Rant: Shaw's wait times

[410440]

What the hell is going on with shaw cable lately?

Half of my channels are all jacked up and dont work - blurry / fuzzy / pixealted / freezing / no sound / etc....

Im getting a bunch of channels free on one box - and none on the other, my girlfriend cant watch damn MTV and keeps bitching to get it fixed.

I called these fuckers on wednesday, waited on hold for 2 hours, got disconected, called back - pressed 2 for a scheduled call back... called back at 2 fucking AM in the morning

Called them thursday, hit 2 for a scheduled call back... again called at 11 after I was in bed.... fuck

friday, didnt even bother since it would be the same b.s

Called saturday, no dice, hit 2 for a call back - never got one.


Not im sitting here again on fucking hold waiting for some piece of shit to answer so I can try and get my damn service working again and add BBC.


Fuck Shaw.............. but its still better than telus.


/rant

[SigmaRacing]

Yeah, I called and got suck on hold for an hour yesterday too. The online chat support was way faster. Service is shitty these days...

[Atriux]

My internet from shaw has been acting extremely awkward recently. Overall latency would spike very frequently (And after resetting everything, router etc) it continued. I proceeded to call shaw, and waited for 2 hours and 15 minutes.

The first hour and 45 minutes, every 30 seconds there'd be a message saying "did you know shaw is awesome" and then "all our representatives are currently busy at the moment, we are taking callers in priority order" or something like that... anyways after an hour and 45 minutes they replaced the constant advertisements with like some radio station's classical music... 30 minutes of nothing before I said screw it.

Seems to be a reoccuring theme with them...

Absolutely shitty service on Shaw's part.

[410440]

I got THROUGH....... !!!! then the rep pissed me off and kept telling me to unplug my boxes after I told him I have done the numerous times over the last week to no avail.


I asked if I could talk to someone who knew what they were doing, he said no... :nut: I then proceeded to tell him to fuck off.

:guns:



So, looks like I call again later when im not so pissed and wait on hold for another hour

[[GaGe]]

Originally posted by 410440

I called these fuckers on wednesday, waited on hold for 2 hours, got disconected, called back - pressed 2 for a scheduled call back... called back at 2 fucking AM in the morning


I'd look into that. Pretty sure they're not allowed to callback after 9 PM local time.

[Type_S1]

Originally posted by 410440
I got THROUGH....... !!!! then the rep pissed me off and kept telling me to unplug my boxes after I told him I have done the numerous times over the last week to no avail.


I asked if I could talk to someone who knew what they were doing, he said no... :nut: I then proceeded to tell him to fuck off.

:guns:



So, looks like I call again later when im not so pissed and wait on hold for another hour

:facepalm:

They have to go through troubleshooting guidelines the company tells them do...they aren't there to piss you off you don't need to harrass them for no reason.

Just do the few reset's he asked you to do even if you have done them yourself it takes like a minute and then they will get to the more advanced resets and crap. But I was on the line for 1.5 hours to get help with my TV last week it was extremely irritating.

[Hakkola]

Originally posted by [GaGe]


I'd look into that. Pretty sure they're not allowed to callback after 9 PM local time.

Not sure, if the option is there it is all automated so it isn't a reps choice to call somebody back, the system does it automatically. I'm in sales and have done some billing, those departments close at 8 so in my case we'd never have callbacks past 8:30. Tech support is 24 hours so if you choose a callback I don't think it matters what time it is, you should be given an estimated time by the system and then you're given the choice for it.

It's probably the busiest it has ever been at Shaw and we're not entirely sure why, but since July I think we've hired at least 100 new reps with a lot of them still in training so it should get better soon.

Wait times this morning were really good, hopefully it's the beginning of a trend.

[Chandler_Racing]

I use to really like Shaw, but them seem to be dropping the ball IMO.

I have the Shaw extreme internet and it has got'n terribly slow.

[S4maniac]

yes ... something is up in CR at Shaw right now ... dropping the ball fast. Never had problems until recently ... they're starting to sound like Rogers these days ...

[Awd-Tsi]

The customer support sucks dick, can't complain about the actual cable though.

