Posts Tagged ‘Service Complaints’

Wildblue Satellite/ViaSat FAP – by Todd

This was a comment on one of the threads but I thought it deserved its own post:

Thanks to the creator of “WildBlueSucks.Info”!!!

I’ve had the misfortune of being a Wildblue Internet Satellite customer since December 2007. I work from my home, and choose to live in a rural area, and satellite Internet is the only “non-dial-up” Internet access option I have. From talking with other local Wildblue and HughesNET customers, apparently both providers are a bird of the same feather regarding the FAP (Fair Access Policy). During the sales process of attracting customers like me, Internet satellite providers certainly don’t talk about the sharp white teeth of the FAP. Unfortunately, I misunderstood what how the FAP works, I thought it was like our cell phone providers where the number of available airtime minutes resets at the end of each month and/or cycle. This is NOT the way the FAP works – BUYER BEWARE!!!

My work requires me to use an online back-up solution (Carbonite.Com), and this process kills the miniscule upload limitations of the FAP for my service option – i.e. 5.0GB. I log daily my usage from the Wildblue bandwidth monitor – http://www.wildblue.com/myaccount/index.jsp – and have found the following hard truths about WildBlue’s FAP:

1. WildBlue’s tech support lies about how this “bandwidth monitor” works. They have admitted to me that it does not reflect “real-time” measurements of your actual usage. Thus a responsible person cannot accurately monitor / manage keeping out of the FAP penalty box.

2. I keep a daily log of actual “bandwidth monitor” screen-shots and track that data in an Excel spreadsheet. There is no precise methodology that I have found / observed as to how WildBlue’s FAP translates into actual available bandwidth to users. For example, since March of 2008, my upload bandwidth usage averages 3.3GB at any one given time. This means that although I’m paying for 5.0GB of up upload bandwidth in my monthly Wildblue service fee, I’m only able to access / use 1.7GB of uploading bandwidth at any given time. In other words, I do not have access to the remaining 3.3GB of upload bandwidth I’m paying for because of the FAP’s methodology of how it measures what you’ve historically used and sets that unchangeable number to what’s left in your service plan’s upload availability. Again, this number never resets back to zero, thus I’m paying for 5.0GB of upload bandwidth capacity, but Wildblue only grants me access to 1.7GB of that 5.0GB based on my past usage – NOTE: This is the same for the “download” bandwidth levels as well. To explain my point, WildBlue’s FAP is like buying all your stuff at the “company store”, you make $100, but your paycheck is only $30, because the rest they’ve laid claim to for past goods purchased / used.

3. When confronting Wildblue about their FAP violation, here’s what I went through:

a. Tech support – no help on this issue, and they refused to connect me with anyone above the person who answered the phone.

b. I was not able to find a Wildblue Communications corporate phone number; then found that they were purchased by a company called ViaSat in San Diego, CA (Chief Executive Officer is Mark D. Dankberg). Eventually, I tried requesting information from Wildblue about “commercial” grade services with more bandwidth. In essence here were my options:

i. I would have to go to another company who’s a reseller of Wildblue Internet satellite services

ii. Pay two-times more per month for a few GB’s more bandwidth monthly and no increased speed (upload or download)

iii. This would require me having to buy out the remainder of my existing Wildblue contract (no transfers)
iv. Pay for additional service / set-up charges with the new company to get the same service I’m currently getting but with increased

v. Have to get a new Email address

vi. Still have to deal with Wildblue’s “bandwidth monitor” requirements

vii. Good deal eh?

c. When you go into FAP violation, they “throttle” back your bandwidth speed to that of dial-up. When I asked Wildblue how long will I be in the penalty box, they cannot / will not give an answer. They have a magic formula that they apparently can’t share with the customer as they simply state; it depends on your upload/download usage. So I asked the question, “If I do not turn on my computer, and no one else is using the Wildblue Internet connection, how long will I be in penalty box / violation?” They cannot or will not answer that question. I finally pressed a Wildblue sales guy at their Colorado (former headquarters) office hard enough that he told me about two-weeks based on how much I went over my upload quota. My job afforded me the luxury of scheduling a 2-week business trip, and upon my return, I was still in the FAP penalty box. It took 15 days to have the “normal speed” turned back on. Effing amazing!!!!

