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Review by burnsa See Profile

  • Location: 33702-3727
  • Cost: $54 per month (12 month contract)
  • Install: about 2 days
reliability & tech support
pricing, billing, sales scams, customer service,
AVOID
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

Their door-to-door salesman arrived in January, unsolicited, and promised the moon.... I got a sliver of it. The reliability of service has been excellent. The pricing/billing practices leave a LOT to be desired. From additional charges that weren't quoted, to prices increasing (even with a signed twelve month agreement) to unadvised 'truck roll' charges for services not requested.... I've spent HOURS on the phone with billing since subscribing to their internet & basic cable service in January.

member for 7.6 years, driveby review (so far)
lodged 7.6 years ago

classicnote
join:2016-05-09
Glen Ellyn, IL

classicnote

Member

Good review.

I hope they're listening.

Review by Skipperpaul See Profile

  • Location: Eaton Rapids, Eaton, MI, USA
  • Cost: $130 per month
  • Install: about 2 days
not many things that i can say are good
the network has many issues always messing up my wifi and everyone loosing signal because wow wont accept or renew my dhcp lease
i think u should look elsewhere when looking for services because this may not be your best choice
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

i am on the 110/5 package im suppose to be paying 100 a month is what i was promised but they add other charges as well
the techs that come out are friendly but some of them try to help fix the issues but seem to find no issues when they come out but when they leave the issue comes back

the modem i have is the touchstone tg2472 arris modem

well the most issues i have is laggy issues and that i had a wow tech tell me that when there techs comme in at night they change my speed from my normal speed to lower than what im paying for so im not really getting what i pay for and the phones are always making noise clicking sounds and always dropping calls i wouldnt recommend the service at all

member for 8.4 years, 82 visits, last login: 5.2 years ago
updated 7.8 years ago

Tony0945
join:2015-03-26
Streamwood, IL

Tony0945

Member

They never want to admit that their modems are bad.

Go to BasicTalk or full cellular and buy your own modem. I have an SB6141, now available at half the price I paid (was $100, now $48) and it will blow the doors off their Touchstones AND you won't have to pay $8 for their crap modem. Win-win-win

Review by jami101 See Profile

  • Location: Basehor, Leavenworth, KS, USA
  • Cost: $260 per month
  • Install: about 12 days
  • No Cap
"Ok" WHEN IT WORKS
Customer service!
Stay FAR away, if you have ANY other option!
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

The worst company I've ever dealt with! I have the platinum package (all channels, including premium, and the fastest internet they offer). Started at around $120 a month, 3 years ago, and now we're at $260 with no change in service. They've dropped several channels, internet frequently dies and I'm never surprised to see error messages. It's generally a monthly call because SOMETHING isn't working properly. Customer service is RUDE, RUDE, RUDE!!! Tech support isn't even an option anymore, so you're forced to explain the problem to a minimum of 3 people before they decide it's really a problem and transfer you to tech support. At that point, you're told it'll be dealt with in another 24-48 hours (unless you call on Fri. and then you start your waiting period on Mon.). And you'd think with all that time without service you'd be offered a discount...NOPE! All in all, a HORRIBLE company and I truly wish my area had any other option!

member for 7.8 years, driveby review (so far)
lodged 7.8 years ago


Tock
It's just me
join:2014-02-19
Glendale Heights, IL

Tock

Member

Hey response to you awsome review

Yeah, I had the same problem with websites not viewing properly one time I found out it was the web browser that needed to get updated.. apparently they update new language to the browser every few years for security purposes.. dslreports.com's speedtest?

an0n
@172.76.164.x

1 recommendation

an0n

Anon

response

I am surprised you say you weren't offered a discount. Usually once you are done talking to support, and either ask them or billing for a credit they should compensate. If they don't just ask to speak with a supervisor, or bluff and ask for retention. If the internet goes out, and modem lights change could be a signal issue, next time ask for a signal check, and see if you can't get a tech out if changing dns servers don't fix the issue. It doesn't surprise me what you say about their techs, however it seems that wow launches a vendetta against good techs, and eventually makes morale so low they quit, or fires them, or both. Sad thing is they won't address the real issues like hiring more techs, and getting rid of act (average call time). Thats why they tell you to wait 24-48 hours, because instead of fixing an issue, they are more concerned about call turnover time. No one I know has had good service with wow either poor internet, or cable performance.
patrmci
join:2010-09-01
Park Ridge, IL

patrmci

Member

WOW Business

I am having a problem with the business side of WOW. I tried to switch back to WOW Residential, porting my number back and switching the internet back. I was told that the phone number is a business number and cannot be moved to the residential side. The number originally came from the residential side though. I was told that my yearly contract was not on auto renew also. After a 2-3 months of porting the phone number to a new provider and finally getting the internet switch over to the residential side, WOW business has started billing me again. All of my account cancellation requests were not handled properly. In trying to again cancel the account I'm being told that auto renew is on and that now I owe 75% of the contract value. The sales people are arrogant and inept. The service was just OK.

