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Review by prefont 
Posted: 8.8 years ago
member for 9 years, 81 visits, last login: 2.9 years ago
 Glassboro,Gloucester,NJ
 $49 per month (24 month contract)
 about 17 days
 Verizon
CLEC party: Covad
 "Good Setup Coordination"
 "OVERBILLED / NO CUSTOMER SUPPORT"
 "THEY SUCK!"
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The have overbilled me 4 months in a row for a second IP address that I DID NOT order. I can not cancel my service or get a refund or even update my billing info... I am thinking of just cancelling my credit card...then maybe they will have to contact me!!!
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 Review by RARPSL
UPDATED: 8.9 years ago
member for 10 years, 3003 visits, last login: a few minutes ago
Suffern,Rockland,NY
$39 per month (12 month contract)
about 90 days
CLEC party: NorthPoint
"Once installed it worked"
"getting it installed was not fun. It got installed 3 weeks AFTER I canceled the order"
"I stayed until my 1 year contract was over and switched to a better ISP"
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I ordered the 416/208 connection on Nov 12. I get the usual Ack Email. On 12/13 (4.5 weeks later) I sent out a query to ORDERSTATUS@FLASHCOM.NET asking what was happening (I'd not heard from Northpoint although I had been told that I'd be contacted "in 2 weeks") nor had a had any other follow-up. Today I got a "WE LOST YOUR MESSAGE BODY - SEND IT AGAIN" email (which was addressed to over 200 addresses in the TO [not in the BCC like a mass mailing of this type is supposed to use - Smart Move FLASHCOM - Thanks to broadcasting my address to everyone]).
I've also been told that the initial contact who I had when I placed the order LIED to me about the hookup. I specifically stated that I had an ISDN line that I wanted to convert to a POTS line with the DSL riding on that line (so I could keep the Primary Number which is in use as a FAX/MODEM line) and was told that they could do this. I've since discovered that I will apparently be provisioned with a new DSL-ONLY line (which will need to be extended/run from the NI to where I want to place the RJ45 jack to plug the DSL-TA into). I am not a happy camper since it is now 6 weeks (by which time I was supposed to be up and running) and I have no indication of when I will actually get service nor will I get what I thought I was ordering (I can live with the later but I'm not happy since BA is offering that option). I still do not know when I will get the line to the NI or the internal wiring scheduled.
I since I have nothing yet, I'm only rating the Pre-Usage ratings.
*****January 16, 2001 Update:
Since I last updated this review (while I was still waiting for my install), much has happened.
In late January 2001, I got sick and tired of having to bug Flashcom for progress reports. I canceled my order and got an Email acknowledgement. I then proceeded to start getting a new ISP. About 2 weeks later, I received a FedEx package with my Modem and a call from Northpoint to schedule the Internal Wiring and Activation. Since this would short-circuit any wait for a new ISP to do the work, I did not tell NP that the order had been canceled. NP showed up on time and in about 1 Hour I was up and running. I've had no problems since.
In mid-summer, the ISP where I have a POTs (since upgraded to ISDN) dial-up account finally started to do Personal DSL accounts. I then targeted February 2001 (the anniversary of my DSL Activation) as the date when I would swing the line over. In late November, I saw what was happening with Flashcom and decided that the time to start the switch was now. I send a Certified/Return-Receipt-Requested letter to Flashcom on December 4, 2001 as well as Emailing a copy to the cancellation address. I got an immediate Autobot acknowledgement of my Email but no further communication from Flashcom (the letter did not do any better since it has never been acknowledged nor has the Return Receipt ever been returned). The letter gave them the required "more than 30 days notice" of my intent to not extend my contract and asked for a line release so I could swing the line over to another ISP. I also stated that I was not terminating the contract early and would pay the rest of the term as required even though I would no longer have connectivity direct to Flashcom after the line swing. A week later Flashcom had all their Northpoint Lines repossessed by Northpoint and these accounts were shopped to Telocity (who has never connected me to tell me that my line would go down on January 14).
