US Telco Support > AT&T > AT&T U-verse > TV cancellation...easy!

TV cancellation...easy!

I used to work for AT&T at a retail location and we were able to sell the Uverse internet standalone all the time. The only hitch was that with the TV/internet the installation was free, but with internet by itself AT&T charged a $100 installation fee.

reply to zqfmbg
Not anymore dude, they aren't allowing people to do this anymore. I already called to inquire about this and they told me in no uncertain terms that it can't be done. They just lost a potential customer with that statement.
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Tom

reply to trparky
Do you already have service? Or did you just call them up as a prospective customer and ask whether they would disconnect your TV if you ordered TV and Internet?

Someone else reported they recently were able to unhook their TV without difficulty. It can't be that we were just lucky.

reply to zqfmbg
I ordered last week. Tech came out on the 3rd could not install it. Second tech came out the 5th and here I am.

I just ordered u-verse vdsl. At first the lady said I had to get it with the iptv service, after letting her know that my current dsl service with them was poor, and techs who have come to my home in the past have told me as such (6-10 snr, 60 atten.), she put me on hold for about a minute. When she came back she told me it would be ok, plus no installation fees. I called yesterday to the billing department to get the estimate of my future bill and the person confirmed there would be no extra fees. My old dsl could only get up to the 3.0mb service. The new vdsl I ordered is the 6.0 service (29-30 snr, 7 atten.) In conclusion, switching from stand alone dsl from att to only vdsl uverse service for me was pretty easy.

Note, pings do seem a bit higher. I'm on interleaved now. My old dsl switched between fastpath and interleaved. Anyone been able to successfully switch to fastpath? Since iptv or voip is not an issue I would hope it would be less of a problem.

It's difficult to ORDER U-Verse without TV. People are reporting it is still easy to disconnect TV after the install is completed. It might require a trip to retentions but that's no big deal.

reply to South Fl CrlSpr
All the Uverse ckts I look at always say interleaved. Perhaps its because the service is designed for video and quality of the packets is more important.
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Americans don't care how much something costs, as long as they don't have to pay for it all at once.

reply to trparky
I just called ATT-2020 and was told I could not order U-verse Internet only even if I could not get ATT DSL. She told it was possible last year, but as of this year all U-verse orders must include TV.

reply to zqfmbg

reply to South Fl CrlSpr

reply to Rendell
The "no fees" thing is a misnomer -- they will prorate for the amount of time you've had the service. The trial period stuff apparently means the whole service, not just the TV.

I didn't bother with U200 (probably should have), but as I understand it: no, you won't get the rebate if you cancel now. You won't be charged for install, but you won't get the rebate. If you cancel after you get the rebate you'll pay more for having had the service longer. But I bet it's still less than $200.

reply to zqfmbg
Thanks. I think you answered my question. Since half of what the sales person told me wasn't really true, I wanted to make sure I would still be able to cancel the TV after waiting for the rebate and that I wouldn't be locked into some kind of a contract.

reply to zqfmbg

said by zqfmbg:

The "no fees" thing is a misnomer -- they will prorate for the amount of time you've had the service. The trial period stuff apparently means the whole service, not just the TV.

I didn't bother with U200 (probably should have), but as I understand it: no, you won't get the rebate if you cancel now. You won't be charged for install, but you won't get the rebate. If you cancel after you get the rebate you'll pay more for having had the service longer. But I bet it's still less than $200.

reply to zqfmbg
I would like to know the real story on this.

One of my considerations when buying the service was the ability to drop the TV side at-any-time.

Actually, I doubt I would drop it now anyway... it is awesome.

I have read nothing that says TV is a necessity with Uverse in my area.

Not as easy as suggested!!
Let me say that my experience with the techs that came to my house and the rep on the phone when I tried to cancel were OUTSTANDING. They were great. Very professional and courteous.
I initially had DirecTV, "Bellsouth" 6 meg DSL and "Preferred phone package" (about $45 a month with fees). I saw that ATT U-Verse was available in my neighborhood in Suwanee. I asked for the U-verse TV (U-200 I think) which got me the HD DVR and asked for an extra STB for the second TV. I also asked for the U-verse Internet 6 meg, and the ATT U-verse phone (VOIP was not available but the said they would just use my existing POTS and match the features and price ($30 not counting fees). The install was set for about a week later. The techs came out on time, called before coming, checked everything out. Had a good clean line from the VRAD. Another tech came to do the "inside work". I had already installed CAT5e cable to my PC's and TV's. He changed a few things in the phone box. Ran a CAT5e cable into the house from the phone box and hooked it into the residential gateway (the RG). The DVR was hooked into the network and the other STB was hooked into the network also. My 2Wire DSL modem was replaced with a 2Wire RG (3800HGV-B).