I have had no problems with the residential side though, both in service and in customer service. Maybe IL is different?

Review by goalieskates See Profile

  • Location: land of big
  • Cost: $200 per month
very little downtime
steadily rising prices while losing services
we'll probablly cut the cord sooner rather than later
Value for money:

We initially signed up with this company when it was Knology. The price was right even after the honeymoon period, the offerings were right, and we were very pleased especially in comparison to the available competitors, AT&T and Comcast, both of which we've used in the past.

Since then Knology was purchased by WOW, and our history with WOW has become one of lost features, rising prices, and more and more fees tacked on. This at a time when the price of tech in general has gone down.

Communications from WOW have been almost nonexistent. They provide email, but typically use it only to announce things like VOD. I've frequently read posts here on DSLR of letters sent out to customers in other cities, while receiving none ourselves. Price increases are frequent (more than annually), and unannounced. The first we knew we were being transitioned to voip phone service was when they called to schedule an install date. Surprise! Even then they never actually came out and said what they were doing or why.

Note that the monthly service amount listed is after negotiating with customer service. It doesn't reflect what we were told, since fees were apparently not included, and according to them gives us a monthly "savings" of $50. That's more than double what we paid Knology.

I used to recommend WOW to friends and family; now I keep my mouth shut. If we didn't hate their competition so much we'd already be gone.

member for 19.5 years, 3974 visits, last login: 7.5 years ago
lodged 8.1 years ago


Review by raypsi1 See Profile

  • Location: Wayne, Wayne, MI, USA
  • Cost: $271 per month (month by month)
  • Install: about 1 days
came out next day in the PM for install
their creative book keeping 'caused me to unplug them kaputski
ordered 15Mbps service and I got advertised speed wicked awesome
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

First order they hooked me up to their bot phone system after talking to a person bot refused to understand my responses I thought I got the order thru for install the next day but when the time went by I called they said they had no record of me:( after using 120 minutes of cell phone time Saturday they set me up for Sunday lucky service man was only 4 minutes late for that window of time.
The install went smooth.
I gots a Arris TM502G modem rented for $2/month
I got the service protection plan $3/month
2Mbps speed for $42/month
and a total balance of $98 for the install and internet listed above
The balance was due 1/25/13 but I paid it the next day after install
I don't know for sure it the bandwidth is capped
And they do give me the true advertised, speed that never happened with any of my other ISP's

11/7/15 they upped my service to 271USD per month, They even came out and got their equipment

9/1/14 yea still getting what I paid for, only 3 outages on the weekends in the last few months this year. BTW I did the speed tests here on dslreports

12/5/14 upgraded to 15mbps for only $20 I upgraded cable to digital, now paying about $60 for cable and $20 for internet
Got through to sales on my google phone, 'cause last time it took so long had to pay for cell phone minutes.
Free install I paying for this in monthly fees, like service protection plan if anything goes wrong they fix it for free.
10/22/15 They double downed cost of the bundle they shut me down and double downed the bill again Stick a fork in it they are done.

member for 22.9 years, 619 visits, last login: 8.1 years ago
updated 8.3 years ago

levis76
join:2013-01-06

levis76

Member

Try a true speed test

Try speedtest.net, not the WOW! speed test. Their's only tests between their servers and your modem. Try a real world speed test on servers around the country and prepare to be disappointed.

raypsi1
join:2001-04-09
Wayne, MI

raypsi1

Member

Re: Try a true speed test

What? I used dslreports java and flash servers every time I got 2+mbps If I could of figure out how to post the results here I would have sorry about that.
raypsi1

raypsi1

Member

Re: Try a true speed test

Here's results of just 3 java tests here on dslreports:

21-01-2013 04:03 AM java speedtest 2105 Kbps 782 Kbps New Jersey, USA wideopenwest.com
del 08-01-2013 08:34 AM java speedtest 2030 Kbps 1122 Kbps New Jersey, USA wideopenwest.com 0635hrs est
del 07-01-2013 08:09 AM java speedtest 2111 Kbps 1121 Kbps New Jersey, USA wideopenwest.com

bananapeal
@charter.com

bananapeal

Anon

sorry for your interwebs

i have cox hsi in phoenix and $50 is cheapest value plan ... buys an advertized 50mbps that comes in at an actual 34mbps. I can't imagine cox offering only 2mbps. seems way too slow for cable. my up speed sucks only about 5mbps.

