months back - when I wanted to opt out of the service altogether due to service charges for student rates being cancelled - the amount on the bill had literally DOUBLED from the student rate, AND the speed was at 20mbps instead of 25mbps.
I called them up, wasting a total of an hour. Just to get the following statements.
I asked: What happened to my bill, I thought I was on student rates.
"Student rates are no longer available" - I was told that as long as I remain a student, the rates will not change, so long I provide proof that I was one. I was PROMISED.
Thus, I wanted to opt out, this wasn't what I wanted, and they had no permanent fix to this problem.
"If you want to opt out, you'll need to return the modem to us - if not, you'll be charged additional money" - I was told before that I can have them come pick it up free of charge.
Lastly, I asked about the entrance rates and why old customers like me don't get the same treatment
"This has been a tradition in the western world, we always want new customers, if you don't like it, you can opt out." - What the fuck? This is completely rude and uncalled for.
I've been lied to and insulted by a service that I used for more than 8 years.
The English service was better, as they actually offered some sort of temporary solution, thus the 1 point in services. But the temporary fix had ended.
member for 73 days, 1 visits, last login: 67 days ago
updated 73 days ago
Comments:
| Review by focustime_06 - Location: Hamilton,ON
- Cost: $47 per month
Good "Always reliable, great tech support, excellent bandwidth caps"
Bad "Sometimes slow during peak hours"
Overall "Great value for money"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I'm currently on the High Speed 25 package with Shaw Cable in Hamilton. This area used to be owned by Mountain Cablevision, but since Shaw has taken over they have increased speeds dramatically in the area. My connection rarely goes down and is only sometimes slow during peak hours. I have 250 GB of bandwidth, which is certainly more than I need.
Compared to competitors and other cable companies in the area, Shaw offers value for money.
member for 103 days, 1 visits, last login: 98 days ago
updated 103 days ago
Comments:
| Review by tony49122 - Location: Vancouver,BC
- Cost: $147 per month
- Install: about 5 days
Good "Fast, reliable, virtually no outages. Onsite service fast and good."
Bad "Expensive but on par with competition"
Overall "Fast, reliable service. Local call centre usually accessible"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
We have combined cable TV and broadband Internet. 50 mpbs Internet and a medium tier selection of TV channels. At $147 it seems like a lot of money each month but is comparable to Telus when comparing apples to apples. I haven't tried Telus for Internet. Shaw is reliable, better than 99% up time for me. No contract. No issues. Would recommend Shaw.
Doing a speed test, our download speed is between 45 and 48 mbps, usually at the upper end, so very close to the 50 mpbs rating. Ping times are around 23 ms.
A recent bonus is Shaw subscribers can access Shaw wifi. Business subscribers can add a hot spot at their location and any other Shaw subscribers in the vicinity can connect via wifi. Usage comes off the home account holder's allotment. Essentially the home wifi gets extended to anywhere there is a Shaw hot spot. In the lower mainland, there are thousands of Shaw hotspots, I'm surprised where they show up.
member for 7.3 years, 5 visits, last login: 106 days ago
updated 107 days ago
Comments:
| Review by korupt - Location: Canada
- Cost Contract price not specified.
- Install: about 5 days
Good "good enough"
Overall "over all the service is OK, but the help desk can be a little overwhelming"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
works for me
member for 13.5 years, 5426 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 124 days ago
Comments:
|
|
(
·