[eblend]

You know what is funny, I have been a shaw customer for many many years and just recently switched to telus for their Optik service (which is awesome by the way). I had issues with line noise the first two weeks and it took them two weeks to fix, but every single time I called they were super nica haha. I was like wtf...I was expecting someone to be like an idiot like my experience some years ago with DSL. Finally got my stuff fixed by a "rushman", who is a 3rd person to go out if the first 2 fail, I guess it is their process, the first 2 are just normal techs, and the 3rd one is the super experienced one. Came in, heard the noise on my line, switched the pair for a new one and whola, solid ass internet and TV service. I constantly get 15mbps any time of the day. I switched from Shaw since my internet was so bloody slow in the evening time.

So yah, I think things at Telus are changing. I am very pleased with my own experience with them. The Optik TV/Internet service really is awesome, only reason why I gave them 3 chances to fix it, normally I wouldn't have had the patience.

A co-workers wife works at Telus and he tells me that the service thing is really improving in there, as directed by the higher ups.

I will experience this Shaw customer service pretty soon, gonna try to call them and get my parents better service, since right now they are paying over 120 bucks for basic phone, full digital cable (not HD) and just lite internet. I hear you can get HD cable with HD box rental for a year, extreme and phone for like $83 bucks. Would like to switch parents over to telus as well, but having more then a few TVs gets really expensive with telus as you need a reciever box for each TV, with Shaw you still get your standard analogue so they can watch it on their nonhd tvs directly.

[projekz]

Bell Expressvu for tv, Telus for internet and home phone:thumbsup:

I've had that set up for a long time and I think it's the best. Internet is always fast, TV is always great and home phone is well...homes phone LOL

[eblend]

Originally posted by projekz
Bell Expressvu for tv, Telus for internet and home phone:thumbsup:

I've had that set up for a long time and I think it's the best. Internet is always fast, TV is always great and home phone is well...homes phone LOL

I had expressvu as well for TV before switching to Telus..main reason was the single PVR. I had two PVRs before and never could figure out what is where haha. Also was building the garage and wanted to hide the satellite wires...with Telus TV working great I decided that i dont' need to hide the wires and took down my sat dish just yesturday. I think the future will be all fiber optics (my house has a fiber line, not yet used though :() so I figure sat is oldschool now. I never had any problems with Bell by the way, was rock solid, definately better then Shaw in my opinion.

[Clever]

I recently went through this and I almost canceled my services with shaw, what pissed me off the most was that when I chose the call back option they call me back after a few hours, only to put me back on hold for another 30-45 minutes, still trying to decide what to do right now, and I have been in touch with Telus and Bell and never had any problems with talking to someone when I called.

[derpderp]

I've had to call Shaw a number of times when the internet network goes down at my work and they have been nothing but really helpful and friendly. Had them even go the extra step and get me to check some internal command prompt stuff to see if was our or our data-centers problem, even though it is outside of Shaw at that point and could have just said oh this isn't our problem, bye.

Maybe they are only nice though because it is Shaw business service I am calling? Or maybe because I usually have to call them in the middle of the night so they are not so busy.

If your cable is fuzzy and cutting in and out it is likely the underground cable is damaged, that was happening at my house and that was what it was diagnosed as.

[jonnycat]

I'm down in lethbridge, and I am having the sakes issues as the op. You guys have patience, I gave up after 40mins three times in a row.

[Guillermo]

I had the same problem with Shaw's customer service

http://forums.beyond.ca/st/317363/problem-with-shaw-digital-box-remote-not-working/

[HiTempguy1]

About 1-2 weeks ago my high speed extreme (or whatever the 15Mbps one is) slowed down. I finally called them as I was getting pissed I wasn't getting my 2Mbps torrent download rates and could only stream 2 HD youtube videos at a time.

I was on hold for 15 minutes, and then asked for a callback. 3 hours later I was called back. That is a LOT of problem calls they are receiving! Nonetheless, a tech is coming out next Sunday to look into it. Sounds to me like they have been having modem problems.

Of course, with the alternative being telus, FAWK THAT NOISE. For all of you with Telus, it is great it is working out for you, but I remember an era of 256kbps internet speeds, constant outages, and terrible customer service. At least Shaw almost always works, which was not the case with Telus. We're talking almost half the month with no internet, ANYWHERE we went in Red Deer.

