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Review by RokHed 
UPDATED: a few hours ago
member for 9.1 years, 1276 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Pennsville,Salem,NJ
 Business customer
 $79 per month (12 month contract)
 about 14 days
 Verizon
 "Stable"
 "A bit slow"
 "Ill keep it"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings above consensus)
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I had comcast for years. When the bill for tv and net broke the $200 I freaked!
I figured id come back to verizon. The connection is solid and I get the same speed when I need it most Id hafta say I can move more data during that time now. Not to mention im saving 15 bucks on the Phone/Dsl bundle.
Had a few issues the first couple month until the Business tech support got involved once they took over my ticket they kept me informed on how they were handling my issue. Once the issue was resolved they refunded my 1st 3 months and the service has been awesome. the residential side is a bit flakey but business side is no joke
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 Review by dataice
UPDATED: a few hours ago
member for 7 years, 1362 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Crisfield,Somerset,MD
$40 per month
about 14 days
Verizon
"Connection reliability"
"Customer Service is poorly trained"
"Great, as long as everything runs smoothly, otherwise you'll be forced to deal with a poorly trained outsourced tech support."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings above consensus)
|
08/14/08: I have had Verizon Online DSL since 2004 with hardly a hiccup in all that time. Well, that was about to change. I Called Verizon billing office on August 14th to order an upgrade from 3/768 to 7.1/768. The rep says there is no such speed for FIOS?!? Um, I'm not calling for FIOS, I am calling for DSL. So, I figured that I would wait a week and try again.
08/21/08: I Called them back today to give it another shot. The rep that I spoke with was obviously from India, as her accent was so strong that I could barely understand her. I explained to her that I currently have DSL 3/768 service and was interested in upgrading to 7.1/768. She checked her system, and said that it was available in my area with a 1 year contract and that voice service was also required for $39.99 a month, then $42.99 a month after the first year was up (after renewing with another 1 year contract), at least this rep knew what 7.1 DSL was. Fine, I said sign me up. She gave me a service ready date of August 26th, said I could continue to use my current Actiontec router/modem, and that I needed to be home.
08/26/08 OK, 08/26 comes and goes, no upgrade.
08/27/08 I called them back today on the 27th and opened a trouble ticket. The rep I spoke with said that the last rep that placed the order for me, didn't enter it properly, and it was never dispatched to a local field tech. Ok, fine set me up again please. The rep gave me a new service ready date of September 2nd, and asked me to be home as the tech "may" have to do what is called a home run (place a filter at the NID). I said ok.
09/02/08 I took the day off and guess what? another no show. Ok, now I was not a happy camper.
09/03/08 Called back the next day on September 3rd, that rep said the same thing the last one did, the order wasn't placed correctly. Ok, set me up again please. The rep did so, and gave me a service ready date for September 9th (what is up with ONLY giving me Tuesday's, don't the field techs work more than one day a week?), anyway I said fine, and stayed home all day on the 9th, guess what?
09/09/08 You guessed it, NO SHOW., BUT, he did go to my local central office, and he CUT OFF MY INTERNET COMPLETELY., ok now I had had it. Called back that same day, was told that a rep would come out on the 16th some time between 8 am - 12 Noon, now I was fuming.It was bad enough I was missing time from my duties by taking off all day, but now I had no internet at all. When asking why I was cut off he said they have to do that first in order to upgrade my line to the new 7.1. That sounded fishy so I demand a supervisor, he says no that is not normal and said it must have been a mis-communication (yeah, no s*it).
09/16/08 The 16th comes, again a no show.
09/17/08 Called them the next day on the 17th and demanded a supervisor, who could barely speak english. He apologized several times and said he was escalating my problem to a dept for supervisors, and that someone from that dept. would be calling me within the next 24-48 hours to set up an appt. They actually called that same evening, and they set me up with a new service ready date of September 18th. They asked if I could be home. I said yes, I would be.
09/18/08 September 18th comes, NO SHOW! Now I am truly livid, as I have missed five days of my duties and stayed at home for nothing AND with no internet. I came here to DSLR and found a toll-free number to Verizon Customer Advocacy group, but guess what? they don't help you with a Verizon DSL problem, only a problem with your landline service. So I was back to square one. I called the outsourced call center in India and demanded to speak with yet another supervisor. Apparently none of the former reps or supervisors added ANY notes to my account, so they would know this is an ongoing issue, so I had to explain my lack of customer service issue to him from the beginning, he said to wait for someone to call me back from the same escalations dept. Finally someone from the USA got involved this time around, and returned my call a few hours later. The agent I spoke with said he would handle it personally and that someone would come out on the 19th and that I needed to be home, OK.
