Former WildBlue Tech Support Agent
The following post was written by a former tech support agent for WildBlue Satellite Internet service. This website takes no responsibility for the accuracy or content of the message and has not confirmed the validity of the post (not that WildBlue would confirm it) so please use at your own risk.
FORMER WILDBLUE TECHNICAL SUPPORT AGENT
I was just terminated today July 26, 2010 from Wildblue.
The reason for my termination was that I took a telephone call from an angry customer that was told that Wildblue was 10 times faster than Cable and DSL.
I told the customer that that statement was not true and we were slower than cable and dsl.
I also asked the customer if she had cable or dsl available in here area.
For telling the customer that wildblue was slower than DSL/cable and asking her if she had DSL/Cable in here area, I was terminated.
If a customer called with slow speeds, we were just instructed to have them fill out 2 forms called Information Gathering (http://help.wildblue.net/care/article/4113&n=1) and Slow Connectivity (http://help.wildblue.net/care/article/4117&n=4). We also had to open a ticket which we would close at the end of the call and give a ticket number to the customer. We would have the customer log on to toast.net to perform 3 speed tests. Once speed came back lower than the customer was paying for, we told the customer the following: Speeds are not guaranteed. Your rate plan has UP TO 1.5mbps (for pro), 1.0mbps (select), 512kbps (value). The actual Wildblue average for Value was 200kbps, Select 500kbps, Pro 900kbps. We would tell the customer everything was working fine as long as they were close to average. If they were not close to average, we would make up some story about how testing at toast.net is never 100% accurate, or it was the web hosts problem like hostrocket, yahoo, godaddy and not our problem. We would then get the customer off the telephone and move on to our next call.
Our Fair Access Policy was horrible as well. It was a rolling 30 day period which means it could go to 2 different billing cycles and never start over at the time your new bill is paid. It pretty much went back 30 days from each day. Example, if today is July 26, 2010, it took usage from June 27th, 2010 to today.
Hughes net gives you unlimited downloading between the hours of 1am to 6am. We never had any unlimited downloading.
Our system was horrible when it was cloudy, snowing, raining, pretty much horrible all together.
I assisted customers with technicians not showing up, modem being offline, customers calling after 3 months of install and into a contract and having to pay $95 to have a technician come out and fix a faulty install (I should say wind storm instead of faulty install since we never would blame our technicians for a bad install we always had to ask if they had storms lately, etc)
We would give you a free Discount Repair Program, Month of Service and Service call if you said the Magic Words, “I am going to cancel”. Pretty much “I am going to cancel” is the statement you need to use to get things free from Wildblue.
We had 3 different systems we would use. Infinys (name of our Billing Program), Support Portal (name of our system that can see if your service is up and running) and CIMS (the system to initially look up the customer). Link to Infinys is https://portal.servicecenter.wildblue.net:8772/go?to=UA_Signin&from=dummy&task=dummy&redirectFlag=true Support Portal https://portal.servicecenter.wildblue.net/ and CIMS https://cims.wildblue.cust-serv.com/WildBlueCims/login.aspx
Infinys was a program designed by Convergys. I am not sure who designed Support Portal and CIMS.
The customer knowledge base was help.wildblue.net/kb/ The employees knowledge base was help.wildblue.net/care/
The Wildblue default installer ID was 34853836. We would always have to use then when customers were suspended for the system not letting them sign the customer agreement. This happened all the time.
When a customer called to pay a bill we would process it in the Infinys program and we never had a confirmation number since I do not believe the charge was instant. So pretty much you could call with an invalid credit card or one with insufficient funds and we would turn you back on and not know about it for a day or so.
The simple fact of the matter is that Wildblue was not a very good service. People constantly called with problems and forget about getting online if it is Cloudy or raining. Also forget about getting decent speeds in some areas because they have way too many people on a circuit than they should have.
We were trained to always Apologize to the customer and try and talk nice to them under any circumstance. We always had to say at the end of the call “For your convenience, you can chat live with us at wildblue.net” This always seemed to make the customers get mad and they would say, “I would if I had internet service, etc”
So I guess if I were stuck living out in the Country I would probably choose HughesNet. #1 because they are a KU BAND service which works in the rain/clouds, #2 they have been around longer #3 Commerical businesses use them, #4 From talking to our customers they always talked about having hughesnet in the past and it sounded like a much better system from what they described. (I did use HughesNet back in the 90’s when it was one way receive only. It worked pretty good
actually)
Hope this helps clear up everything with WildBlue.
