I have TWC. I now have the opportunity to get Verizon Fios for Internet and TV. I didn't find a lot on the Internet comparing the two. Has anyone gone from one to the other for TV and Internet and found a preference? I appreciate any thoughts.
FiOS is fiber to your home, that gives it an edge other traditional cable companies can't match. It has dramatically faster internet available, better picture quality and more HD channels, and best of all it's not TWC. On the rare occasion that I had a service problem it was consistently resolved the next day (remote died once, other time a brief service outage due to renovation in the apartment above me). If I'm moving to a new apartment and looking for cable/internet, my first question is is FiOS available, and if it is I'm to the point of not even considering other companies offers. It's just that much better.
(Albany/Schenectady). Up here, the service isn't bad, and I was comfortable with it...but...
It was getting more expensive every year. A lot of nickle and dime stuff that kept adding to the bill. The internet was slow at times, and lots of outages...plus the new Flat Screen I got didn't get great reception at times.
The kicker, though, was when I heard about the Comcast takeover bid. Comcast is bad news, period...horrible service, data caps, I had heard horror stories from friends I knew downstate.
So, earlier this year, my TWC contract was up. I went to them, asking for a 2 year fixed rate. "Nope, the best we can do for you is 1 year". With contract.
Really? Verizon was offering me 2 years fixed. "No, they aren't...we would know about it."
That was it. Verizon was offering me 2 years, no contract, Quantum 50/25 for the same TV/Internet/Phone bundle I had with TWC. I was saving over 30%...then they threw in $10 a month less for the two years if I had a Verizon Phone and $10 less off the total cable bill.
Sort of a no brainer. Now, it's not perfect (I loved accessing live TV on the net, TWC has a good package for that), and you don't want them coming to your house if it's not their fault...it can get expensive.
My flat screen looks better now, and I'm happy so far (though check your bills...Verizon tends to screw those up). Comcast is the key here...you REALLY don't want them, or anything associated with them. They are evil...really!
We've had it for about 13 or 14 years. The internet is often slow and either down or the modem needs to be rebooted. The cable service is constantly down or channels are not available. And, I don't want Comcast.
My building is almost finished being wired for FiOS and I will sign up immediately.
Is worth every penny. But their customer service has really pissed me off recently. Im moving and bringing my fios account to the new place. My 2yr contract expired and I originally had the double play. When you move, they treat you like a new customer. Cool, I upgraded to the triple play and got all these credits and internet activation fees waived. My bill was to be $134.99 before the box rentals. I was paying $168/month for double play since my contract expired and with the triple play I was to be paying basically the same and get a $400 prepaid visa card. Now I get an email telling me that I filled out the moving order wrong since my apartment is a 2nd floor install and all I'd have to do is call and take care of it. So I call and the woman takes care of it and as Im ready to go she tells me I can get the new dvr that records 6 shows at a time for $11/month more. So I agree. Next day I get the confirmation email but now all of the credits are taken off and they are charging me $49.99 one time fee for internet activation. They are telling me Im paying $212/month now. So I call, wait on hold for 30 mins going back and forth and they tell me they will take the fee off again but I can only have the credits for 24 months or the $400 card. I tell the guy for now I'll take the card but I will be calling again to talk to someone else who knows what they are doing. So now 2 days later Im still at the same point. The order still shows the absurd price and the internet fee.
Has anyone heard of this either or crap? I have the original online order email saying I get the credits AND the prepaid card. Im thinking of just going to the verizon store and getting this taken care of because their customer service really is awful. People online arent lying when they say how bad the customer service is.
(or, in my case, the Verizon kisok). And yeah, I did mention to watch your bill, as Verizon (who is evil themselves, just not as evil as Comcast) screws those up regularly. I agree, keep all the stuff you got when you were offered the service, that helps.
In my case, the $400 credit was for signing up for two years. I didn't think it was worth it, since with two years/no contract I can walk at any time..and I'll let them know that if I run into problems, I'd consider it. In your case, see if you have the 30 days or since you signed grace period (I had that, so if I didn't like it, I could get rid of them.) Good Luck!
I guess I was the only cable subscriber in my neighborhood so there was no internet speed degradation whatsoever.
FiOS has some faster services I guess, but for the comparably priced option, Comcast was exactly as fast as FiOS, maybe even faster.
TV was almost the same. I couldn't tell any difference.
In a "blind" test I'm going to wager almost no one would be able to tell the difference between them.