09/19/08 19th comes and again another no-show, called (you know the deal by now) and was given a new date of September 22nd (great,another weekend with no internet) Not like I really have a choice in the matter, Ok, fine I will be home on the 22nd
09/22/08 FINALLY a field tech shows up on the 22nd, but , not to my residence but to my local central office instead (field tech told supervisor I didn't need to be home after all, no home run required), since I reside in an large apt. complex, and doing a home run in a multi-dwelling unit can be troublesome and very time consuming, so now I had missed 7 days for nothing. This tech finally gets me up and running with 7.1/768 speed. He stopped by my apt. before heading out of town, and asked me to pull up my stats on the gateway to make sure I was getting good numbers. He was satisfied with the transtats, so all was good. I asked him if he knew what in the world happened with my upgrade. He explained to me, that apparently the first field tech who was dispatched to my local central office, moved my line over to a different card in the rack at the DSLAM but he didn't provision it properly once he moved it over. At least that was the jist of it, since it was nearly 7pm and past his normal quitting time, and the man was tired, as I was as well. So I didn't ask him to go into great detail.
09/23/08 I called Verizon Online billing/sales dept. today to complain about what I had been through and how I was being treated as a paying customer, and the retentions dept said they would give me 4 free months of service for all of my trouble, and being without internet for 2 weeks. So, I will update when my next bill arrives and let you know how that went. But I am not holding my breath with the billing dept., especially after what I had just experienced.
10/17/08: Well, bill cycled online today, and guess what? Yep. No 4 month free credit!I was charged the full $39.99 for the service. To late to call today, since the retentions dept. is currently closed. Will try to contact them on Monday when they reopen
10/20/08: Called retentions dept. today (was hung up on the first 2 times). Rep that I spoke with was very friendly and said she would handle this immediately. She said the original rep that entered the 4 month free credit, did enter it into the system on September 23rd, but she didn't enter WHEN the credit was suppose to actually begin. So, basically it just fell out of the system. She said she entered it again, for the credit to take affect asap, and that I would receive a statement in the mail confirming that my last 4 months paid service would be credited back to the account. I assume that they will just hold off billing me for the next 4 months, I could barely make out what she was saying, since I had to go through a rep in India first to get transferred back to retentions here in the states, so the connection was very bad. Hopefully it has been taken care of this time. I will update again sometime in the next 30 days to confirm if the credit went through as the rep promised.
10/24/08: Received phone bill in the mail today. Apparently Verizon Online credited the $39.99 back to my account on the same day that the paper bill cycled and was mailed out to me, just barely making it on the bill at the very last minute. Good thing I called on the 20th or I would have had to wait another month for the credit. So, I did get at least one month free, but I am not holding my breath that they will credit me for the other three. I will update in mid/late November when my next bill cycles.
11/20/08: Received latest phone bill by e-mail this morning. Verizon charged me the full $39.99 this month. So much for receiving a credit for the other 3 months. Unless they do what they did last month and apply the credit literally at the last minute before the paper bill mails out to me. I will update when I receive that bill by snail mail to let you guys know if that is what happened. At this point however, I am so frustrated dealing with them every month for the credits that I am just going to be thankful that I got at least one month free credit for the 14 days I was without service. I never did receive that so called statement in the mail, confirming the 4 months of credits.
11/25/08: Received latest phone bill by snail mail this morning. Sure enough, they charged me the full rate of $39.99 this month. So, apparently one month of credit is all I am going to see. I've decided to let it drop, its not worth the hassle of dealing with retentions yet again.
03/25/09: After not hearing anything more about my so called 4 month credit, my bill that I received today in the mail showed a credit of $171.96. Apparently I am going to get the 4 month credit after all, 4 billing cycles later. I must say I was VERY surprised after not hearing anything back from them since last November. After contacting billing, the rep said I was given a credit of $171.96 to cover 4 months of service at $42.99 a month. However I WAS paying $39.99 a month with a 1 year contract, which they were taking $3.00 off on the regular $42.99 a month, so I am not sure where the extra $3 dollars suddenly came from. I also noticed that they quietly extended my contract from September to December 2009. After the pure hell on earth that I went through last fall I will just let this slide, since by the time I fight them to get them to put it back the way that it was originally before applying the 4 month credit, my contract would have expired by the time it was all worked out. This company never ceases to amaze me.