I pray for the day I have an alternative to dial-up and Wildblue here in my area (South Dakota). I hope that day comes soon! Wildblue / ViaSat in my experience, engage in dishonorable and unethical business practices. I accept 100% responsibility for my actions of signing up for this service, and have done everything in my power to try to understand Wildblue’s business practices, and do my best to be a good steward of our agreement. However, Wildblue’s actions are vastly different from their intentions, and misleading the customer is their true business model, not providing a good Internet access service to honest paying customers!

Another Disgruntled Wildblue Customer in Arkansas

This was sent to me by Lisa in AR and wanted to spread the word about WildBlue so, being more “to the point”, here is her story:

I decided to go television/cable free and watch my programs on Netflix and Hulu.  Evidently I’m the only person in the world that doesn’t know that satellite internet doesn’t do live streaming video; the salesman assured me there would be no problem, sold me the high tier package, and then gave me a phone number to call back if there were a problem:  turns out the phone number he gave me is the number for United Healthcare Medical Insurance!

AFter a week of total frustration and many calls to Wildblue, Internet Explorer and Netflix, I cancelled, requesting my initial set-up fee and monthly charge to be refunded and the early termination fees to be waived.  The man I talked to in the cancellation department assured me that if the recorded call did indeed indicate that the salesman mis-represented what satellite internet was capable of, that I would get my money back.  He gave me a ticket number and told me to call back in two days.

I called back, and was told by a Supervisor (after requesting one) that no, I would not get my money back, that the recorded call could not be listened to as it was “corrupted somehow” and that they would waive the early termination fees and that’s all.  I am out 111.00 for the initial set-up, $165 for the pole mount, and 84.95 for the first months service—unbelievable.  More than $300 for one week of frustration and no service!  Wildblue is not an ethical company, does not stand behind their product or service, and should be boycotted—SPREAD THE WORD!

Wildblue FAP and how it is monitored

I received an email from a woman (Rhonda in TN) who told me that they have been repeatedly hit with the WildBlue FAP and had their speeds dropped down. When she contacted WildBlue about it, they refused to give her any proof, which she wanted because she said they hardly do anything but check their email and such. So you are not hearing a third party story, I have copied her email, word-for-word below:

Hi!

I can’t say that I am happy to write to you under these circumstances, but I, too, have had my barn load of Wildblue problems!  When we first hooked up with wildblue, our speed was great and we were downloading/uploading with no problems whatsoever.  After a few months, though, wildblue started saying that we were running over our “limit” of download bandwidth and started cutting our speed back drastically.  Then, even though we pay our bills, they cut us off completely!  Well…we called them and asked point blank to please PROVE to us this so called overused bandwidth so we could find out what the problem was.  Of course, you can very well imagine, they said, “we don’t have that information”.  Bull!!!  Even when I had sad speed dialup, I could look up on an hourly basis and see what bandwidth I was using.  They think we are all so stupid that we will just TAKE THEIR WORD FOR IT that we are all using up loads of bandwidth without a shred of proof from wildblue to back their claims up for charging us, then slowing down our speeds or cutting us off.  We have called several times and can’t get any more information from them except that we need to watch our download gauge.

Well…now, here is a little something interesting for you.  I also have DishNet Television satellite service, which is also affiliated with wildblue.  My wildblue bill is on my dishnet bill, as a matter of fact.  I was having a bit of trouble with one of our receivers, so I called tech support for DishNet to ask what to to.  They were more than helpful and within a few days, we had a replacement receiver.  Here’s the interesting part.  I talked and asked questions with the tech lady for over an hour about several things, including upgrading my service for DishNet.  But, I told her I was very upset with wildblue service and wasn’t sure if I should invest any further money into their company.  Well…well….when women talk, sometimes things “come out” in the open, you see.  The tech lady I spoke to was very nice and when I told her of my problems with wildblue, she told me, and I quote, “you couldn’t PAY ME ENOUGH to work on the tech side of wildblue right now!!”.  She told me that several months back, wildblue hooked up with Google thinking that this would make things better for the customers and be a good way to out do Hughsnet, another complete waste of satellite internet service (we were with them before we got wildblue..they suck too!).  Well, when they got whatever service they got from Google, it had a lot of “back door applications” going on, which eats up bandwidth like crazy!  She said that DishNet and Wildblue customer service is in the same building in Virginia, I think she said.  She said that wildblue can’t keep tech reps in because so many people are so angry about the same problems.  What is happening is that wildblue hooking up with google has caused so many problems, their tech workers are working around the clock trying to fix it, but refuse to tell the public due to the huge amount of money they would not only loose having to compensate those customers already pissed, but would loose any incoming possible customers that might sign up with them.  I don’t know about you, but wildblue is NOT advertised around these parts, but Hughsnet is on the TV all the time!!   This representative of DishNet told  me that wildblue is trying to make the problems look like it is the fault of the customers and trying to prove it to the customers without any proof, when they KNOW all along it is their glitch and we are paying for it.  Where I live, I don’t have much choice….it is either horrible speed dialup (and I do mean horrible…we are at the butt end of everything here and the lines are so bad, even my phone service sucks!), I can opt to pay $900 a month for T-1 (NOT!! can’t afford that by any means!), no DSL even offered due to the age and horrible condition of the phone lines out here and cable isn’t an option either.  So, satellite is my only choice and I can hardly afford that!  And, I can’t afford it with bad service!!  We run a small business out of our home and if the internet goes out, we are out of business, if we aren’t making money, we can’t pay the bill, if we can’t pay wildblue’s bill, they cut us off….it’s a wildblue circle, I guess you could say!!