Review by NickatNight See Profile

  • Location: North Olmsted, Cuyahoga, OH, USA
  • Cost: $127 per month
  • No Cap
Used to be a great company, with lower cost.
Price keeps going up, now experiencing regular outages.
Have been with them since 2008. Now looking elsewhere.
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

WOW used to be a great company. We've had the "triple play" (Internet, phone, and cable) with them since 2008. Prices used to be guaranteed for a year or more with no contract, the services were solid, and the customer service was polite and helpful. About once a year the price would go up, and I would call them to work out a new deal - annoying but not unbearable.

A year or two ago the price hikes became more frequent, and over time, the service has become less reliable. We've now had 3-4 Internet and phone outages in the past week and a half. Whenever I check downdetector.com, it shows outages across their entire network. When I call, WOW's computer voice tells me there is an outage in my area. I've talked to customer service and there is no further explanation, no info on when service will be available again, and no place to check status.

In addition, their customer service has gotten worse and become almost belligerent. It is time to look elsewhere.

member for 17 years, 73 visits, last login: 1.5 years ago
lodged 8.4 years ago


Review by chitown7777 See Profile

  • Location: Naperville, Du Page, IL, USA
  • Cost: $190 per month
Nothing
Overpriced, spotty internet, bad service
They are terrible.
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
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Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

A bit of history: we switched to W.O.W. from Comcast a few years back because of the attractive pricing. For what we were paying nearly $200 to Comcast for (phone/TV/internet), W.O.W. could provide for around $135. Not an contract or promotional rate...that was just the normal price. And we were told that while a price increase could happen periodically, it would always be minor. Initially, this was correct. After a year or so our price inched up a few bucks. No big deal. Great service, too.

Then, the big increases started coming...a one month jump from the $150s to $175 just in time for the holidays in 2014 which started me on a path to dumping them, culminating in the latest notice (August 2015) that our bill is due to increase by another $15 or so. Our new monthly bill? $190. Right about where Comcast's was when we quit. To make matters worse, the equipment we have (well, had until the other day) was far less advanced than our old Comcast stuff. Note that we didn't have UltraTV...we had that for a couple of weeks but found the equipment wonky, especially the fact that it imposed a very low quality router on our home internet that couldn't be disabled. UltraTV is a neat service only if your home internet needs are very light. But if you opt out of UltraTV, they stick you with a DVR that looks like it came from Russian military surplus, and takes forever to respond to menu inputs.

And oh yes, the internet! Yeah. 15Mbps. And it perpetually dropped at random times. Something they fixed twice, yet began happening yet again. So 15Mbps internet that was perpetually flaky, a mid-tier channel selection, a painfully outdated DVR box, and phone for about $195/month. A total joke, though it was great when it was $135.

To top it all off, their phone support has become a farce. Just offshored know-nothings reading from a one-pager, just like the big-name providers they used to try to avoid being like.

Now I'm back with the evil empire. Internet is 75Mbps (we actually get 90Mbps). The connection is rock solid. We have a whole house DVR that doesn't impose a crappy router on our internet service. We have menus that look like they weren't designed in 1995. Effectively, we have the equivalent of UltraTV without paying a premium for it or getting saddled with the bizarre equipment.

I don't know why anyone would deal with W.O.W. at this point. Same price for significantly worse service than their peers. What's the point anymore? There isn't one. It's sad what has happened to them. They've lost their sole market advantage: price.

member for 11.7 years, 12 visits, last login: 8.5 years ago
updated 8.5 years ago


Review by Liam2 See Profile

  • Location: Knoxville, Knox, TN, USA
  • Cost: $136 per month
  • Install: about 1 days
Fast setup. Money back guarantee (Update, well not really money back)
Everything else. Spotty internet service. Phone service was terrible. TV menu and Video On Demand Menu is terrible.
WOW? More like WOW this sucks.
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

Update July 24th, 2015
After stating I would not be charged for anything, WOW billed me for the install that never worked. So really there is no guarantee. New slogan for WOW internet. "WOW! making Comcast look good."

Original post:

Had internet, cable tv, and phone package setup for about 2 weeks. Internet lasted a whole day before going down multiple times and my phones would show an incoming call notification for a second and never ring so I am not sure if there was an actual call or something else.

The biggest problem was the tv package. I was not given the channels I was promised and trying to navigate the Menu for the TV box was a nightmare. To get any Video On Demand you had to go to a Free Channel menu, then find the network the show you want is on, that is if they even had it, and then find your show.

This is where it got really annoying. If you found the show, which was buried deep in sub-menus, they would usually only have 1 or 2 episodes. Usually it wasn't even the newest episode or the complete season. For example, if there were 17 episodes of a show they would have number 12 or 13 and that is all.

If you have another choice of a provider, I would go with someone else. I did.

member for 13 years, 13 visits, last login: 8.2 years ago
updated 8.6 years ago


sister fran
@comcast.net

sister fran

Anon

They must try to be this bad.