07/31/09: I contacted Verizon Business Office today, after seeing on the portal that I was eligible for a bundle discount, by combining my POTS and DSL on one bill. Apparently I can get both Freedom Essentials and 7.1 DSL for $79.99 a month, which is called Verizon Double Freedom. I am paying $45.99 a month now for Essentials and $42.99 for DSL, so this would save me $8.99 a month off of my bill. The best part about this, is that the rep that I spoke with said I would be able to come off my 1 year contract, and would be placed on a month to month on the DSL portion. I can lock this price in for the next 12 months with no ETF if I drop the bundle. I would just go back to my previous billing. I took them up on their offer, so I guess I will see what happens to the billing when I get my next bill in late August.
08/21/09: I checked my online billing today. The paper bill went out a few days ago, which hasn't arrived yet, but I was able to view on the DSL side at verizon.net what Verizon Online was going to submit to the POTS billing as my current billing cycle before the $79.99 Double Freedom bundle reset it. Apparently I was taken off the $39.99 a month DSL billing. They reset my DSL billing by taking me off of my old billing agreement and entered me into a month to month agreement. They treated it as a new customer agreement, and basically reset my billing in January of this year under the promo that was running at that time for the 7.1 tier for new customer signups. The first 4 months are free and then it bills at $42.99 a month. I was placed on a month to month billing, which would run through December. Then the regular price would be $52.99 month to month with POTS. Of course this is all moot now since it will be reset yet again under the $79.99 Double Freedom promo that I recently signed up for. I then went to their main verizon.net signup page to find out exactly what they charge for the 7.1 tier at the full price month to month, with and without POTS. The current billing info for the 7.1 tier list it at $62.99 month to month dry,$52.99 month to month with POTS, $39.99 with a 1 year contract and POTS or $37.99 with a 2 year contract and POTS. No wonder they can't seem to keep the billing straight, they have so many different billing scenario's, there's no telling what you may end up with at the end of the day.
08/25/09: I received my bill in the mail today, and I was billed correctly under the Double Freedom bundle at $79.99 plus $12.01 in taxes and fees, for a total of $92. You gotta love those damn unfees! I can't believe they actually got it right this time on the very first try. Go Figure! 
11/07/09: Connection has been pretty much rock solid since January of 2009, with the exception of a couple of minor outages that each lasted for maybe 3-4 hours. Bottom line is this, obviously there is very poor communications between the different departments at Verizon Online AND Verizon Business Office, the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing, and that is unacceptable with a so called telecommunications company. Usually when you want to give a company more MONEY, they don't require that you jump through hoops first to do so! As long as everything is running smoothly, and you never have to contact them for any reason, they are great, but god help you if you do have to call them! If you don't need hand holding and rarely have a need to contact support,unless something goes terribly wrong, then Verizon should do just fine. If you do need hand holding, I would suggest searching for another provider, IF that is an option.
Attachments:
Followup comments:  
Mactron
el camino Real
Premium
join:2001-12-16
CM94sv
| Well trained.. "Great, as long as everything runs smoothly, otherwise you'll be forced to deal with a poorly trained tech support dept"
Accurately their well trained to always blame the customer and say everything is fine on their end. Think of all the money they save not actually providing service. 
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If only the Verizon CSRs worked this well.  | |
| |
dataice
Premium
join:2002-10-27
Crisfield, MD
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| Re: Well trained.. haha. You got that right. I miss the good ol' days when they actually employed people from the U.S.A. When I recently upgraded my speed from 3 Mbps to 7.1 Mbps, the rep told me there was no such speed for FIOS., uh, duh! who said anything about FIOS? I am talking about DSL over copper! Unreal. I had to call back a total of 8 times to get someone who knew what was going on. Avoid them at all cost! | |
| 
The Blue Hag
join:2008-08-25
Winchester, CA
·Verizon Online DSL
| their teir 1 phone techs are the worst I am so tired of having to call DSL tech support and having to deal with those hard to understand robots, the voice-automated system is just as bad as the overseas employees too....
