Time Warner NYC must be put out of business

I have internet outages on average twice a month- always on a Saturday. Time Warner usually tells me there are no reported outages. There were a few instances where I was on the phone long enough for them to admit there was an outage in my neighborhood. It seems like a bandwidth issue- but after years of complaining about the same issue (and multiple visits/box exchanges/etc), it still has not gotten any better. I wish I had fios as an option, but it's not available in my neighborhood. My parents live down in the Orlando area- and have a Time Warner cable subsidary- they have a lot more optional channels (including most of the movie channels) and a couple of extra boxes than I do, and their bill is still less than mine. So we pay far more and still get lousy service. I would love to have true competition in my neighborhood.

When our family moved in June we decided to switch from TWC to Verizon. The catalyst for the decision was that when I tried to call their 800 number to schedule a move, each time I got to the menu prompt for "moving" and the phone attempted to reroute, the line disconnected. After two attempts (different menu options to talk to a human) on two different days and getting the same disconnect each time, whatever customer loyalty I had was destroyed. I switched to Verizon at that point.

I have to say that Versizon fios is better than the TWC service we had. With TWC our interent would hiccup at elast once a week where we would have to reboot everything to get it working again which was more an inconvenience than anything else. In hindsight we should have switched to verizon much sooner.

I totally understand your perspective commoner. Lets vote in some politicians to make these large corporations accountable!! (We will need more than a little good luck to implement that!)

Fios is great. Had it until i bought my coop, for which verizon isnt wired up even though "talks" have been happening for almost 2 yrs. I miss fios. Time warner has actually been ok, but this is in Brooklyn. Years ago in manhattan TWC was a piece of shit.

>It seems like a bandwidth issue

That is the main problem.
You may even notice that you have some delay in your channels. Verizon ran an ad campaign pointing that out. But a lot of people just didn't understand it and they ended that campaign in favor of others.

Verizon doesn't have New York 1 though.

We've had RCN for many (15?) years. Very few problems, and those quickly and remotely fixed.

It seems like the cable tv Godfathers sat down and split the turf between them, and that was it. And now they behave like small totalitarian countries instead of service providers.
It's a small thing, I don't even watch tv, but as a part of the big picture, it's very disheartening.

I hate TWC. I am changing to Fios asap. Thanks for reminding me...

I have stuck with tw but have been very tempted to switch to FIOS. My husband does not want to learn new channels. I know I know - stupid. The only problem I have had with TW is sometimes with on demand. I have to reboot to get the in demand. I hate it and it's a pain. I just got their new dvr box that is like Fios' that you have it in one room and can use it in all rooms. I can't comment much on it yet since it was installed this week. I haven't had problems with the internet in years so the phone is fine too since it's connected thru the internet.

I used to have RCN during the early 2000s and really disliked it and I had lots of problems. I also hated those tiny boxes they used where you had to point the remote towards this tiny little place. The in demand was much more difficult to use as well compared to TW.

If I'm not happy with the new TW service I'll change to FIOS if they have a better offer in the future.

Oh and my wifi thru tw is really quick. MY pad using the perfect browser is just super fast.

i have time warner and never had an outage, also whenever i tried reaching customer service have always been able to get through and no, i don't work or know anyone that works at time warner.

I recently made the decison to get rid of TWC and I'm very happy with the choice. The service was spotty at best and the technicians were always lazy and would find an excuse to not perform the work needed.

The best was that after 4 months I received a bill for $581 but I had disconnected my service; when I called and asked for an explanation, they said that thses things sometimes happen. Wow.

Clear Wireless. Just as fast as TWC regular internet, for $30 a month.

Steve,

Does Clear offer phone and tv as well?

nyc s perfectly suited for free citywide wireless as administered by our GOVERNMENT

it's been a huge success in philly and throughout europe

of course, our corp-shill nutlesspoliticians wouldn't dream of even proposing this clearly surerior approach

funnily, at the national level, there have been several repugnantcan sponsored bills intro'd to ban free public-provided internet altogether--i wonder who owns the lobbyists and congressmen behind these??-you know, our politicians looking out for us and all

talk about an economic stimulator---free internet within city limits!!

any moron can see the value of this

i want fios :(
not available yet.

