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Millenicom now out of business. member for 16.1 years, 2191 visits, last login: 8 years ago updated 8.9 years ago
Living in a rural area is a pain when it comes to getting decent internet, I was on ~20kbps dial-up for 2 years before biting the bullet and ordering from Millenicom after finding them on Wikipedia. Start up cost is reasonable, mine was under $150, my mifi hotspot arrived in a timely manner and I was online within minutes of opening the package. I'm lucky enough to have a 4G tower around 4 miles from my house and so far the mifi has got at least a 2 in all exterior-wall rooms. Most times I get 3-4 bars, all without any antenna or amplifier of any sort. Latency is very low as well, never exceeding 250ms and most of the time well under 100ms, it beats both satellite and dial up in this aspect. Mobility is a factor, if you aren't a heavy internet user and are quite the road warrior Millenicom's service will suit you well. Personally, I leave it tethered to my desktop 99% of the time and am happy with how I can easily set it and forget about it. On average I have to restart it once every few days after it starts acting up. The service is prepaid in monthly intervals and you can cancel at any time or put your account on a 'vacation mode' of sorts for 3 month at low cost to forfeit a reactivation fee. I have noted on several occasions I'm bumped down to 3G for several hours before 4G is back up, it's hardly worth mentioning unless you need a 24/7 4G connection. Recently I had to contact Millenicom support regarding end of month throttling of my account at ~10GB of monthly usage. The tech I spoke with was accommodating and knowledgeable and assured me I should be getting much faster speeds, promising to escalate the matter with their main office. Full speed wasn't restored until 3 days after when my billing cycle entered the new month leaving me to believe the problem was with Verizon and that Millenicom did nothing to get my SIM un-throttled. I lost out on at LEAST 5GB of data that I prepaid for that month which is valued at around $25, if this turns out to be a continuing trend I'll downgrade to a $60 plan direct from Verizon for 10GB as I'm adverse to paying for data I am prevented from using. Since Millenicom resells Verizon's data you are putting yourself at the mercy of Verizon because they can push anything down the pipes they want and without a contract you could find yourself without internet in a month's time if Millenicom is forced to discontinue carrying the service. We have already seen this happen once earlier this year when Verizon forced Millenicom to raise plan price. Also, at the moment it seems Verizon won't allow Millenicom to offer any data packages besides the 20GB capped data package. >>> Some prospective for first time users moving from an uncapped broadband connection: Don't expect to watch ANY videos online or download any AAA game titles with this service, 20 GB isn't much when it comes to multimedia and you'll easily blow through your cap with a couple big games or a dozen hours of video (depending on stream quality) but for everyday browsing or mulitplayer games it's fine and blows dial up out of the water. I encourage you to install software on your main use PC to measure and keep track of your usage as Millenicom's data usage reports only come out about once every 4 days. member for 9.8 years, 112 visits, last login: 5.8 years ago updated 9.7 years ago
Before contact Millenicom I checked with Sprint if the service available because it was not before...Sprint says they had added towers but since I am signing with Mollenicom, of which the CSR had no knowledge of existence they advised me to check with Millenicom. I called Millenicom Sales & Services, was on hold for about 20 min. got the representative on line that is working from the home: child is crying, dog was barking and she was able only to send me to the website while I was specific: if there is a service available. I was told to sign and since it was a weekend to wait until Monday to get device activated and pay on line activation fee $50 and the month in advance. I did. Services are not available. The business refuse to issue a refund for charges. They also neglected to unlock the hot spot mi-fi device that I own. It took several times to call to get that done. No refund still: they say that their "policy". I asked to e-mail their "policy" but the business haven't done that either. Awful. Millenicom perhaps makes the most revenue of sales what they don't have and never provide. Almina Kaselis member for 10.6 years, 1 visits, last login: 10.4 years ago lodged 10.4 years ago
