 Review by mking128 
member for 7.7 years, 1190 visits, last login: 1 days ago
updated 2.5 years ago
 College Point,Queens,NY
 $30 per month- (12 month contract)
 about 35 days Verizon "Cheap like dial-up vs. local cable (TWC triple play) - slipping far behind" "Bad, arrogant customer serv. especially bill charges even w. service plans. VZ had their chances to keep us, cancelled>TWC" "Fired: watch out for bad billing & customer serv. Had 768/128 for 2 yrs, bumped to 1.0/384, still no FIOS"
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In short - finally clipped the cord myself at the NID !! 10/22/2010 - just as UNRELIABLE after we came back from 3 weeks oversea trip with slow speed and no FIOS. Had enough of their nonsense, order cable's Triple Play & installed in 5 business days, everyone UP & running above provisioned speed, as fast as 18+MB downstream at off-peak hours.
Timeline: Had 1.5/128 Earthlink DSL at old house for several years, switched back to VZ for 3.0/768 back in 2005 since CO was under 7,000 ft. but still took several repeated visits to tune-up old copper wiring for reliable services, bad when it rain due to corroded outside NID & circuits on the pole boxes. Moved to a brand new house in 2006 & further away from same CO, distance of around 16,000 ft. - was told still possible for up to 3.0/768 service, wanted to coordinate moving to keep voice & DSL with interruption. Local office switched on voice on target date with dial tone but no DSL signal, lost the order & had to re-submit, process & waited 2 weeks getting getting signal - off to a bad start. Then, line sync. & other issues, calls & field dispatch took days going back & forth, finally "concluded" that had to drop speed to 1.5/384 for reliable connection, fine (hindsight, should've gone to cable then & take the bundle) - weeks later in winter 2006, sitting at home all day waiting for repair tech. to come check out house's wiring, NID, etc. & drop speed all the way down to 768/128 - since our line is supposed to be at the far end/limits for reliable ADSL signal, etc. etc.
Had the slowest speed between 2006 and 2008 without much incident while neighbors all seemed to be on cable DSL surfing around 5 MB during non-peak hours. Old Westell W327 modem with old firmware began dying & was told then original warranty only good for 90 days unless extended warranty was purchased. Paid for a new W327 at full price & decided to add the monthy modem service plan (already had the analog/voice line's full inside home wiring maintenance plan as we're getting so many field/service visits). Techs all tried to suggest on each & every visit that there's something wrong with the jacks, terminals, computer systems, etc. & that trouble isn't with THEIR network & neglected old copper wiring hanging up on the old slanted poles. Were told in 2006 that FIOS is coming soon & will be among the first in this area to be notified & installed, on mailing & call lists, etc. etc. .... waiting continued, patiently.
2009: Called business office to check on FIOS & possible line speed upgrade, since our neighbors next door & even our downstairs unit are qualified for 3.0/768 service but we're still on slow 768/128 plan with low S/N margin & various fluctuation line test readings. Got upgraded to 1.0/384 speed at no extra charge & switched to Double Play plan for slightly more with a 12 month commitment in July 2009 as I was doing more tele-commuting work from home office. Had a series of tech. visits, Direct Forum postings here (again) and field dispatch to try to tune-up the lines, etc. over the summer with marginal results. Meanwhile, signs of FIOS install & truck rolls seen in local neighbors, signs of better days ahead with Fios, okay - waiting continued, patiently again, just put up with slow DSL a bit longer since the price is okay. Just had to reboot the modem every other day or whenever downstream drop from 8.5 to below 5.5 to as low as 3.5 or 4.0, a mystery that field techs. cannot seem to resolve or fix. but still concluded that it's the best that we can expect at our distance to the CO.
More line sync. issues last Nov. (2009) and postings in Direct Forum resulted in more trouble tickets submitted, 1 got field dispatched & 5 others, including escalated ones got closed without further action taken or explanation, nor follow-up call for local maintenance office. Worst, even moved my line from ADSL2+ switch/card to a regular ADSL router & data path from interleaved to Fast mode. Line sync. was all over the place & Westell W327 (just 1.5 years old) gave up & managed to get a newer replacement Westell 7500 modem (it's really not so FREE, since I'm paying for a monthly fee) & STATS weren't much better. Had to borrow another working DSL modem & call tech. support to prove that the old W327 was failing & request line testing to verify poor results, etc.
There're sparodic line noise on voice calls & fluctuating S/N readings, ranging from 9.5 plus dB downstream to 5.5 or 6.0 dB while upsteam remained consistent at 9.5 or 10.0 dB. Finally, one tech. dispatched conclueded that most likely, there are unused bridge taps on the line going to/from the CO/relay terminals and another dispatch request is needed - with special equipments & bucket tower/ladder are needed (in other words, it's time consuming & let someone else come out in the cold winter days - Jan. 2010 - to clear up the line conditons & improve my STATS. He believed that at our distance, based on his meter readings, that the line can definitely support 1.5/384 easily and with 3.0/768 possible but probably at a somewhat slower rate, but certainly not remaining at 1.0/384 once the taps are gone. Another request was made thru Direct Forum & also to VZ Repair to check/clear out line noise - resulted in a no-show by the tech. that had to be rescheduled & a cancelled trouble ticket.
