Review by eggman9713 
UPDATED: 76 days ago
member for 6.6 years, 431 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Richland,Benton,WA
 $42 per month (12 month contract)
 about 7 days
 "Good Speed for the price,"
 "A dry loop costs more than if a phone line is installed."
 "Service is great, customer service is not."
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Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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Just moved out of my parents' place into a very new apartment complex. I have gone cell phone only because I just don't need a home phone. My friends have had very bad experiences with Charter cable here, almost on the level of Comcast in their markets, so I decided to go with Verizon. They were the telco at my parents' place and were great. Called to set up service and found out I could get the 3Mb/768kb package 8 dollars cheaper a month if I signed up online instead. I raised an eyebrow but said okie dokie. Aside from a minor clerical error in the install date, it was up and running right when they said it would be. I consistently get 80-90% of rated speed coast to coast and many times, sub 50ms ping times. Havent had an outage yet, but almost never did when they were my telco. Havent had to call tech support so I can't really get a fair rating there. 3Mb is way faster than I used to have, I don't know what im gonna think when they bring FIOS here, as rumor says they will. One little sticky wicket on the pricing though. A dry loop costs $38.99 per month where if you get local phone service (lowest tariffed line is $18 per month) it is $31.99. So its actually worth it to just get the dry loop if you dont need local phone service.
UPDATE 05-16-08: I just moved into a different apartment in the same complex and it took Verizon 2.5 weeks just to disconnect my old line and provision my old one. They could not give me a dialup account since I did not have a phone line with them, so they did give me a 50% credit for the month after I complained. Let me elaborate on the complaint process. It literally took me all day just to get through their loop-de-loop phone prompts to a human who actually knew what they were doing. I was transferred from person to person to person and in many cases, would get disconnected between transfers.
I had a similar runaround when I actually moved into my new place. The modem would sync, but could not get an IP address, and it literally took me 20 callbacks and 10 people to actually figure out what the problem was. Many of the reps simply read from their script and "power down modem, reset, blah blah" and I finally got someone WITH AN AMERICAN ACCENT who fixed the problem in 5 minutes by directing me into an unpublished configuration section of the modem. 5 minutes to fix a problem that had lasted over 10 hours. Yeesh.
Bottom line now that I have experience with Verizon's tech support, just hope you never need it, and if you do, (insert favorite deity name here) help you to get someone in a timely fashion who actually has a brain.
As for the service itself, still fast, still reliable. Everything except tech support is great.
Update 08-29-08: I think I am going to move away from Verizon. I am moving from my apartment, where we can get good 3mb service, to a house where their website says we can only get 1.5. I have been trying all week to get a hold of a human, and all I get is menu after menu looping over and over. When I finally managed to get through to the state DSL office, I was suddenly disconnected and told the number was no longer in service. Seems a bit strange to me. So therefore I cannot even get someone to help me transfer or cancel my existing service. Looks like I get to do it the old fashioned way, by SNAIL MAIL. My new opinion on verizon is that their service is fine, but turning it on or off or moving it will make your blood pressure skyrocket.
Update 09-18-08: I have spent 6 hours over the last 5 business days trying to contact a human to cancel my service at my old apartment. Every time I call I get run around and around and around in the menu and SOMETIMES get to be put on hold for an hour before being asked to call back later and subsequently disconnected. I am through with their customer-no-service and have had to resort to sending a certified letter to cancel my service. I simply asked them to cancel my service and if I received no word within 2 weeks that it was going to be cancelled, that I would not be paying a cent for service after this month. Sent that letter last week (to Florida for cripes sake) and have yet to hear back.
Update 08-22-09: I forgot to update what happened with having to send my letter to them to cancel my service at my old apartment. I sent the letter during the first week of September, and received the return receipt around September 15th. "All right, they got the message, they should shut off the service and not bill me after the last day of September, as I instructed." Well they called me about a MONTH later, after I had already moved out of the apartment, and said they were callign to confirm I wanted my service disconnected. I told them about the letter and they didn't have a clue, despite my sending it certified mail and the return receipt coming back with a signature. They said I would be billed for half of October and I said, "Yeah, I am not paying that." It took 10 minutes of arguing to even get the rep to realize what I meant by "certified mail". They finally agreed to not bill me for October after I faxed a copy of the letter and the certified mail receipts. I have not had any communication with them since then but they continue to spam my email address with offers and crap despite my demanding they stop. Guess it's time to invoke the CAN-SPAM act for whatever good it does.
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