Anyway, I wanted to pass this tidbit on to you.  I have already contacted a local “That’s Messed Up” news piece on a local channel who handle this sort of thing.  He said he has had many complaints about them and is considering doing a piece on the problem.  If you guys do get a class action lawsuit going, please put me on the list. We have lost money due to their incompetence and I want my money back!  If we could just get this out to the media, I think it would break wide open.  I am going to keep trying to get this through in any way I can from my end, please keep me informed as to what you guys do…..I believe if enough of us gather together against them and get a good lawyer to represent us little folks, we could win this thing and make them pay!  Thanks for the great work you are doing, by the way.

Wild Blue= poor service, slow speeds, no refunds, bad attitude

I first installed Wild Blue in July 2007 – installation and equipment totaling $300. Wild Blue had asked for a credit card over the phone for the equipment charges and the first month’s bill. The installer arrived as promised and everything went smoothly – so far so good.

Problems arose the very next day when I went to log onto the internet and couldn’t. My MSN homepage took over 4 minutes to load and logging into e-mail was even longer. This is the beginning of a long and painful saga….

I am self-employed and work from home.  I need to have access to both my parent company’s intranet and a secured socket layer database site. NEITHER of these areas would load with any regularity or consistency. In fact the SSL site from which I send sales information to my clients, failed over 95% of the time! I found if I worked at 5 a.m. est. or after 12 midnight, I might be able to use this SSL site with some form of normalcy.

In September, I “upped” my service package from Wild Blue’s Select Pack ($69.95/mo) which promised 1.0Mbps download and 200Kbps upload to their top of the line ProPack ($79.95/mo) which was supposed to deliver 1.5Mbps download and 256Kbps upload. I saw no significant change in speed or reliability!

Over the next four months, numerous calls were made to Wild Blue’s technical service. – hours upon hours of my time wasted! Although polite, the representatives were not helpful. Their “ping” tests showed we had upload and download speeds in range of the program we had purchased. At one point, they suggested not using Norton Internet Security and not using Windows Explorer as they “did not work well with our system”.
Curious, these are industry standard softwares!

A Tier 2 technical service rep. explained one evening in October that the FCC imposes higher security steps on the satellite data exchange than on regular DSL or cable, which can cause the system to operate slower. This was the first I had heard of anything like this and the first of ANY of Wild Blue’s representatives to admit a speed reduction!! Interesting…. Certainly their salespeople and their website don’t mention this!!

During the first week of November 2007, we called Wild Blue once more and spent another extended evening on the phone with Tech Support. This time, I even went to far as to provide the tech rep with my security clearance and password for my SSL database site to see if he on their computers in Colorado could enter the site with any success. (Remember this is a site I need to work with everyday!!!) After 10 minutes on the first login, he admitted it wasn’t loading up. He tried again and the site although slow, did open but was missing critical search fields and wouldn’t exchange data on even simplified searches. (So it wasn’t just my connection in
Connecticut!!) He had no clue as to why and promised to dig into this and call us back.

The next week we called again – frustration level maxed out. Wild Blue’s response, after checking our complaint log, was to suggest a service call at our location. The service call would cost us $95.00 and was not guaranteed to correct the problem. There is also no refund if they come out and find nothing wrong. We did not authorize them to schedule this service call and opted to wait and reconsider our options.