[kolumbo69]

Yeah, my shaw extreme has been terrible lately always seems to be dropping freezing, everytime I call they give me the same song and dance " it's not our end its your's, reset this, okay try a speedtest. See you have full service" I know it isn't my router cause I just bought a new one, my tv get's flickery on certain channels. It always seems to be a problem with the customer not there crap product and service

[410440]

So I called shaw today, after waiting on hold for another hour, i talked to someone that knew what they were doing.

I told him I have reset many times, did nothing.

so he did something on his end, my box flashed a few times, and it works.

The only problem now, I got my parents old PVR and of course shaw cant just activate it. I have to get my rents to call in and say that the box has been given away and that I can now activate it.... even though they cancelled their shaw services 2 months ago....


what a stupid system, customer A cancels their service completely, sells the box to customer B, custome B tries to activate and is told customer A has to authorize even though they canned shaws services months ago. what a hassle.


My parents have the Optix service with telus, and after messing around with their TV and Internet, im really on the fence weather or not I want to stay with shaw.

[Hakkola]

Originally posted by 410440

The only problem now, I got my parents old PVR and of course shaw cant just activate it. I have to get my rents to call in and say that the box has been given away and that I can now activate it.... even though they cancelled their shaw services 2 months ago....


Yes, otherwise people with stolen boxes could activate them. :facepalm: You can't release equipment from someone else's account, and the serial number is still attached to their name so if you were able to add the box to your account without releasing it from theirs they would still be billed for all SOD/PPV etc.

[eblend]

Originally posted by HiTempguy1

Of course, with the alternative being telus, FAWK THAT NOISE. For all of you with Telus, it is great it is working out for you, but I remember an era of 256kbps internet speeds, constant outages, and terrible customer service. At least Shaw almost always works, which was not the case with Telus. We're talking almost half the month with no internet, ANYWHERE we went in Red Deer.

Haha, been there done that. I remember when Telus used to advertise that they are faster then Shaw cuz of dedicated line blah blah blah, and I used to get like 160kbps downloads MAX, that was a joke. This was probably close to 10 years ago. Decided to give them another chance and boy did it ever change. With Optik internet you get no download limit too since TV is streamed over internet as well, they don't differentiate traffic. I downloaded over 300gb in 2 days :D

I still probably wouldn't recommend Optik in older areas, not sure how reliable their wireing is, as I used to have frequent drop outs at my parents place as well, in Evergreen now and it is solid.

[410440]

Originally posted by Hakkola


Yes, otherwise people with stolen boxes could activate them. :facepalm: You can't release equipment from someone else's account, and the serial number is still attached to their name so if you were able to add the box to your account without releasing it from theirs they would still be billed for all SOD/PPV etc.


So what happens with all the people who buy used equip from kajiji? do they all deactivate boxes before sale? never thought about it being a problem - and if your box was stolen, wouldnt you call it in like a cellphone and say its stolen? then shaw could just ban the Serial number?



On another note: Got through to shaw after another hour to activate the second HD box, shaw couldnt get it on the phone to work, so they had me go downstairs to my other box and unplug it to see if resetting both boxes helped... nope..

Now, neither of my HD boxes work, it gives me an error code and says these channels will be available shortly and just sits like that for hours. - black screen with the code flashing

So after being on the phone and not getting it to work, they have to send out a tech to see why my pace HD pvrs wont work, but my small motorola non hd box will. to bad they couldnt get me an earlier appt.

4 days away with no HD :( and the usual we will be there between: x hour and x hour (which means they wont show anywhere near that time slot and end up telling me both my HD boxes magically need replacing.. with their convenient buy off the truck boxes)


I think this might be the final straw. Im calling telus tomorrow to see what they will do for me.

[eblend]

Originally posted by 410440



So what happens with all the people who buy used equip from kajiji? do they all deactivate boxes before sale? never thought about it being a problem - and if your box was stolen, wouldnt you call it in like a cellphone and say its stolen? then shaw could just ban the Serial number?



On another note: Got through to shaw after another hour to activate the second HD box, shaw couldnt get it on the phone to work, so they had me go downstairs to my other box and unplug it to see if resetting both boxes helped... nope..