Would be nice if they brought jobs back to the USA and gave us customer service as imagined in their commericials.
I am fed up with Verizon phone support to be honest, they are the worst. | |
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dataice
Premium
join:2002-10-27
Crisfield, MD
·Verizon Online DSL
| Re: their teir 1 phone techs are the worst You got that right, they have gone out of their way to program the automated system to make it so difficult to reach a live rep,that you will just throw your hands up in the air and relent. God help you if you try to get your local business office involved in it, they will just refuse to deal with you and transfer you back into automated hell, but before doing so trying to sell you on at least a dozen different products and services. It's really sad to see what has happened to a once helpful customer support center, and I feel sorry for the few U.S. support people they have left, knowing if they don't push those services, they will be fired. :-( | |
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OftenOily
@verizon.net
|  Re: their teir 1 phone techs are the worst
Tech support is nothing other then an insult..11229 under dial up speed now for 3 weeks even with the modem turned on | |
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icepunk6
@verizon.net
| headaches for sure! i decided awhile back to go with verizon dsl 3/768 on a dryloop, tech came out, hooked everything up (came at like 6am when was told they would come between 8 and noon, i know it was 6am because he left a voicemail on my phone, i never answered the door due to sleeping at that time) long story short. i was without my new service (although i had dsl connection lights on modem) for 3 weeks. ended up that they didnt have me hooked up in the hub office, this was also after literally 10 calls of me saying "this is on your end, not mine" they even told me i needed to upgrade my modem/router and it would cost 100$. HORRIBLE customer service, i got exactly the same amount of time i was out of service, 3 weeks credits. so dont hold your breath on 4 months, you were lucky getting 39.99 | |
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dataice
Premium
join:2002-10-27
Crisfield, MD
·Verizon Online DSL
1 edit | Re: headaches for sure! Yep, I figured that as well, that I was lucky to get at least one month credited back to the account. If they don't credit me for the other three I will probably just let it drop. I don't feel like jumping through hoops again with support and dealing with the long hold times to get them to give me what they already promised. I tend to have a short fuse when it comes to those people, and my blood pressure is already high to begin with.  | |
| 
Hpower
Roflmao
join:2000-06-08
Glendale, CA
 ·Charter Pipeline
| Damn Man I feel your pain. I'd die 3 weeks without connectivity. I already was going nuts with 2 weeks of no service for getting charter pipeclog pipeline.
Seems like Verizon does a horrible job with their DSL service but does a much better job with FIOS.
--
The Internet is about to go down....it is actually. | |
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stefanie2530
@verizon.net
| DLS Tier 3 phone# I'm truly thankful that I'm not the only person who has such problems with Verizon...I'm not happy about your problems, I'm just happy that these things don't only happen to me!
Does anyone have the Tier 3 DSL phone number? I had it and now a friend needs it and of course I can't locate mine...she's calling Tier 1 asking for Tier 3 help and they claim to have no clue what she's talking about and hang up on her...
Thanks! | |
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dataice
Premium
join:2002-10-27
Crisfield, MD
·Verizon Online DSL
4 edits | Re: DSL Tier 3 phone# Those Tier 3 direct #'s don't work anymore. Since Verizon now outsources its entire DSL support overseas. They use to work when they were still based here in the USA, but I haven't reached a US based CSR since at least 2007, much less a Tier 3 based rep. So, unless you subscribe to their premium support plan, which I am not even sure if that isn't outsourced as well, you probably will be unsuccessful in getting one of the Tier 1 CSR's in India to transfer you to a Tier 3 rep. That's if they even have any Tier 3 reps on the staff in India, and even if they do, I seriously doubt they will know any more than the Tier 1 script robots manning the front lines. Most of the reps that I spoke with when I had my recent problems, didn't know anything more than what was on the script in front of them, no matter how high up the ladder I climbed. | |
| radiomaze
join:2009-10-25
Curwensville, PA
·Verizon Online DSL
| Tech Support, yeah if you want to call it that I called not long ago for some help with modem/router issues . The tech said, in that barely understandable broken english, sir I'm going to send you toour expert support. Well I knew there was a fee but didn't know how much so I asked the "expert" how much will it cost? She replyed its a one time fee of ONLY $89:-() I said no way I think I can figure this out myself. You have a nice day. Then hung up the phone. | |
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dataice
Premium
join:2002-10-27
Crisfield, MD | Re: Tech Support, yeah if you want to call it that I would keep a VERY close watch on your bill for the next few billing cycles. It would not surprise me in the least bit if those clowns tried to bill you anyway for the $89. | |
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Review by ourumov2
UPDATED: 4 days ago
Fair warning: reviewer joined this month
Hackettstown,Warren,NJ
$29 per month (12 month contract)
"Nothing really"
"Started charging me even though there was no phone line from the pole to my house"
"Support is useless"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings below consensus)
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Ordered 3.0 Dry Loop DSL for my new house about 2 weeks ago. I made it clear that there was no NID on the outside of my house and no line from the pole to my house - they said it would be installed free of charge and asked if I needed inside wiring. I said I would do the inside wiring myself to curb their $120 charge.
