unSUCKing believable
So I have had been enjoying my DSL internet connection, and my cable co-free life. And then my ISP apparently decided they had been much too nice to me.
Over the past weekend, my DSL seemed to be suffering from brief hiccups. Brief enough that when I checked to see why my connection just went down, it was already back up. That was a small annoyance that I planned to call Cincinnati Bell about Monday morning.
But come Monday morning I had bigger problems. By then my DSL connection would not stay up for any more than 30 seconds at a time. It was essentially unusable (I did try however, loading webpages in between disconnects -- what fun).
I got in touch with tech support and they had a solution: lower the speed until it becomes stable. They hit 768 Kb down/ 420 Kb up before it quit bouncing up and down. Needless to say I was not impressed. OK, you got it stable for now, when are you going to send someone out to fix the problem that cropped up over the weekend, necessitating this reduction in speed?
They told me there would be no truck roll. No, they said the minimum guaranteed speed is 768 Kb and they expected me to be happy suddenly paying 5 Mb rates for 768 Kb download speeds. They must have been hitting the crack pipe really hard over the weekend. I couldn't believe it. Clearly my line supported higher speeds, as it was working great near 3 Mb for about eight weeks. Still, they refused to dispatch a tech, even when I told them I would be canceling my service otherwise.
So even though I have yet to resolve my final bill with the cable company (BIG fucking surprise, their billing system still SUCKS) I grudgingly .... (pause for effect) no, SUPER grudgingly called up Time Warner and told them ... :cringe: .... that I wanted to order cable internet service.
But at this point things got a little interesting. My old cable service was 6 Mb / 386 Kb, and I assumed I would be getting the same speed again. However, while the rep placed my order, she told me about their new "turbo" package, which is $9/month more than the standard service.... and gets you 15 Mb / 768 Kb. It didn't take me long to make that decision. I said OK, sign me up. Maybe dealing with their fucked up billing system will be less frustrating if I can download shit really quickly. We'll see.
Update:
I am enjoying the 15 Mb download speed, but I just received another bill from the cable company relating to the service I canceled last month. It says payment is due on receipt and it mentions the possibility of collections if it is not resolved. The bill is for negative $5.59.
This is the third and most urgent notice they have sent me about the fact that they owe me five dollars and change. I called them after the first such notice and they said they would be mailing me a check, which I have yet to receive. This is insane.