I regretted it because as luck would have it the normally reliable FiOS had a two-day outage my 2nd day with the service and Verizon customer service is every bit as bad as Comcast. Plus I hated changing my email address I had for so long from a Comcast to a verizon email address.
Now I do find FiOS reliable and fine from a service standpoint, but so was cable.
Knowing what I know now, the only way I'd switch again is if the "Quantum" or whatever the faster upload and download internet option is similarly priced. I upgrade from my original to a higher speed package and don't notice any difference at all. I'm still not the highest, and to go to that is like $75.00 per month more.
The reason I switched in the first place was a tree fell on my neighbors house and took out both of our power lines from the street to the house. he had FiOS I had Comcast. the FiOS people were at his house that day and Comcast told me 24 - 48 hours. I said the Verizon guy is here, why can't you get here and they said sorry. I called verizon impulsively and switched that day (they also had a $500 visa gift card for comcast subscribers who switch).
Later that day Comcast did in fact show up though.
but having had both in my life, its Fios all the way. It's not even a contest.
Verizon cust service is a nightmare, completely screwed up my accounts and billing and it took 6 weeks and god knows how many phone calls to get it corrected. But I stay with them cause TV and internet is the best.
My install guy was great. Moved - it was seamless. Did everything online. Recently my modem stopped working 10 minutes on the phone they sent out a new one, no problem. I have internet only but used to have double and triple plays.
Comcast was the worst IMO. after 2 no shows by a tech and 2.5 hours on the phone to reach a 'manager' I will never again deal with them.
and we had TWC all my of my life since they pretty much had a monopoly around here until Fios started moving in. The prices kept going up and up, until we were paying upwards of $240 for phone/internet/tv! We tried calling them and negotiating the prices but they would never budge...that is until Fios rolled in. When Fios came to town TWC wised up and tried retaining customers, but we had enough and switched to Fios as soon as they moved into the neighborhood and we haven't looked back! Picture quality, even though still not 1080p, is much better than TWC. Internet speeds are quicker, currently getting 50mbps download. With TWC it was always less than 10mbps. The hardware is also much better; our TWC boxes used to freeze just when changing a channel. I went to TWC a couple different times and requested new boxes, it was always a hassle because they didn't want to give the "good" boxes out to anyone, but I did manage to snag a couple. It helped, but they don't compare to the Fios boxes. We've lost service only once in the four years we had Fios, and it was due to maintenance on the lines down the street and it was only out for a couple hours. I had to contact customer service once because the battery backup on on the phone line died and was constantly beeping, they told me I was out of warranty and it would cost $100 to replace, but ended up giving me the replacement free of charge with very little hassle.
since the solution is technologically superior. Their customer service sucks, but then again - if you're comparing it to TWC's, that's not much of a beauty contest.
In almost 5 years with FiOS, I've never had an issue. No outages, not through hurricanes Sandy or Irene (the former taking out our power for awhile, and internet and phone service remained intact). Can't be beat, IMO.
Thanks for all your comments. I figured Verizon would be the favorite, but not by a virtual landslide. I guess I'm not going to think about this question much anymore.
(or, in my case, the Verizon kisok). And yeah, I did mention to watch your bill, as Verizon (who is evil themselves, just not as evil as Comcast) screws those up regularly. I agree, keep all the stuff you got when you were offered the service, that helps.
In my case, the $400 credit was for signing up for two years. I didn't think it was worth it, since with two years/no contract I can walk at any time..and I'll let them know that if I run into problems, I'd consider it. In your case, see if you have the 30 days or since you signed grace period (I had that, so if I didn't like it, I could get rid of them.) Good Luck!
Tried calling 1 more time. The woman on the line seemed to know what she was doing. She saw no reason why the price of the bundle changed from 134.99 to 154.99 because the 134.99 is the bundle price. But she did also give me a weird response about putting it back to original price but it would need authorization and the person who could do that wasnt in offices at the time but they will call me back to confirm. If I dont hear something by Sunday, I will def go to the store.
Its almost like they know their service quality is superior to other companies that they could care less about customer service.
FIOS all the way. I have TWC because they have a great deal with my apt building (I'm paying $50 for cable and internet plus premiums). But the service outages and issues with the cable box is always constant and annoying.
FiOS is fiber to your home, that gives it an edge other traditional cable companies can't match. It has dramatically faster internet available, better picture quality and more HD channels, and best of all it's not TWC. On the rare occasion that I had a service problem it was consistently resolved the next day (remote died once, other time a brief service outage due to renovation in the apartment above me). If I'm moving to a new apartment and looking for cable/internet, my first question is is FiOS available, and if it is I'm to the point of not even considering other companies offers. It's just that much better.