Come today I get an email a day after my service ready date saying that the service is active and I will start being billed. There is still no NID on the outside of my home nor a line from the telephone pole to my house. How can I possibly be active and billed when I dont even have a physical line to Verizon???
They ran a Line Test and said that I would have to install my modem for the line test to be accurate so I will update later on today when I get home to see if they miraculously installed a NID from the time a left for work to now.
Update 10/29/09 430pm
Well what do you know, there is no NID. I called Verizon again and the first person did not know what a NID was and I was transferred to my local business office. The local business office said she cant get a NID ordered since I have dry loop, so she transferred my back to customer service. The customer service guy wanted me to plug my PC into a phone line, after clearly explaining several times that I do not have a phone line hooked up from the pole to my house he transferred me to someone that was able to schedule a technician to stop by. This 'scheduler' then asked what I needed and he then transferred me to someone who knew the schedule. Finally, this last person asked me when I would be available - so I said tomorrow and then he told me the technician would stop by anytime between 8 am and 8 pm. ARE THEY KIDDING ME??? I told them that I have a job and a NID install is on the outside of my house- he said I had to be home regardless. So now I left a big fat note on my door telling the technician to just install a NID and that I would take care of the inside wiring. I will update tomorrow.
Update 10/30/09
Surprisingly a Verizon technician came out and installed a NID outside my home. I tested as soon as I came home from work and there was indeed a working DSL line!. I then wired the inside of my home and am getting some great speeds for being 2.5 miles away from the CO - 2.9mbps down and 300~ up.
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Review by kubus
UPDATED: 4 days ago
member for 8.8 years, 851 visits, last login: 4 days ago
Irwin,Westmoreland,PA
$35 per month (12 month contract)
about 14 days
Verizon
"Works as advertised"
"nothing"
"Good value and better then my previous ISP - Comcast"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings above consensus)
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Did a self install, connection was on before the ready date, which made me happy. Wish they would let me know before hand that it takes up to 3 weeks to actually get connected, but it worked in 2 weeks, so I guess is sort of mid point.
Connection speed is as advertised 1492/374, slightly under, but close enough to call it exact.
I got the Westel wireless hub from VZ, works fine, however I didn't try the wireless yet, no need for it at this point.
I didn't use the Tech Support, so the rating is based on CSR that I placed the order with.
The open relay blocking is bad, I'm watching the thread in VZ forum on it. I just had one of my friends forward me the return e-mail so I'll be contacting VZ about the blocking.
UPDATE: 1/18/06
I downgraded to the lower 768/128 plan as cost saving measure. At this time, VZ DSL is probably the best value out there. I really don't notice a difference in the speed until I download a large file. E-mail attachments (3-5mb) take few seconds longer, windows updates download just fine. I play BF1942 and I don't notice any major lags or differences either.
I'm not sure if the e-mail blocking is still there. I switched over to yahoo and the only e-mails going to verizon mail are the official stuff.
One stupid thing about VZ is their security package, that they tried to push on me. I had e-mails coming about it almost daily for about a month after the upgrade. Now I get snail mail cards to download it. No thanks, doing just fine on my own.
Update 4/12/07
The price went up to $17, however it is still a good value. No problems to report, except cat chewed on the cat5 and had to be replaced.. cable that is.
I've since started using wi-fi and that is also working pretty good, although the Westel range is not that great, but I can still sit on the porch and get very good signal.
