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aspiller98
join:2014-06-05
Ripley, OH

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aspiller98

Member

AT&T U-verse expansion

I live in a rural area, not too far away from town, but a little ways out. Cable stops 1 mile down the road from me, so I'm stuck with a satellite connection (exede). Exede is just OK, it is OK because of the data limit on it. Now to get to the point lets go back 4 years ago. I ordered AT&T DSL in December of 2011, a technician came and installed it and all that good stuff. It was the best internet I had ever had considering I was going from the old wild blue to DSL. Well, that sure didn't last long. About 2 years later, I started to notice my speeds were getting slow and that my connection dropped very frequently. I called, a tech came and a direct DSL line with a whole home DSL filter. That didn't fix anything, so I just had to deal with it is what AT&T basically told me. I called again, then they had a reason why it was happening, it was because DSL was "old" and was being removed from my area and that U-verse has arrived (non fits version, copper ipdsl). They said that if I cancelled I could call and get U-verse all ordered up and installed shortly after. So, I called AT&T to cancel my DSL and order U-verse. Well, long story short, it wasn't available. I then said ok, I want my DSL back. Well... they couldn't do that either, so thanks to AT&T I was forced to switch to satellite internet which has a very small cap on it every month, it is so frustrating. I have called AT&T countless times, tech support is useless and so is the ordering department. But then, in the summer of 2013 U-verse became available on my road for a full week! I checked all my neighbors addresses and sure enough they could get internet only. So I checked mine, not available... hmm, something isn't right here, another thing that wasn't right is that the U-verse speed that was offered was slower than the current DSL speeds (DSL: 3mbps, U-verse: 768kbps...). Anyway, the point is that today my neighbors are slowly getting transitioned from DSL to U-verse by AT&T... but yet on the AT&T website it says U-verse isn't available to the people that have it... I saw a AT&T technician working on a post that had two white boxes attached to it about 0.8-1 miles from my house, I pulled over and talked to him about my issues. He said that I could get 1.5mbps no problem, and possibly 3mbps U-verse. He said the only problem was that AT&T wouldn't activate it for the part of my road i live on. Makes no sense whatsoever! I could go 3 extra miles down the road, FARTHER from either town on my road and receive frontier DSL no issue! I have become so so frustrated with this. All I want is some stupid internet, I mean HOW HARD CAN IT BE!? I need help people, help me resolve this PLEASE! I put in a research address request on AT&T's website and it stated it could take up to two weeks for my address to be researched, I was like OK, I'll give it a shot. No more than 30 seconds later after submitting that request I had already gotten an email saying that my address had been researched and that it isn't available, now that right there tells ya that AT&T didn't do anything at ALL! AT&T employees, feel free to contact me at [mod note: email address removed for privacy] to get this fixed, I will NOT reply to emails that are complete BS about not being able to get the service. I DO NOT run off a different line from my neighbors, we all run on the same line!!!!!! People have U-verse in front, behind, and on both left and right sides of me EXCEPT for me! Ridiculous!

rtfm
join:2005-07-09
Washington, DC

rtfm

Member

I share your pain. I have other friends in broadband hell.

You can write a letter to Randall Stephenson. If you choose to, be explicit that you had existing DSL and were deceived into losing it. I'd throw in the FTC, with the words "unfair and deceptive trade practices..." featured.

Or build a point-to-point microwave link to the nearest friendly neighbor who does have options.
aspiller98
join:2014-06-05
Ripley, OH

aspiller98

Member

I emailed him a couple years ago and got a call from his secretary, long story short, it was just as bad as trying to get customer service to do anything.

rtfm
join:2005-07-09
Washington, DC

rtfm

Member

I never ever email my complaints. I use paper and stamps.
YMMV.
nrobot80
join:2012-12-05
Union City, GA

nrobot80 to aspiller98

Member

to aspiller98
I'd also try the Public Service Comission also. That sucks that you can't even get 768k
aspiller98
join:2014-06-05
Ripley, OH

aspiller98

Member

Yes it does! My current internet plan is $76/month (including equipment lease) for unlimited emails and webpages and 10GB for everything else. With a unlimited zone from 3am-8am. I am in DAP state right now, gotta love satellite internet...

rtfm
join:2005-07-09
Washington, DC

rtfm to nrobot80

Member

to nrobot80
PSC's have zero power over non-telcom services.

The FTC would as above but it's a hard slog and they have many fish to fry. Worth trying.

But outside the lines [RF backhaul] may be more productive.