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frostyhawk
Anon
2013-Mar-2 11:10 pm
[Internet] Primus is not a company to work with.The most pathetic service I've had for the past 5 years. This post will be long, i just got off AGAIN with another tech support agent who just told me "theres nothing we can do" ___________________________________________________________
Let's start with when i got primus, back in 2007, the first few months; My internet was fine, at that time; i was originally on the "bell line card" as they called it and i was getting a decent speed all the time (around 4.50mbps) but in 2008, the problems started.
I had fluctuating speeds for a few months going down to 1mbps and less in dowload and down to 0.10mbps in upload, this lasted weeks and months before i notified primus (I didn't quite take a look at speedtests and such back then and kept switching browsers to get a better page loading time)
I then called primus, who said that their line card and bell's line card were conflicting each other, so they conned me into disconnecting the bell line card ( big mistake) the speeds i got were around 1-3 mbps for the next year or so and they wouldn't do anything about it (typical cheap corporation)
then all the way up in 2009, i was routinely calling primus due to my internet being an inconsistent piece of *love* and they sent a bell technician here, who by the way found nothing. needless to say with a bunch of annoying and nudging, they put me back on the bell line card but not without a 1-2 year fight that went well on into the late 2010 year, finally i was on the bell line card and getting stable internet, yay!
For a year or so, my internet went perfectly fine, i had a few problems with the connection that was fixed within a week (yay) i was finally getting good speeds for once, or so i thought... in late 2012 i started getting problems again, at first they got fixed but a bit later, the excuses started....
OH IT'S THE QUEBEC GOVERNMENT!!! they said ( i kid you not, they literally blamed the "newly-elected" marois government for my internet problems, saying that they're stopping companies like bell from extending their network...) I LIVE IN THE HEART OF MONTREAL, NOT VAL-DOR for christ sakes! i can get to the closest bell data center in a 15 minute walk and the freaking "transformer box" for my neighborhood is a block away, seriously?
this was around january 2013, the real problems started again, inconsistent internet, always disconnecting, speeds fluctuating; impossible to play the simplest online video game.
This was when primus sent another bell technician who said the demarcation line was peeeeeerfect, alright; tried the internet after they rebooted the material at the bell data center, everything works fine for a week; problems start again!!!
i call primus, they blame either my wiring (yet my phone works perfectly fine) or the old modem i had from 2007, so i send em the modem so they can send me a new one (another big mistake, they just wanted to track pretty much everything i did on the internet) still more problems, all through February, my internet was almost impossible to use and today... today... i call primus and they bring up that i've used up 32 gigabytes of data from feb. 7th to feb 17th.
my answer to that is, so? I can't watch youtube videos or download a game or two off of steam now? They make 32 gigabytes sound so massive when it is in fact very minuscule in terms of data usage, they know it because they impose these almost impossible data limits to make the maximum profit off of their dogs... i mean users.
so i talk with this obnoxious tech support agent who has a complete disregard for what his company promises (unlimited bandwith and high speed internet) and tells me he can't do anything about it, to call a technician to check my lines and if theres no problem then sad day for you.
really? Primus is that how you treat your customers? those who are willing to pay more to get unlimited bandwith service at already outdated speeds? Do you think your users are stupid and don't know how cheap implementing gigabit lines around the country would be? I will be calling a good old chap at bell in a while, get them to check my line, and when i have the proof that it is not my wiring, primus can expect the bill sent out to them with a nice brewing storm of me smacking them upside the head.
Hell, i may just even have to talk to my lawyer about this, bringing the government as an excuse, pathetic.
sorry for the long rant, I'm incredibly angered by this. | | |
kovy7
Member
2013-Mar-3 12:34 am
wrong forum... | | |
to frostyhawk
Why on earth haven't you cancelled Primus yet? You should have done so years ago. There are more companies out there to choose from these days. Do a Google search for DSL and Cable internet providers in Quebec. You can check this website too for company ratings and recommendations from other people. | | fred999 join:2012-02-09 Scarborough, ON |
to frostyhawk
Completely agree with you frostyhawk.
I was with Primus for 7 years until a few weeks ago, when I couldn't stand it any more. They were fine for 7 years, got my full 6meg speeds, but suddenly around Oct 2012 my speed dropped to less than 1 meg, but only in the evening.
I tried to work with their tech support for almost 4 months, but they are just impossible. Either they have no training or no tools, so they just keep repeating the basic stuff. They would never, not once, own up to their congestion issues.
The old saying is true - they're fine until you have a problem, then you're on your own. | | | |
to frostyhawk
If you get lawyers involved without having your ISW checked, you're going to have a bad time. | | GuspazGuspaz MVM join:2001-11-05 Montreal, QC |
to frostyhawk
Remember Magma? Magma was great. They were regarded as the cream of the crop ISP in terms of reliability and customer service; they stayed up during times when every other ISP went down (like that big blackout that affected everywhere but Quebec).
