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When I moved to the Addison area I signed up with direct TV DSL for an ISP provider because I didn't want to fork over money to the $BC monopoly. When they went out of business I came here to find a new provider and saw august.net had glowing reviews. I figured I would support competition and pay a premium rate for august.net service which promised low latency and a quality pipe to the internet. For two years I was pretty satisfied. My ping rates for games were not noticeably different from other players but the service steady and I had no problems. Last fall I came home from work and my service was out. I thought it was a temporary problem and thought nothing of it. However, I came home the next day and it was still out so I decided to call tech support. After waiting forty five minutes I got to talk to a rude technician who tried to pin my outage my "unsupported" windows 64 OS and then on my router. After I convinced them my problem was legitimate they told me SBC was closed for the day and they would contact me the first thing next morning. The next day I came home and still had no service. I called up tech support and again was put on hold for almost an hour. The tech then said he was still working on the case and was going to call $BC. After coming back he told me he talked to $BC and they would look at it first thing in the morning. Funny, $BC was closed at the same time the previous day. I came home and still nothing. I called tech support again. This time the tech wanted to troubleshoot the modem. Unfortunately, due to the buyout, nationwide did not have any of the passwords or configurations august.net modems and he could not help me. I went to the august.net forum and found out nationwide had taken over august.net several months back and service had declined dramatically. There were even accusations that nationwide downgraded the quality of the internet pipes without notifying anyone. I was pretty angry because I never was notified that august.net was under new management and that I no longer had local support but had some support clowns in Michigan. After going without service for almost five days without a daily update from tech support I decided to cancel my service. Luckily I still had their phone number from my account setup info because the august.net phone number on the nationwide site was conveniently wrong. I ended up talking to a belligerent billing manager who told me I had to fax in 30 days written notice before they would cancel my account. I complained that I never agreed to those terms and was never notified that the terms of service changed. I was basically told too bad. I immediately faxed in my cancellation and moved on to $BC. The next week, with over a week of outage time, a nationwide tech finally called me up saying he was looking into the problem finally and was having problems with $BC because they locked my account. I told him I canceled and there was an awkward silence and then said Ok and hung up. I would never do business with nationwide but I would suggest they outsource their whole tech support department to India where at least they could find at least one competent employee. I check the forum.august.net and it was taken down, probably because of the myriad of complaints that had been mounting for months. They also plastered the companies presidents alleged email address on the site as if that made up for the abysmal service. I tried to support the little guy and competition but if nationwide can’t provide a better service then that for the inflated price I was paying then they deserve to be buried. member for 16.1 years, 2 visits, last login: 15.5 years ago lodged 16.1 years ago
I've been an ADSL customer of August.net since 1999 and have always pointed friends, family, and collegues to them as their support and service was fantastic. This is no longer the case. Along in February, I started having some connectivity and major DNS and mail server issues and it took 2 months to get all issues resolved. It did not matter how many cases I opened with the now non-local support (goes to Nationwide), or how often I updated the cases, they simply appear to no longer have the resources or desire to cope with my issues in a timely manner. I even did some of the research, testing, and provided detail logs of what was happening. And when my issues suddenly fixed themselves, I did not even get an e-mail indicating my case was closed or the cause of the problem. On the flip side, though, I did get an e-mail indicating my case was closed an hour after I reported total DSL failure, and I was still down (huh?) for hours. I'm sure some of the issues in Feb/Mar 2005 were configuration changes to support the merger. But the lack of testing, the lack of a direct communication path between the local customer and the local techs for such major changes spoils my trust in this ISP. I will be leaving August.net as soon as Verizon FIOS goes live in my neighborhood. member for 16.8 years, 1 visits, last login: 16.8 years ago lodged 16.8 years ago