Now, neither of my HD boxes work, it gives me an error code and says these channels will be available shortly and just sits like that for hours. - black screen with the code flashing

So after being on the phone and not getting it to work, they have to send out a tech to see why my pace HD pvrs wont work, but my small motorola non hd box will. to bad they couldnt get me an earlier appt.

4 days away with no HD :( and the usual we will be there between: x hour and x hour (which means they wont show anywhere near that time slot and end up telling me both my HD boxes magically need replacing.. with their convenient buy off the truck boxes)


I think this might be the final straw. Im calling telus tomorrow to see what they will do for me.

Tell them you want the 10/10/10 deal, if they say it has expired or something then hang up and call again, worked for me. I got the expirered 10/10/10 deal where phone, internet (15mb) and tv are 10 bucks per month each for a year with no contract requried. You do have to pay rental fees for the TV PVR and additional recievers, but can get the PRV rental for free if you sign up for 3 years.

[Cos]

Originally posted by [GaGe]


I'd look into that. Pretty sure they're not allowed to callback after 9 PM local time.

If that is true then they aren't following it. I called at 2 in the afternoon from work and they called me back at 1045 on a Tuesday night. Woke us all up

[derpderp]

I have Telus internet at home, it defiantly isn't as fast a Shaw, but I never have service outages, I can't even remember the last time the internet has gone down. :dunno:

[eblend]

Originally posted by derpderp
I have Telus internet at home, it defiantly isn't as fast a Shaw, but I never have service outages, I can't even remember the last time the internet has gone down. :dunno:

What package are you on? I believe Optik comes at 15mb as a minumum, whereas the standard High Speed is only 6mbps, which is slighly slower then Shaw regular high speed, and ofcourse alot slower then their Extreme offerings (which is also 15mbps). My friend is on extreme 1 block away from my house, and i am on optik, both at 15mbps, but his drops down to like 2mbps on some nights (was watching the Flames game at his place when tested this), whereas mine is pretty much a solid 14.5 at all times of the day. Like I previously mentioned, the major slowdown in the evening (when everyone is home watching porn) is what prompted me to switch.

[Spoons]

Everyone has downtimes and issues, and during those times your going to have a ton of wait time. They are backed up on the phones because tons of other people are calling for the exact same reason, so you are not helping either, just for them to tell you that they will be back up as soon as possible.

What do people expect from companies these days? That everyone is supposed to work perfect 3054% of the time? That they are supposed to be waiting over your shoulder holding your dick so that the moment you have an issue, they are there to handle it?

Shit happens bro, just be patient and it will all be back to normal.

[eblend]

Originally posted by Spoons
Everyone has downtimes and issues, and during those times your going to have a ton of wait time. They are backed up on the phones because tons of other people are calling for the exact same reason, so you are not helping either, just for them to tell you that they will be back up as soon as possible.

What do people expect from companies these days? That everyone is supposed to work perfect 3054% of the time? That they are supposed to be waiting over your shoulder holding your dick so that the moment you have an issue, they are there to handle it?

Shit happens bro, just be patient and it will all be back to normal.

I work in IT, and yes 3054% of the time uptime is pretty much expected haha. Here I am working at night just so that I don't cause any disruptions during the day time on production servers. Everything in IT is redundunt, so the downtimes should be pretty minimal. Shit does happen once in a while, but most of the shit is accounted for and throught through. All servers have Redundunt power supplies, ECC memory which warns you before it fails and takes down a server, clusters to take over resources should shit fail, at least two of everything on the networking side, you name it, it is a part of the game in this technology dependent world, people just don't accept downtime as internet is the core of the IT world and everythign relies on it, phones, some tv services ect, without it people feel so disconnected. Try going camping for a few weeks without being connected, shit gets hard haha

[codetrap]

Originally posted by eblend


I work in IT, and yes 3054% of the time uptime is pretty much expected haha. Here I am working at night just so that I don't cause any disruptions during the day time on production servers. Everything in IT is redundunt, so the downtimes should be pretty minimal. Shit does happen once in a while, but most of the shit is accounted for and throught through. All servers have Redundunt power supplies, ECC memory which warns you before it fails and takes down a server, clusters to take over resources should shit fail, at least two of everything on the networking side, you name it, it is a part of the game in this technology dependent world, people just don't accept downtime as internet is the core of the IT world and everythign relies on it, phones, some tv services ect, without it people feel so disconnected. Try going camping for a few weeks without being connected, shit gets hard haha

You work in IT. Ok. Then you should also realize that a guaranteed managed service that offers a 5x9 service is a lot more expensive that the $50/month home internet connection.

