on dslreports or broadbandreports there's at least two instances of me complaining about two cable companies because, at last, it was figured out there was moisture ingress in the LE (line extender, usually on cable lines on poles). The only common denominator was it happened during prime time, every night, and went away around midnight.
The other common denominator was the cable company refusing to believe it was an issue with their equipment; this meant it took a couple of months of calling them every night until they finally sent a technician and a manager to my house to verify that I wasn't wrong, leaving my house, coming back 15 minutes later to say "it'll be fixed tomorrow, there's a problem with the LE balance up the road" - and then the issue is resolved.
Now this doesn't sound so bad, until you learn that the first time this happened to me, i had only VoIP - so the internet would start to foul, i'd call the cable company, and the tier 1 would reset my modem at some point, and then i wouldn't be able to call back until after midnight (or whatever), when there was no longer a problem. So after a week of this, i would walk 30 minutes - one way - to a pay phone (remember those?) once the internet slowed, call them, explain that i couldn't do anything they wanted me to do physically, since they disconnected my phone line every time i called.
This is what happens with a de facto monopoly.
I will never pay suddenlink another dime, even if they're the only terrestrial provider, for whatever reason.
Interesting, I wonder if I’m experiencing something a little bit similar that Comcast can’t seem to debug.
Almost every day, in the heat of summer, I get one to five 10-minute outages as soon as the temp gets over about 80F. More when it’s hotter, usually. Usually it results in a modem reset, so it’s hard to tell how long the actual outage is.
Been happening for going on 5 years. They replaced the under-street cable from our house to the junction box across the street to no effect. I suspect it’s that junction box, but afaict, none of my neighbors that share that junction box have the same issue. Not very fun to have your WFH day collapse unexpectedly in the middle of the afternoon.
Strangely, for the last month we’ve had several days of 80+ temps with no sign of outage. So fun.
Edit: yes of course multiple modem replacements and inside cable checks, to no avail.
We had the same problem at an old house. There was a cable splitter in the attic that was expanding in the heat and losing connection to the cable. We bought a heftier one and moved it under the insulation in the attic.
Yeah, probably very similar thing if that pattern is true. It's the shift forcing your modem to change speeds, but neither side being willing to accept it.
If you can, try forcing a level at/below the speed you get during the breakage and see if it just rides it out. If it does, shift it back up and plan your coffee breaks around it. Or don't, I'm not your mother
Several day's of 80+ temps, meaning it hasn't dropped below 80? Possibly it is just getting above 80 before you start your work day. And not dropping below until after your work day has ended?
I've experienced something similar except for temperatures below ~32-36 degrees. At this particular location it would result in a ~1hr outage going below that temperature, but not when it went back above it for some reason.
I think you’d get this problem, monopoly or not, whenever cost saving measures are in place (and they always are, for good reason) at the customer-interface level.
Maybe there should always be a hidden option that only people that meet a certain troubleshooting ability threshold get access to when calling in for tech support….
> I think you’d get this problem, monopoly or not, whenever cost saving measures are in place (and they always are, for good reason) at the customer-interface level.
I'm guessing that these scripts that we're all complaining about solve 95% of problems customers call in about. Sure makes things painful for the 5% of cases, though.
I've been a (grudging) Comcast customer for ~17 years, and I have been impressed by how their monitoring has improved over that time. It's been quite a number of years since I've had to convince them that I had an actual problem that their systems didn't automatically detect.
There is a hidden option - you can call it "proof of work", or "proof of determination". You keep calling, and trying ways to escalate, maybe even send a paper letter; eventually, something in the customer "support" process will yield and you'll get through to someone who can actually help you.
The other common denominator was the cable company refusing to believe it was an issue with their equipment; this meant it took a couple of months of calling them every night until they finally sent a technician and a manager to my house to verify that I wasn't wrong, leaving my house, coming back 15 minutes later to say "it'll be fixed tomorrow, there's a problem with the LE balance up the road" - and then the issue is resolved.
Now this doesn't sound so bad, until you learn that the first time this happened to me, i had only VoIP - so the internet would start to foul, i'd call the cable company, and the tier 1 would reset my modem at some point, and then i wouldn't be able to call back until after midnight (or whatever), when there was no longer a problem. So after a week of this, i would walk 30 minutes - one way - to a pay phone (remember those?) once the internet slowed, call them, explain that i couldn't do anything they wanted me to do physically, since they disconnected my phone line every time i called.
This is what happens with a de facto monopoly.
I will never pay suddenlink another dime, even if they're the only terrestrial provider, for whatever reason.