Review by otto66 
UPDATED: 275 days ago
member for 2 years, 35 visits, last login: 64 days ago
 undisclosed location
 Contract price not specified.
 Bell Canada
 "Good reliable service IF … Too many IF’s to mention."
 "Do you have a lot of time to waste? Call 310-BELL or 310-SURF."
 "Still a BS satisfied customer? Just give Bell some time and they’ll fix that."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I signed up for BS’s ADSL service in 1998 and since then there was only one instance when the service was down. As far as I know the cause was related to some work that Bell had to do to add additional phone lines and it lasted for one day. Other than that it was up all the time, whenever I needed to connect to the internet, day or night. From day one my connection speed was close to the max. (minus the 15%), right now I am on the 6 MB profile and the last time I checked I got 5166/674 kb/s. I rarely used the tech but whenever I did, it was ok.
I notice some comments/questions whenever someone had a similar experience so I’ll try to address them in advance.
While I am not using any file sharing application I believe that over the years my internet usage was above the average BS user. My first dial up account (2.4k modem) was in 1993 using both win 3.1 and the first release of Slackware and when I switched to the ADSL service I was connected with more than one computer, each of them being either a triple or quadruple boot system running different Windows versions, different Linux distributions and Solaris (that should give everyone a good idea of my internet usage). As far as the DNS problems that BS had in the past, I was not affected since I was running DNS servers on my systems.
My only problem with BS is the fact that they switched my grandfathered unlimited account to the new limited account. After an email to Mr. Kevin Crull and several phone calls to/from his office nothing has changed, BS does not have unlimited accounts anymore.
UPDATE Feb. 2009
I did not plan to update my review so soon but my 2007 review does not reflect the reality anymore. As I mentioned for the first 10 years everything was just fine until the end of 2007 when the “switch customers from unlimited (lie to them if you have to)” plan/policy was put in place. Speed wasn’t a problem, reliability wasn’t a problem, latency wasn’t a problem, Bell’s attitude was. Here’s what happened in 2008:
For months nothing happened until they increased the fee for the phone bundle so I decided to drop the bundle and keep only a few (phone) services that I used to have before the bundle. I called 310-BELL, had a lengthy discussion with the CSR and the bundle was dropped, everything was back to normal. Forgot to mention, I also told the CSR that the call was about my phone services and specifically asked not to make any changes to the ADSL account.
Hours later my speed dropped to half of what it used to be. Well, well, what can it be? I do not know for sure, maybe just a simple coincidence. Here we go again, this time BS, speed problems. 310-SURF … No, I did not install anything; yes I rebooted everything, and so on. Finally I was told that a ticket was opened and second level will look into it. When I asked for a ticket# I was told “you don’t need it”. I found it unusual so I insisted and I was told “we’ll take care of it”. I insisted again and finally got the ticket#. Done for that day, the bundle was cancelled and I was hopping that next day BS will fix the speed.
Next day I noticed that one of the canceled services (part of the bundle) was still up. First I thought that there’s nothing unusual, any business may need 24/48 hours to make/run the changes. But this wasn’t any business, this was Bell, they lied to me before so I thought I’d better call them and double check the bundle cancellation…What cancellation? What changes? We’re sorry … There was a log of my call but no cancellation of the bundle … the short version, nothing has been done.
I asked for a supervisor, I will call him Mr. “5 bucks”. Very professional, he told me that he cancelled the bundle, … but “I have to inform you that there is a $5 cancellation fee”. I wasn’t told anything about the cancellation fee when I accepted the bundle, so no, I am not going to pay. Mr. “5 bucks” finally agreed to “waive” this fee and told me that everything is done (cancellation), … but I want to advise you that there is a $5 “one time” fee to activate the …. Now these are creative people; a service which I activated in the 90’s, which at that time was active and Mr. “5 bucks” wanted to charge me a “one time” activation? It was time to move to the third person. The manager(?) didn’t mention any of the $5 fees and assured me that the change will be done. Later I got a call from Bell (4th, CSR) to confirm some details and next day the change was finally done.
Since I insisted on getting off the Bell medication (drop the new and improved and more expensive bundle) I was prepared to deal with the side effects (BS) so again, just to be on the safe side I called 310-SURF to inquire if anyone has taken a look into my speed problem. Sure we can help, could you press the Start button and go to ….., Please no script for me today, I already had it yesterday, here’s the ticket#. Surprise surprise, ticket did not exist. There was a log of my call but … no ticket, again the short answer is that nothing has been done.
Since there is no ticket could you please press on the Start … (going through the script). So here we go again, No, I didn’t install anything and yes, I rebooted everything … Here’s another ticket# second level will look into your problem. No thanks, been there done that, let’s see what a supervisor has to say. Good news, the supervisor told me that a technician will come to my place next day to …. (even today I do not know why did they send a technician to my place).
Next day, the technician called me and showed up as promised. I showed him a couple of speed tests and he called in for troubleshooting. After a short discussion, whoever was at the other end of the phone told him that “it’s fixed/done”. Wait, wait, let me check and I notice that the speed was consistent to the 5M profile so I asked the technician to ask “the smart guy” to put me at least on the 6M profile (Performance up to 7M). At first, he was reluctant to do it and told me that it will not work (he was on speaker phone) but when I told him that I was on the 6M profile for the last year he agreed to try to put me on the 6M profile . Then I asked him to put me on fastpath but he didn’t want to do it, “your line cannot handle the speed”. Again I told him that it’s been like that for about a year, so finally he made the change. And just to make sure there’s no misunderstanding, all the time that I was on the 6M fastpath profile (direct to CO no stinger) I didn’t experience any problems (disconnections, errors, etc) which would justify the automatic line test to drop my speed.