Right after sending the letter, I contacted the other ISP to start the switch. They were willing to process the request but warned me that I might need the Line Signoff from Flashcom. I told them I would live with that since my letter asking for it was enough to start the process in my opinion (the next week that need became moot since NP now had full possession of the lines). In late December, NP said that they would do the switch and one week later I was connected to my new ISP (safely over a week before the January disconnect date for all Flashcom/NP lines).
To sum up, once the line was installed, I was happy with it but all attempts to deal with Flashcom were an exercise in futility.
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 Review by Dude
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 9 years, 2139 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Chicago,Cook,IL
$49 per month (24 month contract)
Ameritech
CLEC party: Covad
"Tech Support (when you can get ahold of them)"
"Everything they aren't that helpful"
"Get A Regional DSL provider. Like MSN DSL or AOL DSL."
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I ordered Flashcom DSL service on January 3rd 2000. They emailed me and said my local telephone company (Ameritech)has received my order for a DSL line and will be running it on Febuary 15th. Well Ameritech rang the doorbell at 7:45AM and said they were here to run the line for Covad. 15 minutes later the Ameritech Technician called for me and gave me my circuit number. He said the line was up and ready to go. All I needed was for Covad to come out and I was set. Anyway Covad calls me to tell me that they will be out on Febuary 20th, which they were. The tech installs the modem and he can't get the line to sync in. So he calls and has them run tests on the line. They have me at 13,000 feet from the CO! The Covad tech said they would schedule a vendor meet with Ameritech and solve the problems. Anyway two weeks later an Ameritech guy shows up on my door step and tells me he is here for a vendor meet. I said ok come in, but I have no notification from my ISP that you and Covad would be here today. He says he is sorry for any inconvience and continues bashing Covad about how bad they are. I call Covad to see if the tech had an ETA and they said he will be there when he can! So the telco tech gets on his phone and calls and they told him the same thing! Could you believe the nerve of them! The tech says since I have had so many problems he would look at the line for me and see what he could do. He ran a test on the line and determined that I was 1,000 feet from the CO (which made more sense since they were 3 blocks away). He opened up the DSL Jack to Notice that the wiring wasn't connected! He said he would get a ISDN jack out of his truck and see if he could get this service up and going for me. 5 minutes later I am downloading at 20kbps (which is better than dial out). The telco tech said they would be billing Covad $125 for the ISDN jack installed. I laughed and he gave me his name and told me if Covad tried to pass the charges on to me to call him and he would see what he can do. I received no charges from Covad or Flashcom. After calling Flashcom for 4 weeks I finally got a confirmed date that Covad would be out here. Well a Covad tech came out and repartitioned the line for a higher speed for the inconvience Flashcom caused. He installed a new router and apologized about the first tech who came out and left. He told me that Flashcom was billed for the ISDN jack and for a no show and I just laughed and said thanks. He said Flashcom is the worst company he has installed service for and he said Earthlink has way better support for customers and technicians. So I think Flashcom got what any dumb company gets when they don't help their customers. Nothing in the end. Static IP.
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Review by retiredroy
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 9.1 years, 734 visits, last login: 1.9 years ago
Upland,San Bernardino,CA
$49 per month (12 month contract)
about 23 days
Verizon (ex GTE)
CLEC party: Covad
"none now"
"speed varies greatly"
"terrible company"
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Flashcom has been a pain in the rear the past month, my service is going down every day for 2-3 hours. I was down for about 18 hours on 1-1-2001. Every morning when I turn on the computer about 0530 hours the service stops after about 15 minutes and for the next hour or two it constantly goes out for 3-5 minutes at a time. Have tried to call Flashcom 5 times but hang up after 30 minutes when no one answers the phone. 3 emails have met with negative results. I'm about ready to cancel the service and pay the stinking early cancellation fee (service began 6-21-2000) just so I can get something I can depend on. If anyone can recommend a decent DSL service for the Upland Calif area I would greatly appreciate it. The only good thing I can say about Flashcom is that it only took 23 days from my first call to order the service to the final set up by Covad.
