Sympatico Canada - Rant

Having suffered ongoing lack of support for the last several months, modem failures, accidental removal of my high speed DSL for a week, continued random access failures to sites that it declares do not exist, they finally did managed to outdo themselves.

For over 30 hours my wife has had no incoming email. I have had random lost email, delayed incoming email, e.g.e email coming in 20 hours after it was sent, random duplication of email, so that some email I get over 50 copies of the same item.

It seems their SMTP and POP servers have failed - no explanation why - no indication when they will be up again.

http://sympatico.msn.ca/ - seems ever since they merged with msn they have slipped from mediocre to incompetant

Failure to support Firefox -
http://digitalhomecanada.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=273&Itemid=51

 

Sounds about right for BELL.

I don't bother checking my sympatico mail anymore - it's just all spam anyway.

P.S. I'm on sympatico dial-up, even they have a hard time screwing that up.

Good luck!
Mike
Nova Scotia

 

Luckily a lot of my mail is coming in through gmail and gets forwarded or comes in via a throwaway at http://sneakemail.com, which I can easility redirect to another email. I also use http://spamcop.net [who wer very helpfull in helping solve this] which give me another source of redirection. So once I found the problem I was able to get about 90% or the email bypassing sympatico. But I have lost random email probably for two days and have to contact every possible person who might have emailed me.

I also have to check all auo notify services, e.g. I migh have orders that came in from paypal, so I have to log into to PayPal and check, and repeat that for a number of services. I have access servie that warn if I'm approachi usage limits, I have sales on eBay - there is no end to it.

My son was signed up for a course and needed the registration number, luckily that finally came through 24 hours late.

But I have thousands of people using my sympatico email, which I've had for many years, and so over the next few week I'm going to have to try and make an organized list of them.

The problem with any email service you choose is that if it goes down, so much of you life depends on it, there is no way round the problem.

I'm going to ask some people and find if there is a reliable provider in Toronto, someone who is not too big to be incompetent and not too small to be overrun. However, I'm not sure I can get anyone providing cheap DSL service - when I looked before at independant providers - they wanted $800 per month.

 

If your problem has only been for the last 30 hours, you've been lucky.

I've been having complaints from clients about unanswered email that I have never received for a few weeks now. Then Easter weekend, Sympatico email gradually slowed to a crawl. In my area, the canned and vague messages about server problems at tech support started Easter Monday and have continued all week. I just got off the phone with a lkive tech support guy who said they had no additional information beyond the fact that they were having server problems and he could give me to ETA for the problem to be resolved. I asked him if he could at lest indicate whether it was a hardware problem or some sort of virus problem and he couldn't answer even that...

Like macdesign, I've had this email account for several years and a lot of people by now use this as my main email address and I do use it in my business so it would be a right pain to change it but if they don't get their act together pretty damn soon I don't think I'll have a choice.

 

This from their website today -- nice of them to keep us in the loop for the past week (and yes that's sarcasm):

 

I'm with AEI and very happy. Many people will say AEI is no good but as long as you have an external modem there is no problem. I've been with them several month and had no problems so far (knock on wood) speeds are great, about 2.2mbits which is above average for DSL modems in Ontario

 

I thought it was just me comp

 

That is why I use the local Cabe Provider for my internet. I have NEVER heard good things about Aliant DSL (Aliant =Bell), however they can't screw-up dial-up so that is what me parents use

 

Actually, they have screwed up dial-up at times

But for the most part, I've been happy with Sympatico for several years... just not sure the service isn't declining lately.

 

Gotta love Sympatico.

I've used symaptico for well over 10 years now, up until 3 years ago I was DSL.

I moved, nice old farm house with no more then 5 houses on the street. Prospects for DSL - NONE

I know the people who lived here before us and they had constant problems with dial-up connections, being dropped, low connection speeds, and connecting but not connecting (dns problems?)

I move in, having my own home business I require a minimum of 2 lines. So with 3 phone lines in the house, I start playing.

Line 1 - Original Line - Not good for dialup connection
Line 2 - Constant 40K connections, connected for 2-3 weeks at a time with no problems, regardless of weather.
Line 3 - Dropped connections, low connection speeds, and possible connecting without a dns...

About 2 weeks ago, I start having problems. I stop getting consistant connections, and am now suffering at 21.6Kbps connections, the occassional connection that doesnt 'connect' (dns?) as well as now suffering at half the speed I downgraded to (from dsl).

I HAVE had the other 2 lines looked at, but I have been told by at least one Bell technician that Bell Canada only warrants a line for voice connection, not for data, and certainly not for a minimum connection speed.

I am gonna pickup a new modem today I think to see if that solves the problem, after all it never hurts to have a spare...

Tho I find it interesting I have problems just after/during a major snow storm, and having seen the bell technician at the box that I am (appearently) connected to.

I have dealt with their customer service before and at this point have not wasted my time calling them about these issues. I am just considering getting a satellite uplink... a hard call tho considering the 36 month contract to get the best value on the hardware.

Thomas

 

Ask, nicely, if there is a digital mux on the lines in question. The customer rep will not know. But, a service technician coming out to your place will.

If there is, get them to remove it.

What happens is that when there is a shortage of lines and a new resident moves in, you get the privilege of sharing the line with them.

With respect to data rate guarantees, insist that your FAX is not working