[TriLUG] Earthlink as ISP

[Cristóbal Palmer]

On Friday, January 24, 2014 at 8:23 AM, Bill Farrow wrote:
>  
> Are there any downsides ?

I’ll give you downsides from a recent (within the last three months) attempt to order home service with Earthlink:

A. I ordered home internet service on their website and received a confirmation email saying I would be contacted about installation within 2 business days. That didn’t happen.

B. I reviewed their welcome email and website, whereupon I discovered that the website said 5 business days (vs. 2 in the email), so I called Earthlink. Phone support staff apologized and said they would transfer me to their “department” that would handle installation, but I was transferred to Time Warner Cable (TWC), who aggressively tried to up-sell me on triple-play. That is, the TWC rep repeatedly tried to convince me that I could “save money” by doing all three of phone, home internet, and cable TV with them despite the fact that I don’t have (nor do I want) two of those services and told them so three times before they would drop the issue. I ended the call when the TWC agent said my SSN was required to complete the application for installation (?!)[0].

C. I receive postal mail (USPS) from Earthlink welcoming me to their service. This has in plain text my email address with them (which is my username in their system) and the password for that account. I’m glad I used a randomly-generated password for that account.

D. After five business days had elapsed, I reached out again to Earthlink and asked if they had any service that was not on TWC infrastructure. They did, but its upstream is 384Kbps, which is less than I have now and the price is very close to what I am now paying.

I’m sure there are plenty of reasons to be happy with Earthlink, and I’m happy for people who have had good experiences. If people have suggestions for a script to follow to actually get service with them without being driven up a wall in frustration, I’d welcome them. I have a DOCSIS 3 cable modem that is currently not in use, and as frustrated as I am with the experiences described above, I’d still rather go with Earthlink than TWC given previous frustrating experiences with TWC/Roadrunner.

Alternatively, does anybody want to pursue setting up a non-profit networking co-op that actually provides an alternative to the incumbents? I don’t have significant capital, but I’d provide labor. I’m only half joking.

Cheers,
--  
Cristóbal Palmer
cmpalmer.org


[0] I recognize that this is mostly a TWC complaint and not an Earthlink complaint. Still, if Earthlink are going to provide a customer service layer on top of TWC infrastructure, they should be able to do better than passing me to a TWC phone rep. Furthermore, the TWC rep asserted that TWC handles billing for Earthlink customers, so a credit check was actually legitimate and called for. This I found baffling for two reasons. What am I paying Earthlink for again? Secondly, why can’t I just give a credit card and pay at the beginning of the cycle? Alternatively, why can’t I pay a deposit?