Update 02/08
I had to move up to 3/768 level as uploading pictures was painfully slow. When you have a newborn, that's pretty much all you will do, upload pictures or send them through e-mail. Upgrade was painless, and took about a week, all done at CO. I had some initial problems with speed, but it turned out that one of my cats chewed through the wire. Took me 15min to fix and speed was up. Last I checked the upload was around 2.5, download over 700, so pretty close and good enough for me.
So now I have 3 years and counting of solid performance from VZ.
Oh an the cat now has 2 strikes... but I'm not sure which one, so I guess both will end up as General Tso Chicken one day.
Update 11/09
Make that 5 years and counting without a problem. Even the Westel modem is still chugging along. I did use the wireless for a while but then my laptop crapped out. The Wi-Fi worked OK at best, not a very strong signal even in next room. Was enough to do light browsing, and to push updates to PS3.
Followup comments: Neoistheone
join:2007-01-13
Tornado, WV | Cat Kill the cat :P | |
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Review by TheLawn
Posted: 10 days ago
Fair warning: reviewer joined this month
Thousand Oaks,Ventura,CA
$35 per month (36 month contract)
about 3 days
Verizon
"It works...."
"It doesn't work well... about 1000-1300ms latency just to the local router."
"In my oppinion, complete garbage..."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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The only other options are slower dial up... or much more expensive...
I ordered a 3mbps connection... but in the 2 years I've had it I haven't seen it reach near that point.
Contacted tech and customer support so many times it's not even funny, they just don't seem to care.
As soon as the contract expires I'm gone.
Worst decision I ever made.
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Review by radiomaze
UPDATED: 11 days ago
Fair warning: reviewer joined this month
Curwensville,Clearfield,PA
$43 per month (12 month contract)
about 10 days
Verizon
"Connection is fast and reliable"
"Tech support is terrible"
"Good for the money"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I ordered the 3MB down and 1.5 MB up package. My speed averages 2.88MB down and 1MB up. Not bad considering how far away I am from the CO. The only other broadband choice I have is satellite.Installation was a breeze no problems what so ever.My modem is a Westell 6100. My worst experience was with the outsourced broken english speaking tech support. In other words the tech support sucks! But all in all after 5 years of no affordable broadband and having to use dial-up, I'm happy.
Although with the dreaded tech support, they wanted a one time fee of $89 for the Tech 2 "expert" people, just to help me change 2 UDP ports. I need those ports for a special VOIP program I use. I said to the "expert" what he could do with the fee. But in a polite way of course 
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Review by pseudo
UPDATED: 12 days ago
member for 39 days, 19 visits, last login: 2 days ago
Brookline,Norfolk,MA
$53 per month
Verizon
"Used to run fine (6 months ago)"
"Runs extremely slow during peak hours (6PM-12AM)"
"Verizon has major network congestion issues, avoid them"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings below consensus)
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For the past 6 months or so my DSL connection has been running extremely slow every day without exceptions between the hours of 6:00PM and 12:00 AM. During this time I'll get around 300kbps downstream for a connection rated at 7Mbps.
A back and forth with Verizon tech support resulted in them sending out a tech 3 times to my apartment. The tech was unable to find anything wrong with my local connection. He concluded that it was probably a network congestion problem and had me switched to a less congested router. The switch had no effect at all which means that all their routers are congested. In fact, simply looking at the forums here at this site confirms this as many people from different parts of the country complain of the same issue. It's pretty obvious to me that Verizon is aware of these issues (how could they not be?) but figures most people don't notice so it's not worth it to spend the money to upgrade their capacities.
If you live in the Brookline, MA area, there's really no reason to go with Verizon DSL since both RCN and Comcast have connections that go up to 20Mbps for the same price Verizon charges for 7Mbps.
Bottom line:
Avoid Verizon DSL. If you use them, be sure to run speed tests during peak hours to ensure you are getting a consistently acceptable connection. If you find that you're not, switch immediately to a different provider and save yourself the tedious hassle of leading yourself to my same conclusions.
Update:
After calling them to cancel, they had the gall to charge me a termination fee. Unbelievable. "Well the contract states that it provides speeds up to 7Mbps". Yea fine, I don't expect a perfect speed all the time but I at least expect something reasonable (i.e. between 3 and 7mbps).