We have been an August.net customer since mid-2000. August provides our DSL service, as well as hosting our web site. In the four and a half years before the Nationwide buyout I can remember 3 unplanned outages, all of which were quickly resolved. The service and support were superb. We were very happy to pay a premium price for good service. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case. Our service has been down six times this morning already, more than the entire four year period before the buyout. I have no idea what is wrong, since the network status page on August's web site hasn't been updated for over a month. And trying to get a solution from tech support is a joke - the support line has been busy for the last four plus hours - no way to even leave a voice-mail requesting a callback. Since August is now supported by Natonwide Intenet, I thought I might be able to get some help by contacting them. Here is the verbage from the top of their support page: "Welcome to our new technical support homepage. It's currently under construction, and will be for awhile...". What ??? A company that proudly advertises having been in business since 1994 has a support page which is "currently under construction". The page contains no information whatsoever about how to actually contact Nationwide for support. Nationwide also claims to offer "Online" technical and sales support. Unfortunately, that too was unavailable. It is now 11:15 CST on Friday, May 13th. It is not a holiday. If "online" technical support is unavailable in the middle of the business day, then when is it available ? Sales support is no better. We were planning to upgrade our hosting package to include SSL to support e-commerce. After receiving an initial price quote from August in mid-April for the upgrade, the sales department has gone AWOL. Numerous e-mails and calls have gone unanswered. We are trying to give them more money and have been unable to get a response of any kind for almost a month now !!! The bottom line: Avoid this company at all costs. August was once a superb company, but no longer. We are happy to pay a premium price for good service, but not for the abysmal service we now receive from August/Nationwide. We plan to migrate to another provider as soon as possible. member for 16.8 years, driveby review (so far) lodged 16.8 years ago
Update 4/13/05 I have replaced this ISP with Verizon Fios - I'm still accessing my email account with them but I will soon cancel the service alltogether. Sorry to be leaving but their service has suffered since the buyout. Ok this years review is a little late - 3/14/2005 All has gone to shit! Weekly outages and no response from tech support. DNS server not visible for hours at a time. AVOID THIS COMPANY! They are no longer the fantastic service provider they once was. Leaving for VZ Fios as soon as they light the fiber. 1/18/2004 - Time for my yearly review! With August.net the speed is great and very consistent along with constantly adding new and well thought out features. They have now implemented spam filters at the mail server. Great for those who don't want to have to wade through all the junk (or setup their own client side processing). Any filtered mail is forwarded to a special account so you can check for false positives. In the several months I have used the feature I've not had a single false positive. Another recent feature is Webmail, this is very useful for those that travel and want to check their email remotely on any browser – anywhere! Their pricing structure is based on usage so if you’re looking for all you can use for a low monthly fee you may want to look somewhere else. But if you’re looking for superior service and consistently great speed they are the tops in our region. The staff is very responsive and ultimately professional in the off chance you have to speak with one. If you want to share ideas with other users they have a forum covering all aspects of the ISP and the internet. Many of their staff actively participates in these forums interacting directly with their users. It’s as if you had a friend who owns an ISP and is letting you in on a great deal. They are that good and no I don’t work for them. Just a happy customer for 2+ years Ken member for 21.7 years, 194 visits, last login: 15.6 years ago updated 16.9 years ago
