Hello everyone,
Seeing as Charter is seemingly unwilling to further help me with this issue, I've decided to post here for some help.
I'm located in Southern California. Two weeks ago, my internet started timing out around 5:30PM every 10 minutes or so. This would persist until about 6AM. I have not had any changes to my equipment. Just to be sure, I connected an old router, and even hooked up my modem directly to my laptop. The timeouts started happening on their own. They've sent numerous technicians out, who did a variety of things. The first replaced the modem, second connected us to a different port on the telephone pole, third relocated the line because it was located ~6" parallel to our main power line coming from the pole, fourth indicated that there was some issues he found up at the pole, fifth insisted that there was some voltage on the cable line. Now, I've addressed the voltage issue by plugging the modem into an inverter, to a UPS, and to a grounded receptable in the kitchen, with all other circuits turned off at the breaker. Edison also came out to inspect our power and indicated no issues. The problem still happens.
The very last visit, the fifth technician came with his supervisor, who claimed that Charter only works with Netgear routers, and gave me his email address to correspond with to help solve this issue. I told him to keep in mind that this issue occurs when I directly plug my laptop into the modem. In addition, the third and fourth technicians have indicated the need for a line tech to be sent out. I even got a text confirmation from him that one would be sent out. On the very last visit, I told the supervisor that two service techs had indicated some issues up at the pole and for a line tech to be issued, however he dismissed this saying that signals to my modem look fine. Today, I found out from corporate escalations that a line tech was never sent out, even though a prior corporate escalations service rep indicated that she would be corresponding with the local office to send one out, and then follow up with me the next day. She also indicated that typically, a line tech is to be issued within 24 hours. This never happened. I also found out I was billed for the last 2 service visits, coded as "Customer Equipment Failure," even though there was no conclusive diagnosis for the issue.
I've continued to insist upon a line technician being sent out, because ellis056 from the below linked thread indicates that this is an issue with amplifiers which adjust gain to combat temperature changes. I've also brought this to the attention to the supervisor, who dismissed it as only applying when Charter used to be analog. They seem adamant about not sending out a line technician.
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/21085-42-cable-internet-connection-constantly-timing
What should my steps be moving forward? I've already filed a BBB complaint, as well as corresponded with Corporate Escalations. However, they seem to redirect me to the same supervisor, who is unwilling to explore other options, saying that sending out anyone else would just be a waste of time. He has also indicated that he has not seen any timeouts since the 16th, which is false, as 1) I'm continuing to have interruptions 2) the phone service representatives have all seen an abnormal number of timeouts, which is why these appointments were scheduled in the first place. I will explore filing a complaint with the FCC, AG and PUC.
Here are graphs from pingplotter, which I recently started using to track timeouts. Every red bar indicates a timeout. I've also connected my laptop to tether to my T-Mobile data network, and pinged my WAN IP externally. The red bars, or timeouts, correspond to the timeouts from within Charter's network.
http://i61.tinypic.com/2qdvp7n.png
http://i58.tinypic.com/dre61z.png
Finally, here are some results from the DSLreports line quality test.
http://www.dslreports.com/pingtest/5b47cb23bb88/3268548
http://www.dslreports.com/pingtest/757585c427b4/3268243
Thank you.
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