Home » Broadband "Shortage" »Broadband Speed »Consumer News »Frontier »Public Policy & Gov't »Rural Broadband » Currently Reading:

DSL and the ISPs That Love It: There’s Better Broadband in the Back-End of Crete

Frontier is the dominant phone company in West Virginia.

Frontier is the dominant phone company in West Virginia.

Ann Sheridan and Michael Sheridan are probably not related, but they share one thing in common: lousy DSL broadband.

Michael Sheridan, who lives in Lewisburg, W.V., is the lead plaintiff in a dragged-out class action lawsuit against Frontier Communications in the state, alleging the phone company has engaged in marketing flim-flam promising lightning fast DSL Internet speeds many customers complain they just do not receive. Ann Sheridan is a university lecturer in Ireland who doesn’t enjoy her DSL service as much as she endures it, when it works.

They live thousands of miles apart, but the problems are largely the same: for-profit phone companies trying to get as much revenue out of copper-based networks suitable for 20th century landlines while spending as little possible on broadband-friendly upgrades.

The phone company that dominates West Virginia has done all it can to have the lawsuit thrown out of court, claiming its terms and conditions mandate dissatisfied customers seek arbitration instead of a class action case. Frontier claims it inserted that condition into its terms and conditions a few years ago. Sheridan and his attorneys are now before the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals defending the case.

Crete is an island and part of the territory of Greece.

Crete is an island and part of the territory of Greece.

Despite Frontier’s insistence it sells contract-free Internet with no tricks or traps, Sheridan argues Frontier traps customers with unilateral fine print.

“Cases from all over the country establish that a simple notation on a website cannot form an agreement to arbitrate, a line item at the tail end of a bill that does not even state the specifics of the agreement cannot form an agreement to arbitrate, and a bill stuffer purporting to unilaterally amend an existing contractual relationship does not form an agreement to arbitrate,” the respondent’s brief states.

Many West Virginians with Frontier DSL complain they never exceed 5Mbps in speed, even though they are buying plans that advertise double that.

“Frontier’s practice of overcharging and simultaneously failing to provide the high-speed, broadband level of service it advertises has created high profits for Frontier but left West Virginia Internet users in the digital dark age,” according to the brief.

County Kildare, Ireland

County Kildare, Ireland

Life isn’t much better for those driving 30 minutes outside of Dublin, where broadband can be charitably described as “rustic.” In fact, Sheridan claims there is better broadband in the back-end of Crete than what the average resident in suburban and rural Ireland can manage to get out of questionable copper wiring.

In one notorious incident Sheridan described as “stereotypically Irish,” broadband service was brought to its knees for a good part of County Kildare for over a week earlier this year after a group of retaliatory cows upset over the Irish winter worked their way through a broken fence and collectively took out their frustration on a transformer they knocked over, taking out Internet access in the process.

Just having broadband service available doesn’t solve the digital divide if that service becomes oversold and unreliable. Both Sheridans argue broadband connections often deteriorate as more customers sign up. Without corresponding capacity upgrades to keep up with sales, speeds slow and service can become troublesome.

Broadband nemesis

Broadband nemesis

Patrick Donnelly, a farmer and builder from Calverstown reports Internet speeds 20 years ago were faster than what he gets today from his DSL service.

“Currently, I think I’m on my fourth provider. There’s all these little start-ups and generally they’re not too bad when you sign up originally,” Donnelly reports from his farm in Ireland. ‘But as soon as an ISP signs up more customers, speeds seem to get slower and slower. During peak usage times, it can become unusable.’

In West Virginia, some customers believe if their Internet speeds are poor, they need to buy an upgraded, faster speed tier from Frontier to compensate. That is usually a waste of money if the existing network is either inadequate or overburdened with customer traffic. But many customers don’t realize this. Often, fine print in a company’s terms and conditions disclaims the very bold and prominent speed claims that most customers actually see. Sheridan argues Frontier’s fine print goes even further by limiting their customers’ recourse when advertising claims do not meet reality.

“Frontier’s position is that consumers are obliged to be on alert at all times – diligently reviewing the fine print on each and every page of promotional material received – for the possibility that they may be waiving their rights by doing nothing at all,” the brief states.

Sheridan admits her point she’d move to Crete to get better broadband would be funny if the implications were not so serious.

“Not having broadband is a bit like not having electricity or only having it intermittently,” Sheridan said.

“It’s not a luxury any more, this is a necessity,” Donnelly said in agreement. “We’re 20 years behind now it’s time we caught up.”

0 0 votes
Article Rating
8 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
TekTalk
TekTalk
7 years ago

I have the blazing fast 5 Mbps Frontier DSL in WV. Frontier won’t even say it IS broadband. They know they can’t call it that. They only call it “High-Speed Internet.” Every customer they have should only pay $9.99 / mo for the “high-speed” equivalent of dial-up. Terrible!!

Matt
Matt
7 years ago

I wish Frontier would upgrade our internet over here in Doyle, Ca! We’ve had 1.5(not even that) Mbps for 12 years!!!!!! And out here in the middle of nowhere, we rely on our internet for everything. I left them a message on facebook about it and they said “We have plans for your area in 2018”! We can’t wait any longer! At least I hear our electric company is going to be putting up a wifi tower here, sooner than 2018. Frontier is going to lose some customers, even if there aren’t a lot of people out here.

Joe V.
Joe V.
7 years ago
Reply to  Matt

Replace the frontier supplied DSL modem and buy your own. The modem they give you is locked down and does not deliver the promised speeds.

Matt
Matt
7 years ago

It won’t increase it any more than what were paying for(1.5 Mbps) right?

Lee
Lee
7 years ago

Frontier will not deliver that 5 Mbps to me. It will not matter what modem I have or what they have in the dslam located at the school. The copper lines between those 2 points have to much line noise to support that speed. They will not install new copper or fiber. There are not enough houses on the road to recover the cost.

Paul Houle
Paul Houle
7 years ago
Reply to  Lee

@Lee, it is worse than that. It is not that they cannot afford to give you fiber, it is that they can already make so much money selling you inferior service that they can’t possibly jack your rates up enough to sell you something good — and there is no competition so they can keep selling you inferior service. NY State required Charter to enter into a plan which could very well give us universal service and you’d better believe my town is going to be a squeaky wheel to get it. Already we see Frontier has basically 0% presence… Read more »

Scott Barton
Scott Barton
7 years ago

Oh I’ve got a tale for you as well–I live in rural N.E. Texas before Verizon sold out (which we were never norificed that it was selling out) we hardly ever had a major problem except for the slow 3 mbps speed that we had. So after the take over we call Frontier to get aquinted and while they had us on the phone they asked if there was anything they could do to for us and we said “yeah it would be nice if we had faster internet speed” and the lady said well let me look to see… Read more »

Search This Site:

Contributions:

Recent Comments:

Your Account:

Stop the Cap!