I also would like to know if I should turn off the modem during the night, I usually keep it on 24 hours a day,
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 Review by ron1501
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 9.2 years, 2238 visits, last login: a few minutes ago
Colorado Springs,El Paso,CO
$39 per month (12 month contract)
about 49 days
Qwest
CLEC party: Covad
"Great Reliability (No down time), Good Price"
"Tech Support, Tech Support and Tech Support"
"Only one word: Bankrupt"
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Thought I'd better finally do my ISP review. I've had Flashcom for four months now. Was supposed to be 416k/208k but later found out they gave me 608k/128k.(static ip) The increased download speed is great but uploading is slow and painfull! Installation was performed on the day/time promised and without a hitch. I haven't had any down time at all. Only had to e-mail them once for a billing question. (Which took at least a dozen tries to get a response from them!)
For awhile my speed was great in the morning and unpredictable during peak evening hours. But in the last 2-3 weeks my speed has been consistently good. Must be the exit of all those Flashcom subscribers to other ISPs? That's the only explanation I can come up with.
So now I wait to see what will happen to us Covad/Flashcom subscribers!
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Review by specialagent
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 8.9 years, 4 visits, last login: 8.9 years ago
Martinez,Contra Costa,CA
$49 per month (12 month contract)
about 24 days
SBC
CLEC party: Rhythms
"Installation went just as planned"
"The Damn ISP couldnt honor their part of the contract"
"Do not do business with these people!!!!!"
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Do Not do business with Flashcom People!!!
Heres why.
i ordered dsl from flashcom, at a speed of 1.5/384 for $39.95. The telco tech discovered there was a load on the line and so i was unable to recieve ADSL. This doesnt make since, i reside 14,600 ft from the CO. So i was offered a lower speed of 144/144 IDSL for $10 more a month. I took the deal because anything is better than my damn 28.8 modem. OK so the install went smooth from there. Rythms did the physical install of the modem. Their tech was awesome and had me up and running in a few minutes. The next four months were a breeze. the dsl went out 1 time due to rythms which was fixed in 5 min.
Now Flashcom has decided that they are going to kick off all of their rythms members and i think Northpoint members as well but im not sure. They have slammed us into joining earthlink. i personally believe that earthlink has bought these members from flashcom. Earthlink has to be the worst isp in exsistance. Flashcom has decided they are going to cancel their business members who use rythms as well. I really wish i could get a hold of the guy that did this, so i could let out the RAGE!!!!
so here i am scooting along on my 28.8 once again. damn im pissed.
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Review by daktari7
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 9.7 years, 41 visits, last login: 7.2 years ago
Burbank,Los Angeles,CA
$49 per month (24 month contract)
about 112 days
SBC
CLEC party: SBC
"Excellent DNS & mail servers"
"PacBell screwed up my existing service, Flashcom has not restored it 90 days later!"
"I had to order ANOTHER provider to install Cable service, which had me up and running THE SAME DAY I ORDERED IT!. Pacbell sucks!"
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PacBell screwed u*p my existing Flashcom DSL (which although it took 112 days from order to working correctly, was working excellent until PacHell screwed it up!)
I have been trying now for over 90 days to get service restored. Flashcom must have layed off a bunch of people, because they used to have 24-7 support, now it is just 9 to 5 PST, and unless you call first thing in the morning they put you on hold for 10 minutes and the inform you that they "cannot handle the call at this time"
Between them and PacHell I have spent 15 to 20 hours on the phone in the last 90 days with NO END TO THE PROBELM IN SIGHT!
Since I was losing money due to the loss of the DSL I was forced to order another service that had NOTHING TO DO WITH PACHELL OR FLASHCOM.
I called a local cable service that came out the same day I called them
and had me working within 4 hours of the orginal call. I will leave a glowing review of my new cable service, but I don't want to mention thier name here, as this is an entirely negative review fo Flashcom & Pacbell.