Our Technical Escalations Department telephone number was 1-877-711-0049. This has a Wildblue agent waiting 24 hours a day that can fix your problem instantly. THEY DO NOT GIVE THIS NUMBER OUT TO REGULAR GENERAL PUBLIC, you have to call a regular Wildblue Tech agent before they will call to this department on your behalf. Personally I would call this number if I were a WildBlue customer and get straight to the source for help in getting your service restored.
The problems with WildBlue are endless. I am having trouble running my home business where I live! I feel conned by Wildblue; it’s one of the most misleading sales and infuriating customer experiences I’ve ever had to deal with.
If you’re unfortunate enough to be in an area that is only serviced by Wildblue Internet, you’ll soon discover that you’re not actually getting access to the Internet like DSL and Cable. What you’re actually paying for is a “squirt of bandwidth”, the rest they’ve reserved for whatever; or perhaps they’re simply incompetent in this modern age.
Even if you pay for the highest residential package, unless you operate in basic HTML mode and stay away from Internet video/music, you’re usage will fly off their charts and you’ll basically be kicked off the Internet during “peak hours” (which apparently is most of the day and night). They claim that you’re merely slowed down, but I can’t even load my good email login page in basic HTML mode without it timing out.
My impression of Wildblue Internet is that they simply have developed a very bad and arrogant corporate culture. Talking to the Sales Department is disturbing. Not one was polite, empathetic, or even helpful. Condescending and defensive is what I found them to be. However, customer service is helpful with general stuff, unless you bring up the collective Fair Use Policy, as they refer to it. They’re fiercely defensive about the FAP, to the point of being rude. It’s bazaar. In fact, they seem to have no problem with shoving their 2 year minimum contract in your face, termination fees ‘n all!
If you need to upgrade to a business account, you’ll be held to the residential account contract along with a per-month-remaining cancellation fee. This is odd; I’m assuming the same satellites are being used and Wildblue is still being paid by YOU! And yet…
The long list of WildBlue’s business providers is problematic at best if you live rural. Wildblue’s sales department is no help in this area. You’ll have to call each one yourself. We use one computer for a home business and the other computer for a day job. That’s it. Nothing complicated. But our business relies on it. “Oh we don’t do that anymore” was the response from each provider. We’re outta luck!
Wildblue Internet operates in Internet Land as if it were still the Dark Ages. Wildblue is way out of touch with Internet reality in the 21st Century.
Add me to the list of former Hughes.net customers who mistakenly thought WB would be an improvement. As much as I LOATHE the lying cheats at Hughes, it was WAY better than Wildblue. I’m currently being punished by WB for exceeding the download FAP one time in 18 months. It will be approximately 45 days before my average (with the WB modem unplugged!) to drop from 112% to 70%. So I’ll be paying over $100.00 for no service. Color me screwed too.
Color me screwed as well. I have Dish Network which unfortunately, in this area, uses Wild Blue, which should actually be called the Wild Bold Faced Liars. I went through the “Speed Test” with a technician that informed me that I was actually getting a higher speed than what I was paying for (home level) and that the problem was in my computer not their service. What the feeble minded bloke didn’t know is that I am a travel writer and that I take my laptop with me everywhere. I can watch a Netflix movie on this supposedly slow computer at any Wi-Fi location but at home I’m lucky if I can get a 3 minute YouTube Video to load in under 20 minutes.
Of course I live out in the middle of nowhere, by choice and was told we’d be getting cable within the year. That was 15 years ago. Everyone out here hates Wild Blue and I’ll be sure to pass on this website information to them. What good that will do I’m not sure, as if so much as a flea farts we lose our service, nevermind any other weather conditions.
I’ve complained to Dish Network and all they can do is tell me to take it up with Wild Blue.
I’m so glad I found this article as I was about to upgrade. That would be a waste. Now that I have a Smart Phone I can check email and facebook from there. Anything else can wait til I’m back in civilization. I’ll just cancel Wild Blue all together. Good Riddance to the worst company and customer service I’ve ever experienced.
I am a 52 yr. old tech and I can relate to your experience with corporate america and the prevailing attitudes at a large company. The lack of compassion and the condecending remarks come from people that enjoy power they perceive to have over the lowly customers, don’t forget we are why they are there…and as soon as the last person that gave a rats ass about a customer quit in disgust, well that was when the company took a shit! You came in at a time when a good manager should have been telling his superiors that wildblue needed HELP! Unless they were happy with ripping people off, they would have made things better.
lousy signal, upgraded to no different speeds. going to switch to hughes, nothing to lose
OMG If I had only known. Wildblue is the worst. I can work at home… that is if I had online access. I wait up to 45 minutes just to open a 13 page document, and forget about saving it. Then when the system stalls out and you have to reload it. Guess what you are charged for the time to reload. It is much worse then dial up ever was. I read the techs post about Hughes net. I am going to contact them to see what they have to offer. And as far as calling in… he said they were suppose to be nice, someone should tell that to the person that hung up on me and maybe the girl that took my last payment, that laughed at me when I told her I had to hurry up and pay as I had to go to a friends house that had comcast so I could work…..
