BEWARE OF AT&T!
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From: Whistleblower on 27 Mar 2010 14:52 BEWARE OF and AVOID doing business with AT&T! AT&T exemplifies screw-the-consumer corporate arrogance at its worst. DO NOT PATRONIZE AT&T or YOU'LL REGRET IT! I had an ISP service package with AT&T Worldnet that included email, DSL, a personal website on their server, and Usenet access. Suddenly they dropped the Usenet service, with no compensation to customers that were forced to find another source. Another example of their screw-the-customer attitude is the fact that reaching a tech support person by phone typically requires at least a 20 minute wait on hold. AT&T once had a good tech support service on Usenet, but dropped that too and became very hard to reach. I should have seen the writing on the wall and dropped AT&T back then! This March 2nd I get an email that AT&T Worldnet service, DSL service, and website hosting will no longer be available effective March 31st - A KNIFE IN THE BACK to all their small business and individual customers! They arranged a deal with Covad to take over the DSL service, and a new email/web service that allows you to keep your existing email address and ID. You could elect to use AT&T for dialup only, or go to another ISP entirely. In effect, if you wanted to keep your present email address, IDs, settings, and DSL, you are FORCED to accept Covad and still be tied to AT&T as your ISP. Before, if your DSL service went down you had free dialup backup, but no longer. Dialup now costs extra. And since converting to Covad DSL about a week ago, I have already had a service failure! For a business, the website customer-screwing by AT&T is the worst of all. I had my site for years and it had a high ranking with the search engines - top10. Now I have been FORCED to move it to another host with a new URL unknown to the search engines. My initial outlay for 3 years of webhosting and a domain was over $150. Fortunately I was able to upload my site to the new host without the typical professional fee of $250 to do so, but it took alot of my time. In addition, I'll have to toss and replace about $50 worth of business cards with my old URL web address on them, replace other printed materials with the old URL, change many documents, and inform many contacts. I will inevitably lose business because the old URL, now in many website links and hard-copy publications, has become useless. The forced "migration" process from AT&T was complex and time-consuming, not helped by the unavailability for several days of the means to do so at their website where AT&T stated it would be. Instructions were vague and non-specific, and good luck reaching them by phone! As the service cutoff date approached, nothing could be done due to this and to AT&Ts inaccessibility. Then, one day after completing part of the migration process, CUTOFF! I had NO SERVICE - no web, no email, no DSL, no dialup, nothing! Finally after hours of effort,I was able to establish my DSL service. My Outlook Express was unable to download email until I corrected that too - with no help from these corporate cretins that couldn't care less! Now, for the same monthly price as before (under a 1 year contract with a BIG termination fee if you want out), I have DSL, web, and email. But no dialup backup, Usenet, or website as before. The website costs extra now. And will AT&T tech support improve? I wouldn't hold my breath! The substantial expenses and inconveniences inflicted by this AT&T customer-screwing is something for which a CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT would be appropriate, but no doubt the agreement you are forced into when buying their service protects them from responsibility. Clearly AT&T, with typical mega-corpseration greed and arrogance, cares little for their home and small business customers. This sort of thing will continue as long as they can perpetrate such actions without being held accountable, and consumers and businesses will remain at their mercy. When you vote, keep in mind it is the Republican-Conservatives that protect these mega-corpserate bullies and allow them to run amok, unregulated, and perpetrate such consumer-screwing actions as this. BOYCOTT AT&T!