HDTV----------
I left DirecTV installed so I could compare the HDTV from ATT & DirecTV. My first observation was the ATT HDTV was not as sharp as the DirecTV HD. ATT had a "soft" look. It was also pixelated at times. I noticed background shifting and color gradients. I think this is mainly due to the compression of the signal. I also could only watch one HDTV stream or record one HDTV(I couldn't due both at the same time). A tech came back the next day and said it was because of my distance from the "box" (I was around 3200 feet). He said he couldn't do anything more for me at the time but he hoped that it would improve in the future.

Internet-----
I was quite satisfied with my "Bellsouth" DSL at 6 megs (consistently getting 6000 to 6100 download speed).
With the ATT U-Verse 6meg I was getting avg of 5700 but my upload speed went from avg of 425 to 900 upload speed).

Phone service ------------
Basically I got a better price with ATT U-Verse for $30.

My decision - cancel ATT U-verse HDTV and keep ATT U-Verse Internet and phone.

I got a great rep on the phone who was very patient and helpful. Told him my decision. He was surprised that the quality wasn't better on the HDTV. He said he had not had anyone who wanted to cancel the TV and keep the internet and asked me to hold on.

He came back on the line and stated I couldn't keep the ATT U-verse Internet if I canceled the HDTV part. He went back to several managers and said since DSL was available in my area I couldn't keep the Uverse Internet. I wanted to upgrade to the 10meg Uverse. He said I could be hooked up to tthe DSL but I'd have to cancel the UVerse internet and I'd be without the internet for a few days.

Hold the phone!!! (pun intended)
I said you mean you'll send another crew out to "unhook" everything you set up and "re-install" everything you took out for DSL when I'm willing to pay you for a higher grade of internet service? Isn't a little "expensive" on ATT's part??? I told him if that was the case I was going to be a very unhappy customer. He said he understood. Went back on hold to talk to another manager. (I could tell he was frustrated at not being able to grant what I wanted). He came back on and stated since I was an "existing" customer I could keep the ATT U-verse internet. He talked to another manager and was told if I was a "new customer" that keeping the internet portion was contingent upon keeping the HDTV portion. But since I was an existing customer I could keep the internet portion. He upgraded me to the 10 meg and he also said he was crediting my next month's phone bill for $65 for the "aggravation" of the past half hour. He said they would send out boxes and labels to return the DVR & STB.

TV cancellation easy???????????? Your mileage may vary. That's my experience. I wanted ATT U-Verse HDTV to work but it's not up to the quality of DirecTV in HD. I'm a little too far from the box and I think their compression factor needs a bit of tweaking. I'm getting a good 10 meg download speed and a good 1 meg upload speed.

Not exactly "smooth sailing" but I am still a "satisfied" customer thanks to the great representatives with which I had contact.

There's no accounting for lazy or uninformed support reps.

All the rep had to do was click cancel on the TV portion of the service. He was apparently unwilling to do so. Maybe they'd had some "policy briefing" or something.

If I get someone who clearly does not know what they are doing I just say "OK Thanks don't do anything I'll think about it." then I hang up and call back. Generally you don't get a loser like that twice in a row.

BTW I had a similar experience with the TV service as you did. It just wasn't as good as my cable service for HD. It wasn't terrible, it just wasn't as good. So I did cancel the TV portion.

You are right, so I feel fine about it. However, it would be nice to have some clear defined policy for a change.

reply to clint50
(VOIP was not available but the said they would just use my existing POTS and match the features and price ($30 not counting fees)

WHOA! That is cool.

You said that a tech came back the next day who told you that because of your distance from the "box" (3200 feet) that you can't record 2HD's at once. Are you SURE that is true? Did anyone tell you what your raw line was running at? Mine is 68mbps.