All Scale Trek

When I moved to the house we built eight years ago the very first surprise was that we figured out that we didn't have cable internet available here. Along almost two years I depended on a friend that lended me a space in one of his stores where I could put my desk in a small corner to work.

Then I got two 3G modems and moved my office back to home and although it was a terrible service I could work. More a few time and we got a radio internet service that was the best we had... until last December when the small company that provided the service was sold to a bigger company from outside town.

Almost immediately the service became crappy without absolutely no support. They didn't keep a local repair team and the customer phone is now disconnected. Last week, the signal that was coming and going stopped forever and since they don't have the toll free number anymore (and I am not going to make a long distance call to complain about their service). I suppose that they decided that the local clients weren't worth and so just abandoned us.

I contacted another service (fiber optic) and am awaiting them to come and install.

In the meantime I contracted an expensive and crappy 4G service (the 4G signal in my area is weak so actually the modem gets only 3G and keep disconnecting every now and then preventing me to use internet more than 5 minutes at once).

At the moment I am using it, my mobile phone and a public paid internet point that I have to drive 10km back and forth to use.

Imagine how stressed I am since my day job is a remote employment that I fully depend on internet and besides I have other four small home business that equally depends on the service to keep alive.

I will never that line of coaxial cable for granted again.

I forgot to mention that I stopped to pay the crappy radio service that was abandoned by the new owners. Two days ago was the monthly day I should pay it. Of course I didn't and just awaited because I knew what would happen. Bingo. Today I received an email from them asking me to pay. In a few days they may contact me again menacing to cut the service (lol). I really hope they do that. Let's see how far it goes until they decide to make me a phone call to know what's going on.

I don't have to say that I don't trust them anymore and that I won't want they around no matter what. By the way I started a process against them last week just in case they have the stupid idea of charge me judicially. Actually I am asking for indenization for all the days they left me without internet. I really don't care about the money (I wanted the service) but if I can bug them a little that's what I will do. And if I can get some cash in the process I won't complain at all.

I like how your mind works. It's not the cost or whether they'll retain a customer. It's the principle of it all

That's the idea!

Today they sent me the second "reminder" about payment...

And now I am going crazy with the 4G modem. It just gets 3G signal and doesn't let me keep connected for more than 5 minutes.

Beside the bad service with a ridiculous bandwidth of 8 GB for $80 I still paid $180 for the modem and had to accept a contract clause where I concur to pay a fine of $350 if I want to cancel the service earlier than 12 months. Dude!

Another one that I will put under Justice. We have a consumer protection organ here called PROCON that helps people with such abuses. Next week I will be starting a new complain this time against those guys. It's a big telecomm company called "Vivo".

Hate it.

It may or may not be helpful, but Vivo here where I'm at is a royal pain as well.

Moongrim wrote:It may or may not be helpful, but Vivo here where I'm at is a royal pain as well.

Wow, so you have this same crap there. I don't know if you are aware of it but it's a Portugal company and its name means "Alive" in English. I think it should be called "Morto" that means "Dead".



We don't have a lot of cell comm options here (around three or four in the whole country I think) and believe it or not Vivo is the "less worse" among them. The Vivo service for mobile is a tad better and I have my phone service mostly of time, although it gets lost eventually too. The funny part is that the 3G on my mobile is too much more stable than in the modem being it the SAME company. Doesn't it puzzling? Unless that the problem is in the stupid ZTE modem.



Miraculously I am connected for about 15 minutes now and the connection didn't get interrupted (yet) but the speed is horrible, very slow...

Third email charging me today. I think this is an automated system and it may continue for a few days. Since they are just simple reminders I am not caring too much about. But I am really eager to receive a message with any kind of menace because I will collect it and save to attach to the process.