Let’s see, 10 years without connection problems, always close to the speed limit of the profile on which I was, for an year on a 6M fastpath profile (SNR=15, Atten=30) and now after I was put on a remote, supposedly an upgrade and not a downgrade, the tech (level 2 or above) tells me that I cannot be put on the 6M profile, then that I cannot be on fastpath because my line cannot handle it? In the past I didn’t trust Bell but I always trusted the techs but it seems that they are not immune to the Bell’s BS/virus.
And to close this chapter, I asked the technician if he has checked/done anything before getting to my place and he told me no, I first came to see what is the problem that you are experiencing. I assumed that he was very busy (BS clients have called his cell several times) so I asked him; “Why didn’t they made the changes yesterday when I called, why did they send you, why did they waste your time (and mine)?” His answer was that he did not know why, that someone else has made that decision.
In the following days I called a couple of times, once the port was reset without any change in the upload speed and in the end I was told that everything is just fine (6016/768), another time I was told that there are no logs or any other way of finding out what happened, when and who put me on the remote (the BS/virus is spreading quickly among the techs).
A couple of days ago I checked the 2Wire modem and noticed a change twld.ds_capped_rate = 7616 but the speed was and is the same as on the 6M profile. I do not know what would be the maximum speed limit if I would be connected direct to CO (no remote) but I can tell that the remote didn’t do a thing for me except double the pings and I wouldn’t be surprised if I would get an increase in speed if I wouldn’t be on this remote (only on 7m profile). But then I’m only guessing, capable technical people (level 2 and above) have told me that now that I’m on a remote my line cannot handle the 6M fastpath profile so I stopped thinking about the 8.5M profile.
The only good thing is that for I do not know what reason I got a second discount. I called 2 different times to clarify this issue but they didn’t have an answer. The only thing that they could tell me is that I will have those discounts as long as I do not make any changes to my account.
Speed tests:
- 2007 speed test (direct to CO): SS5200, 6M profile 6016/800 SNR=14 Atten=30, speedtest.net Toronto server (50mi): 5147/672 21ms
-2008 speed test (on remote)– 2Wire, 6M (6016/768) then 7M profile, speedtest.net Toronto server 4314/646 162ms. Tried other servers and the best results were with the speedtest.net Montreal server (~300mi): 5164/670 54ms
The latency used to be around 15ms to the 1,2,3 hop, now is 45ms, so it’s more like tripled not doubled. So, was this (remote) an upgrade or a downgrade? Since I was put on the 7M profile I suppose it was an upgrade as far as Bell is concerned, and that’s the only thing that matters. While in the past (no remote, direct to CO) I was told that I can get very close to 10M now I know that I could get UP TO 10M; translation, same speed as I have now plus “your line cannot handle more” so I can finally say that I joined the BS club.
And here’s the latest BS from BS: their email says: “Even though you have requested an ebill, we will continue to send you a paper bill because your balance is over $500”, and surprise … one of the discounts has disappeared.
While my experience doesn’t even come close to some of the horror stories that I read in this forum it proves that if you were problem free for 3, 5, 10 years the question that you should ask yourself is not if but when you are going to join the group of BS’s dissatisfied customers.
Followup comments:  
mac dude
join:2006-03-18
Toronto, ON | tech support You have great tech support with them? You're one of the lucky ones.
--
I am one hit song away from a million dollars. | |
| grmoro
join:2002-06-13
Niagara Falls, NY
 ·TekSavvy Solutions..
| Tell Bell Sympatico where to go! The only thing I can say about Bell Sympatico is that I never lost any email when their servers when down, ever. This is not something I can say about TekSavvy.
Anyway, Bell Sympatico service stinks, really stinks. From inexperienced support staff (and I have done this for over 24yrs now), to blatant lies from their people, to downright ignorant people, I have never found that they investigated and resolved any incidents I reported to them in well over 3 years of service with them. They were the only game in Toronto years ago and I was ver thankful to getting rid of them.
Run a Web or FTP server from home and every once in a while they would close all ports on their DSLAM. Reboot the modem and it's fine again.
Report spam to them and then find the ports closed again.
Very ignorant considering your barely using 1GB of bandwidth per month on an unlimited cap account.
Their original internet bill used to breakdown the monthly cost of $44.95. $5/mth network card and $10/mth modem rental. Consumers must use their modems. That works out to $69/yr every year for a $15 network card and $138/yr every year for the modem rental of a $25 Siemens Speedstream 5262/5260 modem.
When the were notified of me moving to another ISP they started calling to get me to stay. So I told them exactly what I thought of the crooks and liars.
About mid 2000 their monthly invoices shopped showing the month fee breakdown costs.
But in Quebec consumers can use their own modems with Bell Sympatico for a reduced monthly internet rate.
Talk about dishonest. | |
| 
DJMASACRE
join:2008-05-27
Nepean, ON | ? lol your on a limited account now ?
so now why not switch to an ISP that is
1. cheaper
2. unlimited.
3. no more BS
i think its easy =) | |
|  | | | otto66
join:2007-11-16
·Bell Sympatico
| Yes, I’m on a limited account for over a year but my problem isn’t necessary the GB limit, it’s the way Bell switched my grandfathered account.
As far as switching to other ISP I am considering all my options. Got a partial answer from BS and we’ll see if they want to address the speed issue and latency (maybe another modem). Meanwhile I’ll get Rogers for a month or two and then I’ll make a decision.
And a correction to my review. I just tried an old SS5200 modem and I got 9-12ms for the 4 x.bell.ca hops and the same speed 5M as with the 2Wire. So the BS “upgrade” 7M profile+remote+2Wire has not changed my speed but increased the latency 4 times (and not 2 or 3 times as I mentioned above). | |
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