And by the way, the DSL companies always like to brag that cable is shared but DSL is not. This is completely false as once your unshared phone line reaches the CO, it's shared with everyone else. Yea sure, maybe it's not shared in the immediate neighborhood but who cares. What matters is the bandwidth pipe that you connect to and DSL's is as shared as cable's.
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 Review by perki
UPDATED: 14 days ago
member for 341 days, 388 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Santa Maria,Santa Barbara,CA
$29 per month (12 month contract)
about 790 days
"None"
"Lied To Me For Two Years"
"Worthless"
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I signed up for there 3mbps package back in 2005. For 29.99 a month. I considered comcast but at the time you needed basic cable if you want there internet. So i choose verizon. Not bad if you compare it with 24.99 AOL Dial Up. Boy was i dumb back then. I had no idea old phone lines kill data speed. But that's not the worst part. They over Charge by leaps and bounds. First my contract expired and they raised my price to 39.99 a month! They never called to warn me and i never check the bill cause its on auto pay. After i found that out i canceled right away and switch to comcast. Every Now and then i go to the verizon site praying FIOS has come to my town and of course I'm let down. : ( So i went to see if they lowered there dsl prices and they have but they no longer offer the 3mbps tier. So i called and pretended i was signing up with them and confirmed that they did not have it. What company gets rid of there highest tier? The Answer is of course one that could never provide it to begin with.
So how much many did they suck out of me lets see. Charging $10 more for a package that they could not provide for 12 months is $120 okay and charging $10 more because of a contract expired for 13 months $260 and if you add the two that's $380 dollars!!! Wow that can buy a xbox 360, Guitar Hero World Tour with tax and then go out for a $20 steak. LOL
But it's all done now and no I'm not going to sue. Its my fault for putting full trust in a company.
Just try to avoid if you can.
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Review by hmagoo
Posted: 17 days ago
member for 23 days, 9 visits, last login: 10 days ago
Palm Desert,Riverside,CA
$20 per month (12 month contract)
about 10 days
Verizon
"I am getting 1M/384k service to my house for $20/month, incl. tax/fees."
"I have only DSL service, so billing is a bit strange and apparently crippled."
"Overall a great value for my needs."
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I had TWC Roadrunner since it was initially offered in my area. I used that service for 5+ years. I found it to be completely overpriced and pretty unreliable. If it was free I might have been happy with the quality of the service. Additionally, I no longer desired to pay more for a faster connection.
About a year ago I switched to Verizon DSL Dryloop service. I don't have home landline phone service, so ordering/pricing/checking availabilty was a bit confusing. There are more than a few complications from Verizon when only having a dryloop DSL account. There shouldn't really be any. Billing is different and options are limited more with this type of account. I get no paper bill, and the website does not show the bill in a reasonable time after its in effect.
Customer Service wise, the install was smooth. Tech Support is not the best, but I only had to use them once or twice since I have had the service.
I did have the opportunity to call customer service and was very happy with my experiences. Verizon had made available better services at similar prices after my one year contract had ended. I was able to get the newly advertised prices and speeds without much of a problem, although I think it did involve a decent amount of attention from the service representative.
I never notice any connection problems, or speed reductions while using this service. My ping times are relatively consistent and low. The Westell 6100 Modem/Router provided with the service is reliable and has proven useful when I needed to use it in different capacaties as a router or bridge mode, firewall, etc.
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 Review by bokamba
UPDATED: 18 days ago
member for 7.5 years, 3327 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Falls Church,Falls Church City,VA
$28 per month
about 14 days
Verizon
"Reliable connection, decent price"
"No static IP, slow upload, slower speeds if you're far from the CO"
"Price is less and less competitive for the speed we get"
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Ordered 768/128 DSL in March, over the phone. It took them at least a couple of weeks to get everything set up and to send us the equipment (it's free self-installation), but the service has been smooth.
Equipment they gave us: Westell WireSpeed DSL modem, and 5 microfilters, which was enough. We had to purchase our own network card to connect the modem to our PC. For me (a pretty experienced computer user), the installation was no problem.
Sadly, they only offer PPPoE using WinPOET, but it's not too bad for my purposes. The most annoying part of it is that you have to run a program in the system tray just to be able to connect.
Once the service was set up, I noticed that the download speeds were pretty low. Thanks to DSL Reports' Tweak Test and the DrTCP utility, I was able to get the connection up to full speed, but it would have been nice if Verizon had provided me with this information.
