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As a counterpoint to that, Ziply just bought Frontier in my area and now owns all the DSL and FTTH service. They have the worst customer service I have ever exp

As a counterpoint to that, Ziply just bought Frontier in my area and now owns all the DSL and FTTH service. They have the worst customer service I have ever experienced. They rolled through and canceled all the autopay, didn't tell us for three months, sent us a letter telling us we didn't have to do anything, and followed that up by sending us no bills or anything until the account was three months past due. Not a single person on their customer service team could refund a $30.00 late fee on an account that had previously been current for 5 years. On top of that when my fiancee was calling every CSR she would get on the phone with would offer to transfer her to the correct department, then hang up. She literally spent a total of 8 hours on the phone over the course of two weeks, so it ended up costing them way more money than they extracted from their little late fee. And their CEO had the unmitigated gall to say they have the best customer service on their website. In contrast, Comcast/Xfinity have not caused any problems at all for me over the 10+ years I've been a subscriber. Also Comcast was able to give us 300 megabit cable for less than the cost of 75 megabit fiber from Ziply. So it wasn't even comparable. So yeah, DSL/FTTH might be more technically capable, but it's only as strong as the company providing the service.

milankragujevic 6y ago
Yes, of course customer service is top priority, at least it should be. In my country, there are people intentionally staying on a cable ISP for their excellent support and the fact they carry non-government non-right-wing channels which are unwanted on other government-controlled ISPs (i.e. CNN affiliate). The cable ISP is slower and more expensive (up to 100% more) than FTTH at the government owned telco, but people really appreciate having problems fixed in a day after one call and not an agonizing process lasting months(!!) that often just ends with them cancelling your contract and waiving the early cancellation fee, and then blacklisting your location from getting service because it is problematic. Also funnily enough we had that same problem with billing, it lasted for 18 months, during which time no correct bills were sent, no payments were logged and nobody's service was shut off for non-payment. The ISP mostly forgave the debts [1] of all customers because they couldn't keep track of it. I first because a user just as it happened and haven't paid a year due to them messing up my discounted rate and then just telling me not to pay and sending a corrected bill for 1,00 RSD (basically free) because they can't guarrantee they will log the payment properly. Hilarious really. [1] and reported the biggest lost since 1980s when it was founded, but hey it's government owned, the people will eat the debt haha /s

milankragujevic 6y ago

Yes, of course customer service is top priority, at least it should be. In my country, there are people intentionally staying on a cable ISP for their excellent support and the fact they carry non-government non-right-wing channels which are unwanted on other government-controlled ISPs (i.e. CNN affiliate). The cable ISP is slower and more expensive (up to 100% more) than FTTH at the government owned telco, but people really appreciate having problems fixed in a day after one call and not an agonizing process lasting months(!!) that often just ends with them cancelling your contract and waiving the early cancellation fee, and then blacklisting your location from getting service because it is problematic. Also funnily enough we had that same problem with billing, it lasted for 18 months, during which time no correct bills were sent, no payments were logged and nobody's service was shut off for non-payment. The ISP mostly forgave the debts [1] of all customers because they couldn't keep track of it. I first because a user just as it happened and haven't paid a year due to them messing up my discounted rate and then just telling me not to pay and sending a corrected bill for 1,00 RSD (basically free) because they can't guarrantee they will log the payment properly. Hilarious really. [1] and reported the biggest lost since 1980s when it was founded, but hey it's government owned, the people will eat the debt haha /s