I thought about adding a comment to kslaton's review, but decided that this might be a more effective way to warn people: Stay away, at all costs. Since they were bought out by Nationwide late last year, service has been simply horrific. I am on hour 36 of an Internet outage that started Friday. Being able to talk to a local techie was once the biggest selling point for August.net; no more! Calls are routed across a very poor-quality VoIP link to Tucson, AZ. It took three phone calls to open a trouble ticket; 36 hours later, I'm still without service. What bothers me more is the bullshit I've been fed during those 36 hours. At first, it was a "temporary outage." Twelve hours into the outage, I was told Verizon was bringing customers back on line (they actually referred to this as "provisioning"), and I should be up in the next hour. Eighteen hours into the outage, I'm told it's a Verizon problem and that they've been working on it "for 13 hours." I asked what was being done for the 5 hours unaccounted for; no response. Twenty hours in, they finally open a trouble ticket, and advise me to expect a return call within 4 hours. Well, 24 hours passes, I call, and guess what? "Verizon has been working on the problem for 13 hours, and will continue to work the problem." You would think the support desk would be thoughtful enough to change the script over a 6-hour period. I actually was able to make contact with a local technician in Irving, but he acknowledged that he wasn't even an August.net employee, but was "on loan" from another Nationwide ISP. He told me there was no longer a way to contact a local tech, and was surprised I was able to contact him. He promised to get back to me, but never did. I'm sorry, but a 36-hour outage is simply unacceptable. Especially when Verizon, upon verification, indicated they had no trouble tickets open during this period. Since October of 2004, we've experienced various outages lasting from 2 hours to several hours. Prior to that, I can't recall a single outage. My recommendation is to STAY AWAY! Nationwide has ruined what was once an excellent ISP, and are simply not worth your valuable time. Hour 42: They know me by name now at the River. I asked them point blank when was the last time they heard back from an August.net network admin. They told me 24 hours ago. This, after assuring me they've been working non-stop to restore my service. Shortly after this call, it looks like the local roll-over from August.net to the tech center has been taken down, as there is no longer a way to contact tech support via the August.net number. Hour 48: Got a call back from Tier 2 support, telling me they still have not heard back from August.net, and to keep recycling the DSL modem every few hours. Right. I've since learned that several customers serviced by the same CO have regained service. So much for 24x7 tech support. Hour 68: Confirmed: August.net, despite whatever you might read here or see on their website, does NOT provide 24x7 tech support! Earlier this morning, it was confirmed that contact with August.net was never made over the weekend, and that they (River tech support) are unable to contact them any other way. Some operation. Last time I checked, advertising something you don't offer is tantamount to fraudulent misrepresentation. Oh, and the local tech support number is still out of service -- it simply disconnects, instead of rolling over to tech support. Hour 89: Nationwide appears to be imploding. Their website (»www.nationwide.net) has been inaccessible for several hours. Calling various Nationwide numbers (888.628.4669, 800.368.2688, 972.323.6598) is useless, as most menu selections and extension dials result in a disconnect. I learned a few hours ago, when I was able to actually reach a live person, that Verizon replaced some Lucent switches with CI switches, but that no updates were forthcoming. At this point, I've ended up against a brick wall, as no one is talking. Hour 91: After some marathon dialing (no one at August.net bothers to return calls), I was able to reach somebody who is in charge of "Provisioning." They told me pretty much what I've been hearing all along: Verizon isn't talking to August.net, doesn't seem to be interested in solving the problem, and isn't allowing them access to anybody above Tier 2 support. Apparently, about 30 customers are affected, and Verizon isn't about to break their back over 30 customers that don't even subscribe to their ISP service. Hour 120: Well, after 5 days of getting no closer to Internet service, I decided to cut bait and move on. Yes, I returned to the Comcast fold. And you know what? I had an Internet connection up and running within hours of calling them! (It probably helps that I was a customer before). Their tech support seems very much improved from 3 years ago, they can actually talk intelligently about non-Windows environments! So to hell with Verizon, and to hell with August.net. Service has been cancelled, good day! As if there wasn't another reason to run, not walk, away from this company: I'm now being told that there has been no decision made yet as to whether or not credits will be issued for the Internet outage. WHAT? member for 17 years, 5 visits, last login: 17 years ago lodged 17 years ago