You also know that you can make electronics as redundant as you want, duplicating services, power etc.. but non of that helps you out much when someone goes and takes that big yellow fiber finder (backhoe) and rips a couple of handlholds out of the ground. Or when someone does something utterly stupid on the corporate network and plugs in a bridge to the lan connection on two ports and causes a packet storm. Or the building loses cooling water and your big AC's in the datacenter shut down, which forces all that nice redundant hardware to shut down or die of heat.

Lots of things can go wrong no matter how redundant you make systems. Redundancy costs money, which we're not getting charged for a home internet connection. If you want that redundant type connection, I know where you can get a dual path fiber solution with guaranteed 99.99999%/A up time for a mere few hundred grand initial cost, plus I think it's 30k/month connection fee.

btw eblend, this isn't directed at you personally, but at anyone that bitches about losing their home internet connection as if it was a $30k/month managed service.

[adam c]

Originally posted by eblend


I work in IT, and yes 3054% of the time uptime is pretty much expected haha. Here I am working at night just so that I don't cause any disruptions during the day time on production servers. Everything in IT is redundunt, so the downtimes should be pretty minimal. Shit does happen once in a while, but most of the shit is accounted for and throught through. All servers have Redundunt power supplies, ECC memory which warns you before it fails and takes down a server, clusters to take over resources should shit fail, at least two of everything on the networking side, you name it, it is a part of the game in this technology dependent world, people just don't accept downtime as internet is the core of the IT world and everythign relies on it, phones, some tv services ect, without it people feel so disconnected. Try going camping for a few weeks without being connected, shit gets hard haha

you're lucky, i much rather work at night to accomplish downtime but instead i'm expected to come in this saturday on my own time (no compensation) to do the stuff that's required

[rc2002]

I agree with the OP. Shaw's customer service is absolutely brutal.

They've had to reset my PVR 3 times this year for reasons unknown. And each time I lose a bunch of recorded programs. And each time was an hour long wait on the phone.

[GoChris]

I tried calling last friday, I gave up after over 30 minutes on hold.

It's pretty sad when I'm considering calling Telus for services.

[Impreza]

I'm having the same issues as the OP. The most frustrating thing ever.....

[Sugarphreak]

....

[TorqueDog]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak
Shaw is the new Telus... Telus is the new Shaw. Hah. After having to work with Telus' technical staff for a client a couple months ago at my old employer, I can honestly say I will NEVER be a Telus subscriber.

[AndyL]

Telus is the new shaw? :banghead:

I called them up recently to switch - after 2 hours I decided I didn't like their ads and hold music... They were really after my buisness apparently...

[cam_wmh]

Originally posted by codetrap


You work in IT. Ok. Then you should also realize that a guaranteed managed service that offers a 5x9 service is a lot more expensive that the $50/month home internet connection.

You also know that you can make electronics as redundant as you want, duplicating services, power etc.. but non of that helps you out much when someone goes and takes that big yellow fiber finder (backhoe) and rips a couple of handlholds out of the ground. Or when someone does something utterly stupid on the corporate network and plugs in a bridge to the lan connection on two ports and causes a packet storm. Or the building loses cooling water and your big AC's in the datacenter shut down, which forces all that nice redundant hardware to shut down or die of heat.

Lots of things can go wrong no matter how redundant you make systems. Redundancy costs money, which we're not getting charged for a home internet connection. If you want that redundant type connection, I know where you can get a dual path fiber solution with guaranteed 99.99999%/A up time for a mere few hundred grand initial cost, plus I think it's 30k/month connection fee.

btw eblend, this isn't directed at you personally, but at anyone that bitches about losing their home internet connection as if it was a $30k/month managed service.

touFUCKIGNche'

I was just in the Cook Islands, and most people have no idea how lucky we are with the CHEAP broadband connections we have. Then again those same people who bitch to a random over the phone, will b!tch about anything.