From: Joel on 27 Mar 2010 19:26 On Sat, 27 Mar 2010 14:52:06 -0400, Whistleblower wrote: > BEWARE OF and AVOID doing business with AT&T! > > AT&T exemplifies screw-the-consumer corporate arrogance at its worst. DO > NOT PATRONIZE AT&T or YOU'LL REGRET IT! [rant snipped] > BOYCOTT AT&T! My sympathies. Sorry it happened to you, and thanks for sharing your experience so others can learn from it. Personally I've been taking your advice since they gave us a choice of long distance companies (in the 80's for you whippersnappers). I chose unknown brand X "to give the little guy a chance" and expand competition. (Brand X eventually became Sprint.) At the time many friends chose to stay with AT&T, the default, because they were big and a known quantity. They thought they could be counted on for superior service. Your experience shows that can be wrong reasoning. I don't have a web site. But I had the impression you can buy a domain name that is portable across ISPs. Is that not so? If I had a business that I counted on for income, that's what I'd try to do, even if it costs a little more. When I wanted a personal email address, I avoided my ISP (AOL at the time) because I knew I might change ISPs somewhere along the line. Of course you have to trust that whoever you go with will be there as long as you want them, and sometimes you just don't know. A big company like AT&T probably won't fold like some upstart ISPs have. But there can be other problems, like yours. As to Usenet, my ISP (not AT&T) made it clear that was not guaranteed -- best effort only. If you had it in a contract with AT&T, you might have had grounds for breaking it, although it sounds like you wouldn't have wanted to. You didn't say why AT&T dumped you. I'm surprised to hear they boot customers in one area, when they are spending so much postage and paper trying to sign them up somewhere else. Best wishes. Look at it as a learning experience, and try to make the best choices going forward. -- Joel
From: George on 28 Mar 2010 15:02 On 3/27/2010 2:52 PM, Whistleblower wrote: > > For a business, the website customer-screwing by AT&T is the worst of all. I > had my site for years and it had a high ranking with the search engines - > top10. Now I have been FORCED to move it to another host with a new URL > unknown to the search engines. My initial outlay for 3 years of webhosting > and a domain was over $150. Fortunately I was able to upload my site to the > new host without the typical professional fee of $250 to do so, but it took > alot of my time. In addition, I'll have to toss and replace about $50 worth > of business cards with my old URL web address on them, replace other printed > materials with the old URL, change many documents, and inform many contacts. > I will inevitably lose business because the old URL, now in many website > links and hard-copy publications, has become useless. Unfortunate but now you know why everyone will tell you that if you need a web/email presence for a business you register a domain name. So instead of an email such evergreenlandscaping(a)att.net or evergreenlandscaping(a)aol.com and a website you don't own such as att.net/users/evergreenlandscaping you have www.evergreenlandscaping.com which makes it totally portable and ISP agnostic. That way you can have it hosted anywhere you want and links, printed items, email addresses remain the same.
From: Jordon on 29 Mar 2010 13:05 Whistleblower wrote: > For a business, the website customer-screwing by AT&T is the worst of all. I > had my site for years and it had a high ranking with the search engines - > top10. Now I have been FORCED to move it to another host with a new URL > unknown to the search engines. With the cost of domains and hosting services being so low why would anyone even consider using an ISP for those things? I got tired of changing my personal address when changing ISP's ten years ago so I got my own domain just for the email address. I pay about $50 a year for the domain, a place to host it and email. And I'm sure I could find something cheaper than that. -- Jordon
From: Whistleblower on 29 Mar 2010 18:11
"Joel" <jseidmanNOSPAME(a)dslextreme.com> wrote in message news:0vwrn.12438$Ek4.4015(a)newsfe24.iad... > On Sat, 27 Mar 2010 14:52:06 -0400, Whistleblower wrote: > >> BEWARE OF and AVOID doing business with AT&T! >> >> AT&T exemplifies screw-the-consumer corporate arrogance at its worst. DO >> NOT PATRONIZE AT&T or YOU'LL REGRET IT! > > [rant snipped] > >> BOYCOTT AT&T! > > My sympathies. Sorry it happened to you, and thanks for sharing your > experience so others can learn from it. > > Personally I've been taking your advice since they gave us a choice of > long distance companies (in the 80's for you whippersnappers). I chose > unknown brand X "to give the little guy a chance" and expand competition. > (Brand X eventually became Sprint.) At the time many friends chose to > stay with AT&T, the default, because they were big and a known quantity. > They thought they could be counted on for superior service. Your > experience shows that can be wrong reasoning. > > I don't have a web site. But I had the impression you can buy a domain > name that is portable across ISPs. Is that not so? If I had a business > that I counted on for income, that's what I'd try to do, even if it costs > a little more. When I wanted a personal email address, I avoided my ISP > (AOL at the time) because I knew I might change ISPs somewhere along the > line. Of course you have to trust that whoever you go with will be there > as long as you want them, and sometimes you just don't know. A big > company like AT&T probably won't fold like some upstart ISPs have. But > there can be other problems, like yours. Yes, I finally have my own domain, but att. still is stuck in my email address > As to Usenet, my ISP (not AT&T) made it clear that was not guaranteed -- > best effort only. If you had it in a contract with AT&T, you might have > had grounds for breaking it, although it sounds like you wouldn't have > wanted to. > > You didn't say why AT&T dumped you. I'm surprised to hear they boot > customers in one area, when they are spending so much postage and paper > trying to sign them up somewhere else. To my knowledge they dumped EVERYONE that was buying their DSL and had a webpage with them. No choice in the matter. > Best wishes. Look at it as a learning experience, and try to make the > best choices going forward. > > -- Joel Thank you Joel. It's hard to find concerned, courteous people like you on usenet. |