Had RCN in the very late 90's early 00's and wasnt thrilled then. But had them later in the Rivergate 2004 until last year and they were great. Had only 2 outages in 6/7 years.
One was the blackout, second time someone actually pulled out my cable from the stairwell box.

Have TW now because new apt doesnt have the option.

CC I have your same probs with on demand and same remedy. ALso if you patient, watch soemthing else for 10 mins and go back to the on demand you ordered and it will load.

My cable box broke - no sound. The service options on this Wednesday before Labor Day:

1) Appointment Saturday 4 - 8 pm
2) Appointment Sunday same times
3) Appoint Tuesday same times.

So, a service appointment takes a week!

Fortunately I was able to work around the problem by switching out HDMI for composite video, which has a different sound card. But if I didn't have all the right cables, or that solution didn't work, I'd be screwed.

They must die. :)

It's been a long time since I had TWC, so maybe I don't know how good I have it (relatively), but FiOS is not quite as amazing as you might think, especially on the TV end. Load times are surprisingly slow for fiber optic, and a fair amount of channels are simply not available in HD (don't know if that's a Verizon issue or not, but seems odd given how long the technology's been available now).

FiOS customer service is particularly terrible as well - their website is atrocious (arguably the least user-friendly I've ever seen - yikes), most likely by design. To get anything accomplished, you really have to call and wait to speak to someone. And even then. There's room for serious disruption in the cable TV industry. It just might take a little while longer, unfortunately.

If you upgrade, downgrade services they also screw you over by double billing you for the same time period...

if you complain enough they'll credit you a portion.. if you take a step further and show actual #'s, the operators play (arguably) dumb..

I have FIOS and love it. When I use the remote to change TV channels, the change is almost instantaneous. I previously had cablevision in NJ before moving back to Manhattan and it took forever to scroll through channels. Also, FIOS is way faster than my cablevision internet (and I don't even have the top internet speed package with FIOS). FIOS is also way cheaper than Cablevision.

'FIOS is also way cheaper than Cablevision.'

is this the case after their 12 month promo?? they quoted me only for promo rates, then i ask what the 'norma rate' is after promo but they dont wanna answer... this was a while back tho

hol4, my 2-year contract just expired. I had the triple play package for $99/mo (not including a gazillion fees, taxes, etc.). I got them to take out my phone line (which I never used), keep the same TV package, and up my internet speed to 35 Mbps (from 25) at the same price, with no contract. It's a 12-month price guarantee as well. So you can negotiate with them a bit.

thanks bj... thats still a better rate than my TW.. i never use a landline

RCN is completely incompetent and almost impossible to cancel. They will fight you to the last moment and then fail to return refunds until prompted. Had them in 2007-2009. I tried to get FIOS and could get everything but the Internet which seemed strange...something about having a fixed amount of outlets so we could only get one if someone canceled in the area. I actually don't have any problems with the service but the customer service is just awful out of principle i want to cancel.

Twc is the worse service ever, they should just give up and retired.
They never have a solution and always have outages.
Since yesterday we experienced no network for about 8 hours and tonight
at 7:30pm the same bs. The so called vip phone number can't do anything, the excuse
of the wiring of the building is bad. We have been having the same issues for
3 years and they never fixed anything. Twc Out-of-Bs!

TWC is HORRIBLE. We have them in our office, and we've been having outages literally every day for a year now. Tech support is incompetent, it is impossible to reach anyone on higher level, nobody every knows what is going on, and their "excuse" is "there is an outage in your area". Every freaking time. They are monopolists, and do not care if the service provided is any good.
Unfortunately there are no options for us, as there is no FIOS in the building, so we are really stuck. Hope TWC goes out of business soon.