We signed up based on reviews from others and speaking with Millenicom's customer service rep. Our situation is that we are in a rural area and have limited internet options. To make matter even more challenging, we live in a metal barn/home. Our local electrical coop had a satellite agreement with Wild Blue and we tried that for a year. It was still very slow (.5 to .8M download)to non existent during bad weather. Also, due to the delay in the satellite, Skype and Voip would not work. So we opted for the Millenicom. It seemed like the best deal for the money and, like I said, the reviews were generally good. From day one we struggled to even reach the poor speeds of the satellite. After many calls to customer service ( I will say they were always polite and tried to help) we decided to install about $600 worth of cell reception and repeater enhancements. I get 5 bars everywhere in my home, but my Millenicom is still putting out .5 or less! Millenicom would blame Verizon, Verizon, of course, did not give a hoot! Gave up after a year and checked out the satellite services again. Hughes net now promises 5M+ on downloads. We went through Dish TV to take a bundling discount and WOW. Only up for a week, but we are averaging 20M on the downloads! We are not real heavy users ( how could we be with .5 or less, right?) but with 20K per month, plus 20 bonus for non prime time downloads, that is more than 10k on our Millenicom plan. We are paying a whole buck more per month. End the end, I call to cancel my Millenicom plan on the 4th of the month, and they stick me with the entire months charges!! NOT cool, but hey, they think the got the last bite, too bad. They may have a great service in an urban area, with great prices. I do not know. But I do know this... based on their parting shot, I will never do business with them again. member for 10.6 years, driveby review (so far) updated 10.6 years ago
I initially called and chatted with millenicom's customer service several times before I made any decisions. I looked to see if I was covered and it said I was, although sprint's coverage map showed me just on the edge of their data coverage. I wanted a wireless router so the only option I had where I live was with a mifi device, and the only plan that supports a mifi device is their BYOD (bring your own device) plan (69.99 /mo.). One of their reps on the phone said that if their site shows me being covered then I am 'GUARANTEED' internet service at my house. Although I talked to someone in a chat and they said if my cell coverage isn't spectacular (I get 4 bars roaming at home) I should be wary. So fine, I ordered a sprint/novatel wireless mifi 4082 device. When it got in I called millenicom to set it up, as with most other times I have called I got a couple people I couldn't understand or simply cut out (cheap headsets I assume... I called a friend right after, asked him if he could understand me clearly and he said yes every time no problems, so it's not me cutting out) So I set up a BYOD plan. that took about an hour (simply because the guy was so hard to understand) . This was done by about 1130am. So I couldn't activate my device at home, called millenicom about it, they were very nice, thorough, and understanding so far. We discovered my signal was a 1xsomethingsomething, and I needed an evdo signal to activate my device. The closest one I could find was out in a wheat field 25 miles from my house (no joke, wonder if anybody could see me out there with my laptop?) So I activated it got about 700kb/s right off the bat. I was very excited, so I went home and got 60kb/s max if I wasn't totally disconnected and most of the time it was about 15-30kb/s which is essentially dial up but less reliable. I tried it until this morning to see if my speeds changed, they didn't. I called millenicom to cancel my service because they told me if I contacted them within 24 hours of sign up I could cancel with a full refund. (had to call twice, the first person I got I couldn't understand) The guy told me I had to cancel online, I told him I have no internet, and he said that I have to be getting a minimum of 400kb/s and gave me a ton of attitude. I wasn't going to argue with him about it though, I took care of all my animals at home and rushed to town to cancel before the 24 hours. Came into work to use the internet, was unable to log in with the log-in info that was gone over extensively on the phone when I signed up. So I had to open another chat to ask to get logged in to open a cancellation ticket, because they couldn't help cancel either. When I finally got logged in I was so worried that I have lost my money by this point that I was extremely frustrated. In my ticket I mentioned some key issues I had and that a lawyer would be contacted if I don't get a refund. An hour later they told me I will still be eligible for a full refund. I will update on here if I don't get it for some reason. So in the end 24 hours of confusion and frustration is all I've gotten out of millenicom. member for 11.6 years, 4 visits, last login: 11.5 years ago updated 11.5 years ago
I use millenicom because where I live, I have few options. It works OK 70% of the time but I am by no means happy with it. It is slow, unreliable and expensive for the speed you actually get. Also, took forever to get it to work. First gadget they sent didn't work and it was like pulling teeth to get a replacement. Praying that real high speed makes it to my area soon. member for 12.7 years, 1 visits, last login: 12.3 years ago updated 12.2 years ago