Last night we started an outage at around 22:00 (10:00PM) at our business. We contacted August.net and was re-directed a company called The River »support.theriver.com. The initial contact with August's support yielded few results. "We are aware of it and are looking into it." I can understand this and is expected for the first 5-10 minutes of an outage but beyond that and I question their support ability. This morning at 6:00 we are told “Oh it’s a Verizon line issue and they will not work on it until their business office/repair office opens. I questioned this greatly. I contacted Verizon Business line repair and was told that “NO” issues have been opened for outages in the Dallas area that would have affected our “Verison” lines. The Verizon representative was very helpful (out of character for Verizon by the way from past experience!!!!) and started calling and conferencing me in on conversations with people here in the Dallas area (Repair center and network monitoring). I called August back and now I am told Oh we might have found the issue we “Think” we have a hardware failure and will need to repair it. Hrm I think remember reading the following. »www.august.net “August.Net purchases expensive, reliable backbone bandwidth for our customers. We purchase connections to both Internap and Level(3), and peer directly with Yahoo Broadcast for blazing fast multimedia content for our customers. Our network core is ringed and completely redundant, including redundant vendors for each high-speed leg between each of our data operation centers in Dallas, Texas. Our network is designed to protect against fiber-cuts as well as vendor insolvency.” So what happened to that completely redundant stuff??? Did that go away when they “August.net” were bought out? After reading some of the posts on Broadband about other experiences with this new company I think it’s clear we need to start shopping around. You can also read the following at the above link: August.Net is committed to providing the best technical support in the industry. You won't have to talk to teenagers reading a script if you call for help. The people at August.Net that take your support calls are the same network engineers that build our network infrastructure, each with years of real-world experience handling a wide range of technical issues from bgp routing to dns. Ever talk to a support person who knew less than you did? Not at August. Chances are that if you call for support the first person you speak with will be able to help. The clam that you will talk to a real-world experienced technician is not so true now. I just got off the phone with a customer support agent that sounded like he could be my son and was told the following: “Man I don’t know……..I’m just a support guy stuck back in a cube answering phones. I don’t know about no network outage stuff. I’ll ask my boss”. This nice young kid promptly hung up the phone. Presumably he though he was placing me on hold. When Mr. Greg Fausak started signing up customers I don’t think he ever imagined this happening. When I found August.net back in the mid 90’s Mr. Fausak was the one that answered the phone. Greg told me what they had to offer. To say the least I was impressed and signed up. I can only hope to find another company that is in the same state of operation that I found August.net back then. We are now in our 16th hour of this outage. With conflicting answers each time we call in. The Search is on!!!! member for 18.3 years, 1 visits, last login: 17.1 years ago lodged 17.1 years ago
UPDATE 1/31/2005: Well, my six-year love affair with August.net has come to and end, but it wasn't because of anything they did. Instead, as often happens in romances like these, we have been torn asunder by a meddling 3rd party. In particular, it's Verizon and their incompetence that has caused me to have to dump August.net (and DSL altogether) and move to Comcast. Here's why: We signed up for DSL from GTE (long before Verizon was born) waaaaay back in 1998, and they installed us on a Frame Relay circuit -- the only kind they had back then for our area. Over the years, Verizon has built out more of their network on a ATM system, and they were offering higher speeds and lower prices to new customers signing up for DSL. Yet my price was $77 total ($55 for Verizon's telco portion & $22 for August.net's ISP connection) for just 1.5mbps/256kbps DSL service. New Verizon customers were being offered 3Mbps/768kbps for $39.95/month total -- so I was getting gouged by staying on the old system. So I called Verizon and asked to be switched to the new system and the higher speeds. Guess what? They said they would need to disconnect me altogether for 3-4 WEEKS in order to make the change -- they have no way to enter an order for a new line of service on a customer that has an existing line of service! Incredible. Since I and my wife both work at home and rely extensively on our Intenet connection, we had no choice but to order up Comcast, which was installed in less than 2 days with blazing 4Mbps/256kbps and a free modem/free install for just $52.95/month (no cable TV needed or wanted). So now were up on Comcast and loving the speed. Sad to see August.net go, but until Verizon gets their act together, we can't continue to pay 1999 rates for 1999 service when 2005 service and pricing is out there. So thanks to the great guys at August.net, who have never failed us and have an incredible network and support, and good riddance to Verizon! ====== I switched to August from CyberRamp after seeing August's very attractive