Then Primus bought them (early 2004). Then Primus' stock tanked (late 2004) and they eventually entered bankruptcy protection (early 2009). | | |
I was wondering what happened to them | | fred999 join:2012-02-09 Scarborough, ON |
to Guspaz
Actually I started with Magma, so it was even more than 7 years.
After all that time, I got no apology, no effort to keep me, no response at all from them.
Spent the time to tell them I was leaving because of their tech support, very polite and detailed, thinking they'd want to know something like that, and heard not a peep in response. | | |
to frostyhawk
I can assure you it's not Primus' fault, it's all Bell.
I too was on their ATM network and saw ~1Mbps speeds in the evenings with 1000+ms of latency, but not once did I blame Primus. It took Bell more than four months to fix it. Since then I've been moved to their Ethernet aggregated network and the most I see is some occasional packet loss in the evenings, but nothing like the problems forstyhawk and fred999 are experiencing.
I've been with Primus since Feb. 2005, and they've been great for me. | | |
CrazyCanuckz
Anon
2013-Mar-7 3:59 pm
Primus tech support was always terrible for me. Because of them i lost 3 weeks of internet which I paid for because they didn't know what they were doing. Tech support trying to explain how to setup internet was terrible I simply figured out on my own. Primus phone service went out about 4 times a year. They used to have a low bandwidth cap, they told me when I close to the cap they will email me. Never got a phone call or email. So they throttled my internet slower than dialup speed. Even with this they had the never boot me offline temporarily. I got so fed up I called and complained but no apologies. So I signed with rogers which is a big mistake. | | |
Primus Canad to frostyhawk
Anon
2013-Mar-8 10:54 am
to frostyhawk
Hello,
We're sorry to hear about your experience. We would like to investigate your situation further. We invite you to e-mail your contact information to us at: execresp@primustel.ca.
Sincerely,
Don Pelletier Executive Response Representative Primus Canada | | fred999 join:2012-02-09 Scarborough, ON |
to xsbell
said by xsbell:I can assure you it's not Primus' fault, it's all Bell.
I too was on their ATM network and saw ~1Mbps speeds in the evenings with 1000+ms of latency, but not once did I blame Primus. It took Bell more than four months to fix it. Since then I've been moved to their Ethernet aggregated network and the most I see is some occasional packet loss in the evenings, but nothing like the problems forstyhawk and fred999 are experiencing.
I've been with Primus since Feb. 2005, and they've been great for me. In my case it was not Bell. On my last attempt at working with them, I wasted a whole Friday evening doing around 70 speedtests, to show them the extent of the problem, and how it suddenly improved around 11.30pm. No response until 10 days later (by which time I had finally cancelled), and then he called back and left a message saying "we found the problem and we are in the process of upgrading our network", and I "might" continue to experience slowness until it's done. I interpret that as a congestion problem on the Primus network. After four months of calling and working with them, that was the first time anyone had admitted to anything. Prior to that it was deny, deny, deny, and point at Bell, and anything else the tech could think of. | | |
to frostyhawk
If you're on wholesale Bell, there are pockets of congestion that really are beyond the control of Primus. If you're on their own network, they should upgrading to avoid congestion.
If your sync rate dropped when you moved to a Primus line, then its possible you were served from a Remote before, but were transferred back to the Host, as that's the only place Primus (or any other CLEC) can have their equipment.
Too many variables to tell exactly what what is wrong with your service. Inside wiring CAN affect DSL performance, even if your voice service works fine. | | hm @videotron.ca |
hm
Anon
2013-Mar-8 10:31 pm
said by HeadSpinning:If you're on wholesale Bell, there are pockets of congestion that really are beyond the control of Primus. If you're on their own network, they should upgrading to avoid congestion.
If your sync rate dropped when you moved to a Primus line, then its possible you were served from a Remote before, but were transferred back to the Host, as that's the only place Primus (or any other CLEC) can have their equipment.
Too many variables to tell exactly what what is wrong with your service. Inside wiring CAN affect DSL performance, even if your voice service works fine. That's true. What this person can do is determine the following: 1. Find out if he is on Primus lines or Bell Wholesale. Back a couple of years ago (going by memory) the way to determine this was if you were eligible for their landline phone. If they said yes, then you were on Primus fed lines and not Bell wholesale. Or you can ask. 2. Also, you should get the line stats from your modem. This will show what your line is set up as, and show the attenuation and noise on it. What you want to do is copy the line stats when the line is working fine. Then when it acts up copy the line stats again. The differences in noise, attenuation and speed (between when it's good and when it's acting up) will give a picture of what (if anything) is affecting your line. If you don't know how to get the line stats, then search for your model modem in this forum, or tell us and maybe someone can point you on how to get them. 3. Primus used to throttle their own lines. Ask them if they still do this, or look on their website if they have a disclaimer anywhere about their throttling. #2 is the most important. The guy who reached out to you above will be looking into this (or he should). But you can do this yourself also to eliminate any BS you might get. | | 1 edit |
to fred999
said by fred999:In my case it was not Bell. On my last attempt at working with them, I wasted a whole Friday evening doing around 70 speedtests, to show them the extent of the problem, and how it suddenly improved around 11.30pm.