I ordered the 598U modem and unlimited Sprint plan from Millenicom. According to the Sprint map, my area is covered well by 3G. When I received and installed the modem, it had no signal indoors or out. Millenicom tech support passed me on to Sprint. Neither Sprint or Millenicom could figure out why the modem wouldn't work. After 6 days of calling and holding and hearing them blame each other, I asked for a refund and they agreed. I didn't receive my initial $15 shipping fee back and it cost me $5 to return it. So, I'm out $20 and several hours of time for this misadventure. I'm not sure why Millenicom even has tech support if they're going to pass folks on to Sprint. Even though they didn't help much, the sales and tech support staff was friendly. The billing department, on the other hand, was absolutely rude! member for 15.9 years, 72 visits, last login: 4.6 years ago updated 12.3 years ago
I switched from satilite. For the first year my service was "ok", never saw the "up to" speeds of 1.2mbps but I did see speeds in the 600kbps range. This past fall (2010) it all went to poop. My download speeds are mostly below 100kbps while the upload speeds are in the 400kbps range. VERY RARELY will I see a burst of speed even close to 600kbps. Millenicom tech support & verizon have given up on trying to help. The tower is less than 5 miles away. They claim it is on my end. I tried two different computers, with/without antenna. It works great right at the tower site but at 5 miles away it is poop. Millenicom "offered" to let me cancel. I have over 250 dollars of equipment sunk into this folly. I will have to cough up another 300 dollars to get reconnected to satilite again. NOTHING HAS CHANGED ON MY END. Sure- MAYBE it will work out for you. It worked for me for a while until verizon changed something at my local tower (coinkydink it was right during the 4G rollout that my service crapped out?????) Was it worth the 500 dollars I lost? Heck no. member for 15 years, 1274 visits, last login: 2.2 years ago lodged 13 years ago
After a few months of no problems, my account usage spiraled out of control. I do minimal usage: email and web surfing. No video streaming, no downloading. After numerous excuses and finger-pointing by the company, I unplugged the USB modem and stopped using it for an entire week. The account usage climbed at a rate of almost 1 GB per day! Clearly, the problem is Millencom's. They have refused to replace my modem (which I paid them $99 for) and to credit my account for the time I couldn't use it to prove that the problem wasn't on my end. They claim I may have used my 20 GB allotment by the middle of the month, even when I explained that I hadn't done anything but email and web page surfing (and proved 1 GB per day "usage" when not even plugged in). They still haven't solved the problem, and are looking now to blame another user on the property who has her own Millenicom account (cross-contamination, they claim - hmmm, sounds impossible). Beware of their customer service if you ever have a problem with them. They are not consumer oriented. What good are 20GB per month if you're getting booted out of the system because of glitches that are theirs? member for 13 years, driveby review (so far) updated 13 years ago
I was afraid originally to try this service seeing how I am a gamer. I have to say that it is excellent for what it is. I had a fixed wireless service that was terrible ping bounced from 50 - 15k all day long. This service you will get about 120ms-170ms constantly with short spikes to 300ms off and on, but not often. I play World of Warcraft and Team Fortress 2 on this service with no issues at all. The one thing I was disappointed in with pre sales information was I requested to know about how much my ping would be on average with low amount of people using the service. Their response was spend 250 bucks to try it and just cancel if I don't like it. I know they could give me some examples because I checked out a 3G ISP before and they gave me ping reports to people using their service in my community. All in all if you cannot get cable or DSL like me GET this it will get you by, my downloads speeds are about 130-250k and ping is average of 150ms. Also before you sign up make sure you figure out if you would be getting Verizon's towers or Sprints, because Verizon's towers you'll only get 5gb a month of data and Sprint is unlimited. Millenicom uses both towers depending on your location. I gave the value for money a 1 because I could get like 20mb or 50mb services from some ISP's for the same price. P.S Anyone in Shady Oaks Minooka that use Cyber Broadcasting should change to this service. member for 18.7 years, 591 visits, last login: 12.9 years ago lodged 14 years ago
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