pricing plans and having had several friends tell me how much they liked the August service. I had been with CyberRamp (now Internet America) since 12/31/98 when my GTE DSL was installed, but they had neither lowered their price nor offered to increase the speed since then, and their $34.95/month for 384k/384k was starting to look pricey. The reps and techs at August have been awesome. I sent them my first inquiry late one night, after 11:00 PM, and was astounded to find a personal, detailed and friendly reply waiting for me at 6:00 the next morning. Account setup was a breeze, and they had my connection switched on within minutes after GTE switched the route from CyberRamp. Since then, the guys at August have been incredibly responsive, and the service has been perfect. I am on their Bronze package with 5 static IPs and we have both a Mac and a PC running into the DSL through a hub with absolutely no problems. August recently switched to a new news server, much better than the old one, so even this minor complaint of a few reviewers has been addressed by August. In all, August is what ISPs should be: competitive, responsive, friendly and technically excellent. Update 11/05/02: Been with August since 1999 and they are still incredible. Totally solid connection, advertised speeds, lightning-fast customer service by guys who really know what they are doing. If only August could handle the house-to-CO portion of my connection, I'm sure there would be NO outages, NO glitches ever...but even still, the service has far, far exceeded expectations. member for 22.1 years, 2745 visits, last login: 1.8 years ago updated 17.1 years ago
static IP, 768/128 Since take over by MobilePro, customer service doesn't exist anymore and tech support is only slightly better than clueless. To top it all off, it would actually be cheaper for me to use Verizon as my DSL provider at this point. That wasn't the case in 2001 when I signed up with August.Net. member for 20.5 years, 27 visits, last login: 12.5 years ago updated 17.2 years ago
Service Provider: August Networks, Dallas, TX I have been an August customer for several years and have always been very satisfied with their service and support. That was then - this is now - today I am *exceptionally* pleased with the support that I receive from August. I had an early install of DSL (not G-lite) and was a long way from the CO. In the beginning I accepted that I couldn't get the full speeds that DSL was capable of because of the distance, but over time I developed periodic problems and SBC always responded that they needed to slow down my connection to improve its reliability. When this reached the point of absurdity, I called August. Here is what I found: * These guys really know their business. I was talking to knowledgeable personnel right from the start. * They are responsive. When they say they will get back to you, they do it. * They are creative. They solved my problem in a way that never would have occurred to me. * They are relentless. They tracked and followed up on this issue over the weeks that it took to resolve. * They are customer-oriented. I'm not a big business user, but I get treated like a big customer when I call August. * They are thorough. There were times when, due to my inexperience, I miscommunicated with them. They sought clarification when there was any question, without making me feel foolish. The point is, they didn't end a conversation until they had gotten everything that they needed to know. My service is fast now. My ISP is smart. I am a satisfied customer. Paul M (review was emailed from domain healthaxis.com) lodged 17.3 years ago
»www.mobileprocorp.com/pr ··· hp?id=39 "Bethesda, MD, April 21, 2004 - MobilePro Corp. (OTCBB: MOBL) announced today the company has closed its acquisition of August.net, a Dallas, Texas based Internet services provider (www.august.net). The deal is forecast to add nearly $1.8 million in annualized revenue and to be accretive to MobilePro's 2004 earnings. Jay Wright, MobilePro president and CEO, said, "The acquisition of August.net is a watershed event for our company and our growing telecommunications business. We have significantly increased our scale of operations while providing strong cash flow. Based on our current estimates and business conditions and excluding non-recurring items, we anticipate becoming cash flow positive on a consolidated basis in the third calendar quarter of this year by which time the August.net operations are expected to be fully integrated into MobilePro." ... member for 19.1 years, 19 visits, last login: 17.3 years ago lodged 17.8 years ago
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Southwestern Bell
I've experienced 3 long outages (over 2 hours each) in the past 3 weeks. That's about equal the number of such outages I had experienced in the 3 years with august. Additionally, tech support is no longer as responsive as they once were either. I used to think I had the best provider available. I'm not so sure anymore.
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