Bottom line, line conditons got no better & VZ repair tech.dispatched found no issues & blamed it on VZ DSL-provided line filters for possible problem, did NOTHING at all to check for & remove line noise, and, to bill for service visit at $91 plus taxes. Called billing office & they called repair office, and after a 20 minute wait for a conference calling, verified that it was a VALID ???? billing for a field DISPATCH since no trouble was found on VZ's equipment or NID, etc. and that it's inside wiring/customer owned equipment. It didn't matter at all that the modem was defective and/or we had full inside wiring mainteance as Billing claimed it's not covered, according to TOS in fine prints, etc. etc. There's no higher up or next tier supervisor to speak to and dispute the charges, and that just pay it. Okay, fine - what kind of customer service is this! It's no wonder that negative posting about VZ's DSL neglected services and poor OVERALL customer services, especially billing are on the RISE. The corporate culture is what sanction this mindset & that they feel they can do whatever they want and bill you for they argue is valid, and I am not going to spend 2 more days on the phone on HOLD & miss out at work to deal with this nonsense.
I cancel both inside wiring maintenance & extended service plan on the modem. Our contract on the Double Play deal with the monthly discount will be up by end of July 2010, it's now late March & FIOS installation is skipping some blocks around here but available for the Zip Code already, so must be the slowdown in rollout & layoffs that's being reflected. Calling the local business office & even visiting the VZ storefront on Main Street in person didn't get any useful help at all or timeline, "well, you'll probably know about its actual availability & can order it sooner than we do as we have the same access to info in the database as the customers." Wow, that's customer service for sure ....
Within the past week, DSL line conditions have taken another turn for the worst, and that's after the wind/rain storm and I'm back to a daily modem reset/reboot. Doing all the advanced testing & benchmarks, along with results & findings of previous visits all pointing to Verizon not taking proper care of their aging, copper-based DSL equipments & outdoor lines as they selectively made FIOS available to local homes on certain blocks, and further efforts to improve the line conditions are hopeless, useless & a waste of time as they couldn't care less about it.
Unless VZ can deliver FIOS to our house in the next 4 months, we are going to cut the copper wires & port our number to cable, and go with their packages - we might not get better speed at peak time, but at least, we'll surf at a much higher speed plan sometimes while paying about the same or less for comparable level of services, with fewer taxes, fees & surcharges, etc. on our monthly bill. And, if we don't like what they deliver, we can cancel at anytime with ETF or penalty - and you know what, their local field office/truck depot is just several blocks away from us on the waterfront & we can see - on a daily basis - that they are working on & taking care of their cables & making house calls.
Update - 5/7/2010 - The switch to cable's Triple Play package is now getting ever closer as we are nearing the end of our VZ contract as there's still NO Fios availability on our city block (fine with ordering if we move 1 block up north & local CO - business office have no useful info - been on those email lists since 2006 & still waiting .....) DSL line conditions remained in an unstable, fluctuation state with slipping margins, prompty a daily routine of modem/router reboot - any cable HSI package, despite congestions & evening slowdown, will likely still be faster than what VZ can deliver now or anytime soon on their aging copper wires.
Update - 7/12/10 - Last month on VZ DSL, received email that DSL prices will be going up by $5.00 starting next 2 billing cycle since our Double Play contract is UP (finally, this month) and promo offer will end. Thus, nightmare is going to be OVER soon. Line margins has gotten worst & it's now a twice daily (sometimes, 3X) routine of manually resetting the modem to restore line conditions - speed has not drop, line quality tests are fine, just that copper wirings are getting worst & worst as we see more Fios rollout in the area on a selective basis. My patience has run out on it after nearly 4 years for Fios and faster/reliable speed. Emails are getting switched & messages saved/backed up, and ready to get a new unlisted phone number upon switching to cable HSI, for about the same price.
We will rejoin Fios in 2014 (or sooner - since we do not have sign any contract or agreement with cable) - right now, it looks like many others are feeling the same about dsl and ditching it. Watch out, here we go & click, DSL - you are fired.
As of Aug. 13, 2010 - speed & latency continued to worsen, tech. support played the usual games and my contract is finished as of today, planning my next move since Fios is supposingly available but NOT on my block (yes for next city block).
Speed Test #90628646 by dslreports.com
Run: 2010-07-21 21:04:39 EST
Download: 479 (Kbps)
Upload: 374 (Kbps)
In kilobytes per second: 58.4 down 45.6 up
Boost: 479
Latency: 39 ms
Tested by server: 9 flash
User: 1246302 @ dslreports.com
User's DNS: verizon.net
Compared to the average of 784 tests from verizon.net:
* download is 96% worse, upload is 95% worse
Final update: 10/22/2010 - We've switched from copper wires for voice & DSL to cable triple play with 15MB up/768 down boosted. Fios sales broke 3 promises to call back since July and no faith in their customer care.
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