It was getting more expensive every year. A lot of nickle and dime stuff that kept adding to the bill. The internet was slow at times, and lots of outages...plus the new Flat Screen I got didn't get great reception at times.
The kicker, though, was when I heard about the Comcast takeover bid. Comcast is bad news, period...horrible service, data caps, I had heard horror stories from friends I knew downstate.
So, earlier this year, my TWC contract was up. I went to them, asking for a 2 year fixed rate. "Nope, the best we can do for you is 1 year". With contract.
Really? Verizon was offering me 2 years fixed. "No, they aren't...we would know about it."
That was it. Verizon was offering me 2 years, no contract, Quantum 50/25 for the same TV/Internet/Phone bundle I had with TWC. I was saving over 30%...then they threw in $10 a month less for the two years if I had a Verizon Phone and $10 less off the total cable bill.
Sort of a no brainer. Now, it's not perfect (I loved accessing live TV on the net, TWC has a good package for that), and you don't want them coming to your house if it's not their fault...it can get expensive.
My flat screen looks better now, and I'm happy so far (though check your bills...Verizon tends to screw those up). Comcast is the key here...you REALLY don't want them, or anything associated with them. They are evil...really!
My building is almost finished being wired for FiOS and I will sign up immediately.
+1
Has anyone heard of this either or crap? I have the original online order email saying I get the credits AND the prepaid card. Im thinking of just going to the verizon store and getting this taken care of because their customer service really is awful. People online arent lying when they say how bad the customer service is.
In my case, the $400 credit was for signing up for two years. I didn't think it was worth it, since with two years/no contract I can walk at any time..and I'll let them know that if I run into problems, I'd consider it. In your case, see if you have the 30 days or since you signed grace period (I had that, so if I didn't like it, I could get rid of them.) Good Luck!
I guess I was the only cable subscriber in my neighborhood so there was no internet speed degradation whatsoever.
FiOS has some faster services I guess, but for the comparably priced option, Comcast was exactly as fast as FiOS, maybe even faster.
TV was almost the same. I couldn't tell any difference.
In a "blind" test I'm going to wager almost no one would be able to tell the difference between them.
I regretted it because as luck would have it the normally reliable FiOS had a two-day outage my 2nd day with the service and Verizon customer service is every bit as bad as Comcast. Plus I hated changing my email address I had for so long from a Comcast to a verizon email address.
Now I do find FiOS reliable and fine from a service standpoint, but so was cable.
Knowing what I know now, the only way I'd switch again is if the "Quantum" or whatever the faster upload and download internet option is similarly priced. I upgrade from my original to a higher speed package and don't notice any difference at all. I'm still not the highest, and to go to that is like $75.00 per month more.
The reason I switched in the first place was a tree fell on my neighbors house and took out both of our power lines from the street to the house. he had FiOS I had Comcast. the FiOS people were at his house that day and Comcast told me 24 - 48 hours. I said the Verizon guy is here, why can't you get here and they said sorry. I called verizon impulsively and switched that day (they also had a $500 visa gift card for comcast subscribers who switch).
Later that day Comcast did in fact show up though.
Verizon cust service is a nightmare, completely screwed up my accounts and billing and it took 6 weeks and god knows how many phone calls to get it corrected. But I stay with them cause TV and internet is the best.
Comcast was the worst IMO. after 2 no shows by a tech and 2.5 hours on the phone to reach a 'manager' I will never again deal with them.
EVER
Go with Fios and don't look back!
In almost 5 years with FiOS, I've never had an issue. No outages, not through hurricanes Sandy or Irene (the former taking out our power for awhile, and internet and phone service remained intact). Can't be beat, IMO.
In my case, the $400 credit was for signing up for two years. I didn't think it was worth it, since with two years/no contract I can walk at any time..and I'll let them know that if I run into problems, I'd consider it. In your case, see if you have the 30 days or since you signed grace period (I had that, so if I didn't like it, I could get rid of them.) Good Luck!
Tried calling 1 more time. The woman on the line seemed to know what she was doing. She saw no reason why the price of the bundle changed from 134.99 to 154.99 because the 134.99 is the bundle price. But she did also give me a weird response about putting it back to original price but it would need authorization and the person who could do that wasnt in offices at the time but they will call me back to confirm. If I dont hear something by Sunday, I will def go to the store.
Its almost like they know their service quality is superior to other companies that they could care less about customer service.