So overall, Verizon has been good to me. I recommend it to anyone who doesn't want to worry about long service contracts or smaller ISPs that might go bankrupt, a la Northpoint.
UPDATE: I ditched WinPOET, and started using RASPPPoE. It's much better!
UPDATE: As of Jan. 2003, no issues, other than the fact that RASPPPoE occasionally screws up (or maybe it is Verizon's fault). Nothing serious.
UPDATE: Jan. 26, 2003 -- service has been slow today. I'm almost positive that it's on Verizon's end, but after spending a long time on hold, the tech wasn't very helpful and told me (after trying one thing that failed) that she couldn't help me since I don't use their PPPoE software and I don't have their default settings on my computer. How ridiculous.
UPDATE: Jan. 27, 2003 -- Found out that the service problems appeared related to packet loss. Talked to an intelligent tech (no hold time!), who helped me out greatly. Seems the problem may be with Qwest rather than Verizon; when she switched me (temporarily) to a Genuity account, the speeds and line quality went back to normal. If the problem doesn't go away by week's end, I'm going to switch my GSP from Qwest to Genuity.
UPDATE: March 16, 2003 -- The packet loss problem went away. Sticking with Qwest, although given their financial difficulties, that could be a mistake.
UPDATE: May 28, 2003 -- I've taken advantage of the new $34.95 per month rate, but I'm too far from the CO to get faster speeds.
UPDATE: August 20, 2003 -- The packet loss and latency problem is back. This time, I can't even get through to tech support; I am disconnected because there are too many people on the lines, and this has happened for 2 days in a row. I have downgraded my rating of their support.
UPDATE: April 23, 2004 -- I'm thinking that Verizon should put in a new CO to make faster DSL available to me, but they haven't. Actually, our neighbors directly across the street can't get DSL for some reason!
UPDATE: August 4, 2004 -- We've had connection reliability problems recently. Not acceptable, and tech support hasn't been helpful.
UPDATE: November 24, 2004 -- no problems recently. We aren't able to upgrade to a faster tier, though.
UPDATE: June 5, 2005 -- we upgraded to the 1500/384 tier about a month ago, once it was made available too people at our distance. We also started having intermittent sync issues possibly related to the higher speed. After some troubleshooting on the phone today, a ticket was opened to have the network folks check our line out more thoroughly. I had a good experience with the support folks today (3 different people since the line got disconnected twice, not Verizon's fault), so I'm upgrading my rating of the tech support. I'm downgrading my rating of the connection reliability. We might have to go back to the slower tier since our modem is apparently working at 97% of capacity at the higher speed tier.
UPDATE: June 10, 2005 -- a very friendly, very experienced tech came to the house today (two days late). Bottom line: we're really, really far away from the CO (perhaps as much as 20,000 feet, and the wire in our neighborhood is 26-gauge, which is thinner than DSL prefers. So we're going back to the lower speed tier in the hopes that it will bring back connection stability. But now our upload speed seems to be 75 kbps, when previously it was always at least 128 on the slow tier. The technician was a great guy; knew his stuff and did it quickly. After he finished, we chatted on a whole variety of unrelated topics for quite a while.
UPDATE: January 4, 2006 -- things are still running all right, though it seems like disconnections have become an issue. Still waiting for FiOS to be available; that will be a much better deal once it comes to our neighborhood.
UPDATE: March 30, 2006 -- switched to the $15 per month plan, since it's at the same speed. It's a 12-month contract, but that shouldn't be a problem. I estimate it'll be about $20 a month once taxes and fees are added.
UPDATE: February 13, 2007 -- No connection problems. The 128 kbps upload speed is definitely a more serious shortcoming nowadays.
UPDATE: May 21, 2007 -- Connection is perfectly stable but 128 kbps upload is killing me. Waiting for FiOS, which will hopefully arrive eventually.
UPDATE: January 12, 2008 -- Still working fine, still waiting for FiOS.
UPDATE: April 14, 2009 -- Connection is stable and we're getting the speed we pay for (768/128). FiOS is supposed to arrive in our neighborhood soon.
UPDATE: October 20, 2009 -- Connection is stable and we're getting the speed we pay for. FiOS is now available, but costs about $12 more per month, so we are waiting for further price reductions before we switch.
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