The service, both of the cable and the people who should have been providing it, was so awful I l terminated our relationship on 23 April 15. The right choice. On 19 June 15 I arrived home after a long working day to find a bill from them for May/June service. What service?!? Incompetence beyond any others'. After wasting a good 45 minutes of my time Carl, "service" supervisor, told me he had removed all charges in a tone of voice that inferred I should thank him. When I protested and told him WOW owed me a very large apology Carl told me I would hear from management Monday. Still waiting. Liars and horrible service.

Review by Tony0945 See Profile

  • Location: Streamwood, Cook, IL, USA
  • Cost: $124 per month
Pleasant customer service
Totally unreliable
Considering leaving
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

I'm on a bundle with basic TV, advanced phone, and 15/2 internet. I have to rent their ancient TM402G modem for $8 a month to have the phone. I will have been with WOW for ten years in August, IF I stay with them. My monthly bill has not changed much in that time, although it was originally TV only. WOW was a good customer-friendly company until a few years ago. Now they seem to want to turn themselves into Comcast. They swap channels around and tell you about it (maybe) months later. I think this is to make you rent their cable boxes which report back to Lord knows who about what you are watching. I mostly watch broadcast programs and occasionally TCM but I don't like being spied on. I never used my email address, sticking with my old att.net and aol.com addresses. Yet I started SPAM from a right wing religious group called the American Family Association. Did they sell my address? Does upper management belong to this cult?

When I first got internet I had problems with WOW's domain name servers going down, but I solved that by pointing my computers to OpenDNS. For the last year or two I have been having trouble with the cable modem having T3 timeouts and going catatonic. It also reports getting unknown commands. I think this POS is too old but customer service keeps telling me I don't need anything newer. I bought a battery on my own but it didn't help. Every day I have to go from the second floor to the basement to reboot the cable modem, sometimes three times a day. I would buy my own modem, but I would lose the phone. I may go back to a landline anyway because of the phone service outage which is intolerable. Vonage or Ooma is not a solution because the internet service is unreliable.If I knew how to post my smokeping I would. I see from it that this morning service was out for four hours until I rebooted the cable modem. That meant losing a call from a contractor who said he tried to call and tell me he was coming late. The indicator lights looked fine but it couldn't be reached from either the LAN or WAN sides. TV service has been fine, except for dropping/moving channel frequencies without notice.

I really wish this was the same company that I signed up with ten years ago. I'm sick of climbing two flights of stairs to reboot the cable modem. I'd pay $10 a month if they would give me a good one.

member for 9 years, 2157 visits, last login: 2 years ago
updated 8.7 years ago


Review by Kamran Atl See Profile

  • Location: Grovetown, Columbia, GA, USA
  • Cost: $42 per month
  • Install: about 2 days
The only Broad band in the neighborhood if it is good. Broad band Mafia in our area
Over charges are too often, their website is retarded, their costumer service is in Nikaragua
The worst interned provider I have ever had, but we had no choice, because WoW had contract
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:

WoW is a Mafia system that has contract with most of neighborhood builders in our area and does not let other companies to come in. WoW provides us with the same internet as Comcast provides, but with double price and no benefits that Comcast provides as 12 months discount or free antivirus and etc.

WoW over charges me every other month. and I have to call their customer service ( in Nicaragua) to fix the issue. Why in the world I need to tell my SSN info to a foreign National in central/south Africa???

WoW website is super retarded and every single time I tried to pay my bill, it automatically put me on Autopay and overcharged me. When I contacted the CS for a refund, they told me that its better to get credit on my account, because it takes forever for them to refund my money, so I disputed the transaction via my bank website.

WoW is a Godfather in our area, it deals with the builders, so better companies couldn't come to these neighborhoods. WoW is a modern and legal kind of Mafia in the USA. I hope it crashes soon!

This view is not face. You can contact me if you want me to be your witness at a lawsuit against WOW!



member for 8.7 years, driveby review (so far)
lodged 8.7 years ago

Tony0945
join:2015-03-26
Streamwood, IL

Tony0945

Member

Comcast is not better than WOW

It's worse. If you think you will get better service from WOW, you will be jumping from the frying pan into the furnace. Comcast actually insults their customers. WOW at least talks politely. As far as service, both suck. Been with WOW fifteen years in August. Switched to them from Comcast. My sister still has Comcast (WOW not available in her town).
netwerp
join:2010-12-10
Evans, GA

netwerp

Member

WOW in Columbia County, GA

Phone customer service is just ok - I talked to someone at the Augusta office at least once. Accounting service and getting the charges and rates correct is very poor. However, the benefit for broadband internet compared to Comcast is that WOW has NO bandwidth limit surcharges.