Three weeks later, I receive a call from a subcontractor looking to schedule a service call at my house. I responded that I did not authorize any such call and I did not want a service call. Four days later I get a call from another provider wanting to schedule my service call. I tell them the same thing. Their rep. asked me to call the “dispatch center” where these calls originate and also alert them that I had never authorized a service call. I did as she asked and thought the problem was solved…
Until I received my next months credit card bill and saw that Wild Blue had charged me for a service call that was never made. (This charge is currently in dispute thru my credit card company)

On December 31, 2007 I called Wild Blue to cancel my service since they never once provided the service, reliability or speed they had sold to me under contract. I wasn’t asking for a refund for lack of service – just stop billing me for service you don’t provide. The woman was absolutely rude and argued with me for more than 35 minutes that without a service call so they could see if there was an equipment problem at my location there was absolutely nothing they could or would do for me. Willing at that point to work with them, I asked to have the service call at no charge – absolutely not!

I rang off the phone with this person with a warning I was going to pursue this through proper channels. Since then I have filed a complaint with:

Better Business Bureau of Colorado (where Wild Blue is headquartered)

Wild Blue has responded, again claiming that without a service call they will do nothing. They did admit in this response I refused a service call (this information is sent to my credit card company – hope it helps!) Interestingly enough, the file was sent from their legal dept and tagged “escalating dispute”. I responded back thru the BBB with another 2 pages of rebuttal – we’ll see what happens!

AT&T Customer Service in Connecticut …since they are the local affiliate, and advertise Wild Blue in their bill packages, etc. I called them on 12/31/07 and the representative I spoke with asked me to wait on filing with the DCP and the Attorney General until AT&T had a chance to investigate this through their company. He promised someone would call be back. I waited 10 business days with no response, so my additional complaints were sent.
UPDATE: on 1/18/08  I received a call back from the AT&T rep who took my complaint originally. He stated that the response to AT&T’s investigation (from Wild Blue) was that a service call was initiated then declined by me so I am still liable for full payment of my contract.  (same tune different day….)

Connecticut Department of Consumer Protection …waiting ot hear back

Federal Communications Commission …waiting to hear back

Connecticut Attorney General Blumenthal …waiting to hear back

…as my fight continues I will add to this post. At present I am not asking for anything more than to be released from the remainder of my Wild Blue contract: $479.70 and the refund of the erroneously charged service call: $95.00.

If I were to add in the install costs ($300) the months of unreliable service ($459.70)… then included the hours of lost productivity (remember I’m self employed!), hours of tech support time wasted, telephone calls, letters and the like, this figure would be substantially higher.

UPDATE – 1/29/2008 – “RESOLUTION”

I  received a final response back from Colorado Better Business Bureau. They have marked the case “Administratively Closed” on 1/24/2008. Although Wild Blue is sticking to their guns that their speed is satisfactory and performing within the range of my package. They are willing to terminate my contract and waive the early termination fees associated. I had to threaten legal action with charges of loss of business, hours of time w/ tech support, plus equipment, install etc. to get to this point.

In the end, I’m out the equipment and install fees, what I paid in monthly “service” charges, plus I still have this huge dish hanging on my house. My credit card company is still working to get the erroneous charges reversed from my December bill.
After all this, my advice to other consumers out there:
Use any other internet service instead of Wild Blue Communications!

WildBlue Associated Companies – The Wireless Center

When I purchased my WildBlue Satellite Internet Service, I did so through The Wireless Center in Gautier, MS (near Ocean Springs, MS).

Of course, during the initial sales and setup – they were great to deal with but after talking with them about how poor the WildBlue service is – the owner got VERY offensive, raised his voice, and basically told me to go screw myself because he was not interested in helping me.

The funniest part about the whole ordeal, was my intent on calling The Wireless Center in Gautier, MS was to have them come get the satellite and modem. I WAS GOING TO GIVE IT TO THEM – FOR FREE! All they had to do was come pick it up, but as soon as I said the service was crap, he went off on me and would not let me get a word in edgewise.

I have filed a Better Business Bureau complaint against The Wireless Center in Gautier, MS, although I doubt it will do any good since they are not even a member.

Anyone living in the Mississippi Gulf Coast region and thinking about doing business with The Wireless Center – think twice. They are very friendly as long as you are handing over your money but as soon as an issue arises, they will not even listen to you before automatically going over the edge!

Caveat Emptor! (Buyer Beware)