We live in a rural area of Colorado and although Century Link has DSL here, we cannot get it because they said they only have so many “slots” as they call them and they are full. We exceeded our usage allocation and b/c it is a rolling 30 days (iow, it does NOT start over after 30 days), you have to wait for it to go down. I have no idea how long it will take to get below 100%. We did find that the mobile phone companies now offer mobile hotspot smart phones or separate mobile hotspot devices. I believe that’s the answer to our problems. Cheaper, more download (2-5GM) and more reliability. That’s what we are trying next!
I had Hughes for several years and it worked great. I could even use Skype. I am in an extreme rural area, off grid. Hughes started to fail miserably, out of country support was rude and arrogant and unhelpful. Went to Wild blue in hopes of better service. Sorry to say it is just as bad, and skype does not work. I only use it for email fortunately, as I guess the rest of the service is poor. I live at 10,000ft altitude and connections are poor, Hughes at least went through snow and rain. What to do??? No cell phone service up here.
I never signed the customer agreement can I still be held to the contract with wild blue.?
PLEASE ADD ME TO THE CLASS ACTION SUIT TOO!! I SENT MY PROBLEMS TO F.C.C!!!!!!!!!
Please add me to the law suit. I was told I could stream Netflix, while being sold the lowest tier plan that Wild blue offers. The first day I had the service I noticed nothing would stream, it was slower than dial up. I called, I was told “I don’t know why anyone told you that netflix would stream on this package, this package is only for email.” I was then upgraded to the 80.00 a month plan (wow) and told my speed would improve that night. It never did. The next day I called and they said there was a computer glitch that prevented me from getting the upgrade and they had to have the offline team work on it. I said “if it isn’t faster today I want to cancel my service” he said “fine, call back later.” It wasn’t faster, I called back, and the new guy I spoke with tells me about some 2 year contract I didn’t know about. My husband signed us up for this in my name (with my permission) and I listened to the call on speaker phone. I never heard anything about any contract, in fact, I thought he said “the best thing about wildblue is no contract.” Anyways, this was 23 hours after the service was installed, yet if I cancelled the system would charge me gobs of contract breaking money. I was told they would pull the sales call to see if I was told i could stream Netlix, which would take 2 to 10 business days. That once it’s reviewed they’ll refund my money (my first months payment was billed two days after my service was installed) It’s been 19 days and all I get is the run around. Even worse, I’m still getting billed for the 80 dollar upper tier package that their computer glitch prevented upgrading. So they’re billing me for a package size that I don’t even have. I unplugged everything weeks ago and switched to DSL, I want my money back. If a customer is dis-satisfied within 24 hours of installation, there should’nt be a bunch of drama about disconnecting it:(
One more thing, I will say that the rep told me xbox live would be a second or two behind the action, and that it’s a LITTLE SLOWER THAN DSL OR CABLE BUT IT WILL WORK FOR MY 5 DEVICES.
:(:(:(:(:(:(:(
I was referred to them by DirecTV, when we complained to DirecTV they said “we rarely refer to them” and were surprised we were referred. When our installer showed up he said “Wild Blue is alright, but it’s generally for customers who can’t get DSL or CABLE.” None of this was said until after I had signed up for the service, of course.
Something every WildBlue Customer should know:
“WildBlue Satellite’s Undocumented & Unmetered Downloads”
http://alienbabeltech.com/main/wildblue-satellites-undocumenented-unmetered-downloads
The problem with satellite internet and living in a rural area, is the B’s have you by the nads because there is no other service available, so they can charge you outlandish fees for dial-up speeds, fail when a cloud moves over the area, and they have real crappy attitudes because they know you do not have alternative high speed options that are affordable.
Kinda like the frigging oil companies, they charge you want they want because there is no competition.
So bend over folks and grab your ankles and suck in your breath, it hurts, I know, but what choice do you have.
Signed,
sickofthewholesystem
Just the worst of the worst. From service to policies to customer service. Hope WB goes belly up and that they take DirectTV with ‘em.
You forgot to mentioned that things have change with wildblue service. with the new viasat 1 satalite now in service, you now have speed up to 12 MBPS!!!!
Which is faster than Huges and other Satalite
service Combined!!
What’s your ping rate? I have been off the service for some time now but I doubt that I would still be getting the amuont of emails and traffic on this site if the service really was improved and better.