Custom Search
|
|
|
|---|
|
|
|---|
|
Custom Search
|
|
It used to be one of the best dial-up ISPs in the United States. I should know. I spent more than a week during the summer of 2007 researching twelve of the larger U.S. dial-up ISPs.1 I put the excruciatingly painful details of my research in a dial-up ISP comparison table.
The ISP I chose was Phreego. One of the primary reasons I chose them is that they had no hourly connection restrictions. I say it used to be one of the best ISPs because a number of changes at Phreego have now put them near the bottom of my list.
You may not use a dial-up service. But what happened to me at Phreego can happen to you at any ISP.
My problems began on the evening of July 28, 2008. I noticed my computer trying to reconnect2 my dial-up connection to the Internet. I noticed the red X on the network connection icon in the Notification Icons in the toolbar. I couldn’t understand why my network connection had been dropped. I had been connected for less than four hours. A four-hour session time-out is one of the recent changes at Phreego.
Then an error notification box popped up. I had this problem once before and Phreego had reset my hours to fix the problem. Phreego offered unlimited hours so I wasn’t that concerned about the issue. Little did I know at the time that it was to be a harbinger of things to come.
Fortunately I had the toll-free number saved in my Excel spreadsheet list of Internet accounts and passwords. I called the number and was told by the support representative that I had reached the 200-hour limit. What 200-hour limit? I questioned him about that. Phreego was supposed to have unlimited service. I was told that it was a recent change.
I obviously couldn’t connect to view Preego’s Terms of Service (TOS) to see if they had added the 200-hour limit. They hadn’t added the four-hour session time-out in June when they made that change so I had questions about whether the 200-hour monthly limitation had actually been added to the Terms of Service.
The support rep offered to reset my hourly limit for $10.00. This would give me another 200-hours and service for the remaining three days of July. I declined the offer. I could sign up with another ISP and get a full month of service for $10.00. I decided to try to live without Internet access for the last three days of July.
And then while ruminating over the whole affair, I decided to call them back and ask for an additional ten hours of service to tide me over until the monthly reset on August 1. The person I spoke with explained that I had called earlier and had been told of the new monthly limitation. I told him that I hadn’t been informed of the change and asked if I could have a one-time only ten hour addition to my hourly limit.
He was very helpful. He admitted that the change hadn’t been added to the TOS. When I asked him why an email wasn’t sent to the subscribers he told me that he didn’t know why.
He told me he would have to ask his supervisor about my request. After a couple minutes he returned and told me that his supervisor agreed to an additional 30 hours. I thanked him. They had given me 20 more hours than I asked for.
I was still fuming about having my Internet service yanked right out from under me. I’m an Internet junkie. I have three Websites. I depend on my Internet service for information, communication and so much more.
The Phreego support rep was honest with me and as an upset customer I appreciated that. He heard an earful from me about the change in service without notification. I apologized. My issues weren’t with him but Phreego’s upper management. I have supported a corporate help desk and I understand the frustration that first line support can feel for issues and problems they didn’t create, know little or nothing about and far beyond their control.
Phreego made the following mistakes. They failed to notify their client base of the four-hour session time-out and 200-hour monthly limit. They implemented these changes before modifying their TOS. Their TOS had a date on the bottom of 06-19-2006 even though obvious changes had recently been made.
You may not be aware of the details of your ISPs Terms of Service3. Most Terms of Service allow the ISP to change their pricing and services at any time. They can simply change your service by adding new restrictions to the TOS posted on their Website. Their Terms of Service can be set up in a way so that they do not have to send you an email notifying you of any changes to your service.
It is totally unreasonable to expect or require an ISPs customer to have to access their Website, find their TOS and read through the legalese to find any changes that may have been made. At the very least, the ISP should show the revision date on the link to the TOS just as I have done on my Websites and send an email notifying their customers of the changes in advance of their implementation.
The Phreego support rep was right. The 200 hour monthly limitation had not been added to the TOS.
So what happened to Phreego? Phreego was purchased by CISP. The new company made changes to their service before notifying customers of the changes. For this reason I strongly advise against prepaid quarterly or yearly contracts. Find a good ISP and stick with a monthly payment plan. Good ISPs can still be found with monthly plans under $10.00 U.S.
If you haven’t read your TOS lately or not at all, you should take a few minutes to locate it at your ISP's Website and carefully read it. You may be surprised at what you might find in it.
If you are here shopping for a new ISP, I have tried to outline the restrictions, limitations, fines and fees in the discount ISP comparison table. I know it's not a lot of fun to read the details of an ISP's TOS. It's not any more fun but a little bit easier to read the summary I have provided in the table. You should review it before selecting your ISP. Once you have chosen an ISP, carefully read their TOS and Privacy Policies. I have provided convenient links in the comparison table to make your research a little bit easier.
1 Since then XACTI has discontinued their dial-up ISP service Inbox to concentrate on broadband and Cognigen Networks, Inc has dropped one of their two dial-up ISP services CogniSurf.
2 When using Firefox 3.0.1 in Vista Ultimate SP1 my computer automatically redials if the network connection is lost. This may be exactly the behavior you want. I find it annoying. It ties up my phone line and wastes connect time to the ISP. It is also annoying if you are on the phone and the modem tries to redial. I believe I have found a way to stop this annoying Vista / Firefox behavior. Please be aware that making the changes below will turn off the Vista automatic redialer. You will no longer get the option to connect to a network when opening Mail or Internet Explorer if you are not already connected to a network. There are two methods to turn off auto-redial in Vista:
3 It is also known by other names like Terms of Use, Terms and Conditions. Acceptable Use Policy, Acceptable Use Guidelines, Guidelines for Acceptable Use, etc.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