Yes I am paying for 2 high speed provider now, operating via 2 different infrastructures.
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Review by vinniesj
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 8.9 years, 2 visits, last login: 8.9 years ago
Fort Lauderdale,Broward,FL
$49 per month (12 month contract)
about 40 days
BellSouth
CLEC party: Covad
"worked for a month"
"cut off service with no notice right before Christmas no less"
"dirtbags"
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There's nothing worse than doing business with a company who could care less whether you live or die. Flashcom was my best friend during the sales pitch and hey...I had service for a WHOLE MONTH.
Now because COVAD is my backbone, I'm screwed.
Worst of all the dirtbags charged my credit card some ridiculous amount of money out of nowhere. This will land them court for sure with my credit card company. Its outright theft. Nice going, go Chapter 11, but before you go, charge a customer to steal some money from his credit card we have on file.
I hope the whole management team goes to jail.
They screwed a lot of customers, me included.
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Review by Troncone
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 8.9 years, 3 visits, last login: 8.4 years ago
Lyndhurst,Bergen,NJ
$49 per month
about 120 days
Verizon
CLEC party: Covad
"Reliable Service"
"The absolute worse sales, customer and billing services I have ever encountered. Inept."
"Go with someone else, save yourself aggravation."
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I've never had the misfortune of dealing with a company as incompetent as Flashcom. Their sales and customer service has been a comedy of errors from the start, one which has left me literally banging my phone against my desk for hours at a time.
It all started when I called to get hooked up. It was explained that the service included a free modem, free installation and one free month. "Great," I thought. Here's a $100 deposit. I was told it would be 6-8 weeks. About 6 weeks later, I called back and was told there was no record of my order and I had to reorder. That should have served as a warning to me as to what was about to come.
Eight weeks later, my service was on and all was good with the world. Flashcom had my credit card number and would bill me monthly automatically. Until, that is, I started to get notices that I owed them money via email. I thought it was wrong, so I sent them 5 emails that they never responded to. Then, one day, the DSL went off. I tried calling them - which is where the F***ING nightmare began.
I spent days trying to get through to them. Days I tell you. I kept a phone log of my calls - in one night I called from 5pm to 10pm consistently. I got hung-up on by machines, busy signals, told the call volume was too high for them to handle. (Uh, bandwidth, morons).
In the end, I got though (after calling their number 178 times). And what I was told was they changed their billing systems and my cc# had gotten lost in the system and that they had not been billing me for 5 months and I owed them $500 and they had shut off my service without even telling me and that I had to pay the full amount right now or call back (no, anything but that)and my DSL should be on within three days. Oh, and one more thing, that free modem is only free when you send in the rebate form, which they also did not tell me when I signed. I cannot wait for this company to go under!
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 Review by marconius
Posted: 8.9 years ago
member for 8.9 years, 360 visits, last login: 1.4 years ago
Chevy Chase,Montgomery,MD
$79 per month (12 month contract)
about 70 days
Verizon
CLEC party: NorthPoint
"Great Solid SDSL connection for ADSL price. VERY low pings and EXCELLENT throughput."
"Company Going out of Business"
"Look Elsewhere"
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Placed my order back in end of August 2000. On Sept. 20th, Verizon installed a 2nd line which Northpoint tested and deemed unacceptable. It then took 1.5 months to get Verizon to return and do the job right. Finally, Verizon did do what they were supposed to do on their 2nd try, and a Northpoint appointment was scheduled a week later. Northpoint came on schedule and installed the modem within 20 minute time. I was up and running with a rock solid connection that featured 780/780 SDSL (I had ordered 1.5/384 ADSL) and great latency. Hence an ideal connection for games. After 1.5 months of excellent service, I've now discovered that Flashcom is going out of business. I'm personally very satisfied with the actual DSL service, however very annoyed and upset that I have to look for an alternative provider and go through the installation hassles again. What's happening to the DSL market.....
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Flashcom
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