AOl... idiots and cheats..............

mike230652

AAArrgghh!!

I've been with AOL for years now, no real issues.

I pay for the 8 meg + package and take line rental and calls included...at £22.00 per month.

My speeds dropped from around 5.5-7.8 meg to 2.6-2.8 meg about 3 weeks back. I lived with it expecting it to remedy itself. However, it never did.

I rang their call centre...:mad: After MANY calls and BS answers from them I eventually got a Level 2 Technician, he's probably the guy who doesn't need pictures to read from the script.

He put me through hoops over 4 different calls, line checks etc etc etc.

He then admitted to me that AOL have actually downgraded the speed from the exchange ( 500 metres away from me! ) to a max of 2.8 megs. the reason is they have a lot more cutomers and the higher speed was de- stabilising the lines, whereas 2.8 megs means all customers get decent reception!!!

I even allowed them to send an engineer to my home to check in case the fault was internal... he confirmed there's nothing wrong at my end... and the max I'll get is 2.8 megs.

Obviously, I want out of the contract since I'm not getting the speeds I'm paying for, AOL are saying to me that when I agreed to the all inclusive line rental etc contract, it doesn't actually state what speed I'll get, so they won't let me out of the contract unless I pay in full to the end of the contract, although they admit they've reduced my speed from a max of 7.8 megs to 2.8 megs!

This is ridiculous, I'm getting less speed than I was and they're just messing me about, and hiding behind their contract.

Any suggestions?

Carpi10

I had these problems with AOL years ago, i'm shocked they are still in business. The customer service is appauling.

wilkies5

They get out of it by actually saying your internet service ' is up to 8Mb '...which you have proved is nowhere near happening!

It's not a surprise.

macman

2.8Mbps is up to 8Mbps.
So you are getting what you paid for. Because you got more last week, doesn't contractually mean that they have to give you that speed forever.
All you can do is vote with your feet and move to a decent ISP.
I'm not clear if you are still in contract, as you say you have been with them 'for years'.
Another potential piece of bad news-if they sent out an OR engineer and no fault was found, then you will find a £130 call out charge added to your next bill (this is charged by OR to TT, who will recharge you). All call outs are chargeable unless a fault is found at the master socket or upstream of it. All internal faults and no-faults are charged.

mike230652

macman wrote: »

2.8Mbps is up to 8Mbps.
So you are getting what you paid for. Because you got more last week, doesn't contractually mean that they have to give you that speed forever.
All you can do is vote with your feet and move to a decent ISP.
I'm not clear if you are still in contract, as you say you have been with them 'for years'.
Another potential piece of bad news-if they sent out an OR engineer and no fault was found, then you will find a £130 call out charge added to your next bill (this is charged by OR to TT, who will recharge you). All call outs are chargeable unless a fault is found at the master socket or upstream of it. All internal faults and no-faults are charged.

Hi.... I had a Gold Package prior to the latest agreement which guaranteed speeds between 4 and 8 megs...so I can't see how they can sign me to a new agreement and then admit they've downgraded the line... no doubt they'll try.

As regards the engineer.... I only allowed them to send an engineer on the basis it was no charge ( they suggested the engineer, not me. ) I only allowed it once I got the e-mail from AOL confirming there would be no charge whether or not they found a fault at my end...so I'm covered on that.

What's really annoyed me is the lies and BS they've tried to feed me... from needing new filters ( claiming they only last 6 months ) to a poor router ( they supplied it! ). Then claiming I only ever had a max 2.8 megs ( disproved when their own records showed I was getting up to 8 megs until the last few weeks...) The fact is I've had good speeds up to 1st August which is when they admit they've reduced the speed to everyone. Just wish they'd be honest about their little tricks... If I rent and pay the price for a 1.8 litre car, I don't expect to be given a 1.2 Litre!!

Let's see what happens, I'll update the forum as and when....lol!


Anyone know any good ISP's in the Durham area?

macman

Go to https://www.samknows and do an exchange search for the available LLU suppliers on your exchange: broadband is exchange-specific.

Mark_In_Hampshire

Given your engineer visit I'm suspecting that the maximum sync rate for the line is 2.8Mbps and not the maximum throughput (though the latter is always less than the former, it can't be the other way around)

You must have a very poor quality and/or long phone line if it isn't capable of a sync of more than 2.8Mbps and you're only 500m from the exchange. A line of say 800m long on a 20CN "Up to 8Mbps" service should really see a full or near full sync at the full 7150kbps profile (the top rate for that service)

There could be multiple reasons, but if the sync rate dropped sharply perhaps the physical pair has been swapped by Openreach for another one. (I do wonder what Openreach "do" with the knackered pair when they "resolve" a defective broadband line). AOL don't operate the phone network and simply rent their services from Openreach/BT Wholesale. So there isn't, actually, a lot they can do. Line speeds do change over time, but they don't generally degrade like yours has quite so rapidly.

If the ISP subscribes to a particular code of conduct then the customer may escape without penalty if the *original estimated speed* cannot be met. But that is recent and probably later than your sign up.

You could change to what's called an "LLU" supplier (advice as per macman above) which places a bit less of the "BT kit" in the loop, but the biggest chokepoint is the physical line itself. If it can only do that sync rate then nobody is going to be able to better it by any meaningful degree.

When you have a look at the Samknows data, do see which exchange you're connected to. If it isn't the one 500m down the road from you, that might be why it's so slow.

Finally, if you post up the statistics reported by your router (things like attenuation, sync rate, ip profile, modulation type) then people can have a look at that and perhaps get closer to the truth of what may have happened as so far there can only be hypothesis and supposition.