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General discussion

Windstream_Oversold Bandwith_Nothing Being Done_Please Help

Jul 6, 2007 6:13AM PDT

This is the issue i have, ive posted before about it but i have some more details on it that actually come straight from windstream.

In my town and the surrounding areas, over the course of the past yeat the DSL service from windstream/alltel, has been nothing but horrible. If you plan to use the internet at any time of the day that any other normal human being would, consider it unusable, from mid-day until at least midnight, sometimes even more, the speeds fluctuate rediculously and pings easily will idle at 500-700.

I actually work in the IT Department for my local government and am an IS major, we are Windstreams biggest local customer at work also. But ill stick with talking about at home service for this. But the reason i bring work into it to begin with is that my boss is actually friends with the guy who works at the local C.O.

This local guy had come to my house to check my connection when they wouldnt believe that it wasnt my issue it was on their end, but he came at a time in the morning when not that many people are on the internet in our area (small town) and so of course everything checked out. One day when he was actually at our courthouse, he joked with me saying "did i ever fix my DSL?" I replied with "i would have but its not me its you" I said i have several friends and familys connections who ive tested as well during the hours that mine acts up and theirs all do the same exact thing.
This same day, he aslo offered to upgrade our DSL for work to 6meg from 3, telling us it was now available, my boss said ok to do it.

Few days later it was never upgraded and my boss calls and asks him about it, and he basicly told him that they are able to sell it here now, but they cant deliver it until the equipment is upgraded, that they have sold more bandwith than they have available and need a DS3 upgrade. He aslo told him to keep that on the hush hush, i wasnt even supposed to know which is why i never called in about it.

Well finally yesterday i got so frustrated with not being able to watch even a streaming youtube video, browse the net at a decent pace, forget online gaming, that i did call anyways, and told them that same story but with more detail since i was talking and not typing. They had no solution for me but the guy did say he does see a latency issue marked for my area and that they are "aware" of it now and that it had just been updated again that day, but he didnt show any other details other than that. He then put me on hold to check on one more other thing and of course the line instantly went busy.

The problem i have with this is it seems like any time i call they already have " a known issue of it in my area" but nothing ever gets done about it. I mean literally going on a year of this BS and nothing has been done. No one even "noticed" it until i started calling everday and pointed it out to the guy which is just sad.

My main thing is i really dont know what to do about this. SHould i keep calling support and try to get a few local friends to call as well.

SHould i ask to speak to level 2 or 3 support, or does windstream even offer this....

Im just so damn frustrated because im getting no discount on it, but im being delivered a complete pile of s**t. Any suggestions...

Discussion is locked

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"ive posted before" but where?
Jul 6, 2007 6:20AM PDT

This looks like your first post. But I could be wrong. Can you supply a link to your prior post?

As to your complaint, why did you stick with DSL?

Bob

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Windstream_Oversold Bandwith_Nothing Being Done_Please Help
Jul 6, 2007 6:40AM PDT

my bad i havent posted here before, i took the same message i posted over at DSL reports and pasted it here to get some more opinions on the issue... sorry!

but DSL is the only option here, windstream has a monopoly on both phone and dsl on this and the other 2 or 3 surrounding areas

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I don't know where "here" is.
Jul 6, 2007 9:49PM PDT

But here we have wireless broadband as well. It's not cheap but it works for those odd places.

Good luck with your quest.

Bob

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When I call, the tech representative cries mercy!
Jul 8, 2007 9:23AM PDT

OK, not really, but I've called technical support a lot in my short life of 16 years.

Here is a good strategy. Run a internet speed test (either Windstream's or speedtest.net). Get a percentage of how much you are getting. Most people consider 90% the breaking point where it is not you anymore, but the company. Of course, it differs for different people. Anyways, call them up and tell them about your speed problem. If they say they are looking into it, tell them how long you have had the problem. If the rep. still isn't doing anything about it, ask to transferred to their manager. Then talk to the manager about how you are dissatisfied with your service. Tell him about the percentage, etc. A good calculation, too, would be to see how much "extra" you are paying. Like, if it is $40 per month for 6Mpbs and you are only getting 3Mbps, tell them that they are charging you $20 extra. In a sense. Usually, managers are kind and will listen to you. If not, ask to be transferred to their manager, if they have one. Keep calling.

I was actually thinking of switching to Windstream, but darn, even Bellsouth is better than this!

~Ibrahim~

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Welcome to WYSIWYG
Jul 10, 2007 7:32AM PDT

In short - you get what you pay for. It does not matter if it is DSL or Cable. In certain areas at certain times you will have slow speeds due to bandwidth saturation. Most larger Providers over sell the bandwidth - Just like the airlines - in order to attempt to make money. Most Telco's loose money on the Internet access b/c they are after the local and Long distance services. In addtion, most Internet access agreements include somewhere in the small print, that the 1.5, 3.0 or 6MB connection is between your location and the ISP. Once you get on the network - all bets are off. look for "bandwidth speeds may vary due to the nature of the world wide web" - in other words, the out bound pipe(s) are probably not large enough to handle the peak times. 10 pounds of ???? in a 2 LB bag.

The fact that they are aware of an issue is just that - they are aware, but until the business case shows that it makes sense to increase the Backend bandwidth (cost) - it probably won't happen.

For the most part, consumer bandwidth is under priced for the speeds that you are supposed to be getting.

Another thing to think about - Just becuase the 6Mb package is availabe does not mean you will get better speeds that a 3MB package. DSL is distant dependant based on your location from the DSL equipment (located in a CO or remote terminal) and the high speed packages have a smaller servcie area than the 3Mb package. Your location may be in the middle of the 3Mb servcie area, but at the out edge of the 6Mb area.