No response until 10 days later (by which time I had finally cancelled), and then he called back and left a message saying "we found the problem and we are in the process of upgrading our network", and I "might" continue to experience slowness until it's done.
I interpret that as a congestion problem on the Primus network. After four months of calling and working with them, that was the first time anyone had admitted to anything. Prior to that it was deny, deny, deny, and point at Bell, and anything else the tech could think of. I agree that some of the level1 support reps aren't the greatest, that is why I always open a ticket online (through e-Care), so you don't need to call them, and it allows you to add all of your speed tests, latency tests, and any issues you might be having, right in the ticket. Did they ever tell you to use test@test, password: test, as your PPPoE credentials and then run latency tests to Bell's local BRAS (10.x.x.1)? (latency will rise if you're on their ATM network and there's congestion) Did you ever try reconnecting to hopefully land on a less saturated link from Bell's BAS/LAC to Primus' routers? Like HeadSpinning said, there are too many variables to pin point the exact issue, but if it was Primus, there would be a lot more people on here complaining, including myself. And you never did mention if you were on GAS or an unbundled loop, I'm guessing GAS though. | | xsbell |
to hm
said by hm :What this person can do is determine the following: 1. Find out if he is on Primus lines or Bell Wholesale. Back a couple of years ago (going by memory) the way to determine this was if you were eligible for their landline phone. If they said yes, then you were on Primus fed lines and not Bell wholesale.
Or you can ask. Easiest way to tell is just to use the test@test credentials. | | fred999 join:2012-02-09 Scarborough, ON 4 edits |
to xsbell
said by usuckbellI agree that some of the level1 support reps aren't the greatest, that is why I always open a ticket online (through e-Care), so you don't need to call them, and it allows you to add all of your speed tests, latency tests, and any issues you might be having, right in the ticket.
Did they ever tell you to use test@test, password: test, as your PPPoE credentials and then run latency tests to Bell's local BRAS (10.x.x.1)? (latency will rise if you're on their ATM network and there's congestion)
Did you ever try reconnecting to hopefully land on a less saturated link from Bell's BAS/LAC to Primus' routers?
Like HeadSpinning said, there are too many variables to pin point the exact issue, but if it was Primus, there would be a lot more people on here complaining, including myself.
And you never did mention if you were on GAS or an unbundled loop, I'm guessing GAS though. No they didn't suggest any of those tests, during the 10 calls I made during the almost 4 months I tried. They did move me off an old Magma server and onto a Primus server, but that didn't help, obviously. My ping was always ok - between 30 and 80 every time, usually around 50, it was only the speed that sucked - enough to browse, but not to download. Several times it went to level 2, but who knows what they did. Twice a Bell tech came and measured stuff, and said everything was clean, and apparently made changes. Interestingly, aftor both times Bell made a change, the speed went back to normal for two days, then on the third day the speed went back to below 1meg, but again, like clockwork, only between 7pm and 11.30pm. When the supervisor left me the message "we found the problem and we are in the process of upgrading our network", how else to interpret that? He said "our" network. If it was Bell's network, I'm pretty sure he would have emphasized that it's a Bell problem, not "our" problem". | | TypeS join:2012-12-17 London, ON |
to frostyhawk
Hmm, I had Primus many many many years ago, when I used the internet for simple things so I can't remember if it was good or not.
But I've got a relative in the same boat. They have home phone + DSL from Primus right now. I've been trying convince him to switch to TekSavvy for 2 years now and he wouldn't budge because of the deal he is getting on long distance to Australia.
But now he wants to stream NetFlix on his 1080p TV in the basement. So he asked me what he needed. It's not a smart TV, so he'll something. My uncle and aunt are simple people, all they have is a 10 year old DVD player for movies and Rogers basic cable. So the plan is to go with something like the WD TV Live.
Next I checked his internet. From memory his internet has always been painfully slow and inconsistent. Early in 2012 he was barely getting 2Mbps. Then in the summer of the same year, it was getting 6Mbps on the dot. Now I tested it last week, it jumps between 2-3. I need to go back and do more speed tests but it didn't look very promising. Even if it were a stable 3Mbps, thats just enough for NetFlix, no one else will be able to use the internet or they will disrupt the viewing for the person watching something. I would assume its a line quality issue (perhaps too far from the CO) if I hadn't seen him get a full 6Mbps for weeks straight during the previous summer. Trying to set up a day to go some more testing and get Primus on the phone to sort it all out. My uncle is pretty excited about getting NetFlix.
Any advice from current or former Primus customers? My uncle wants to give Primus a chance to give him the service he's thought he was paying for, I'm skeptical, but I'll work with Primus to see if they can get his speed up so he can watch NetFlix in HD. | |
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