Here's a reality check:
http://www.oyster.net.ck/about/index.php?about=idsl


To get 1/10th the TELUS Optik HS service, from Oyster:

MEGA - $1,650/mnth up to 1024kbps/512kbps with 30Gbytes, excess $0.10/Mbyte, 5:1 contention**


Too many whining idiots with a lil bit of knowledge and it makes them dangerous.

[Spoons]

Originally posted by codetrap


You work in IT. Ok. Then you should also realize that a guaranteed managed service that offers a 5x9 service is a lot more expensive that the $50/month home internet connection.

You also know that you can make electronics as redundant as you want, duplicating services, power etc.. but non of that helps you out much when someone goes and takes that big yellow fiber finder (backhoe) and rips a couple of handlholds out of the ground. Or when someone does something utterly stupid on the corporate network and plugs in a bridge to the lan connection on two ports and causes a packet storm. Or the building loses cooling water and your big AC's in the datacenter shut down, which forces all that nice redundant hardware to shut down or die of heat.

Lots of things can go wrong no matter how redundant you make systems. Redundancy costs money, which we're not getting charged for a home internet connection. If you want that redundant type connection, I know where you can get a dual path fiber solution with guaranteed 99.99999%/A up time for a mere few hundred grand initial cost, plus I think it's 30k/month connection fee.

btw eblend, this isn't directed at you personally, but at anyone that bitches about losing their home internet connection as if it was a $30k/month managed service.

Exactly. People expect too much.

My point being is that Shaw has down times, so does Rogers, so does Telus, so does Bell, so does ANY OTHER FUCKING COMPANY!

I'm just getting sick of rants on here about it every second day like its something that doesn't happen often. It's like ranting that there is snow in december.

Don't like it? Go to to Telus, but have fun with that. Yes you wait on the phone with Shaw, but I will tell you you get better customer service with them than any other. And no, I do not work for Shaw.

If people didn't call everytime their internet connection went down/cable, you wouldn't have these ridiculous wait times. Fuck when you call Shaw they even tell you about recent issues so you can hang up and wait, and also give you simple steps to resolve most issues (remember the episode of South Park when they lose the internet, and all it requires is them unplugging the modem and plugging it back in? Yeah it really is actually that easy for most residential services). There is no need to call over downtimes.

[eblend]

I see what you mean spoons, yah i know shit can be unpredictable, I know they can't provide redundency to the residence, but for sure they will have everything on the back end redundunt. Shit still fails, unfortunatelly people really can't deal with it haha. People are the worst thing about IT.

On a more related note, called in today to Shaw and after 1 minute was asked if I want a call back, said YES and 5 minutes later got a person calling me back. Talked to them and got them to give my parents the same deal as my friend got.

Previously my parents were getting phone basic, digital full cable and high speed light for $117 per month, now for $84 they get full HD cable with free HD PVR rental for 1 year, basic phone and extreme internet :D I wasn't really gonna switch my parents to Telus just cuz of the number of TVs they have, but I used it as a threat and it seems to have worked :D

[Impreza]

I've pretty much given up on my PVR. My recordings are pixelated and have no sound. Then it would work fine for five minutes, then the same problems again. So frustrating. Does calling Shaw even fix the problem? I don't know if I am experiencing a problem with my PVR or shaws signal. Can anyone shed some light? I hear a lot of beeping from the PVR, maybe the HDD is going bye bye?

EDIT: seems to affect recordings mostly. Also, sometimes the tv screen would just go black and I have to change the channel to get it to work again.

[410440]

Shaw was out here on wednesday to see what the deal was with all the problems I was having.

It turns out there was a problem with the main cable line coming in from the box in the alley.

It was either a bad cable or the shaw guy said it might have been screwed up when someone else was in the alley box hooking up other houses

So far it is all working, minus the glitches my pvr has with 1 min inteval recordings - but thats a common problem apparently with the PACE PVRs and external HDD.

oh well, it works for now..

[Spoons]

Originally posted by Impreza
I've pretty much given up on my PVR. My recordings are pixelated and have no sound. Then it would work fine for five minutes, then the same problems again. So frustrating. Does calling Shaw even fix the problem? I don't know if I am experiencing a problem with my PVR or shaws signal. Can anyone shed some light? I hear a lot of beeping from the PVR, maybe the HDD is going bye bye?

EDIT: seems to affect recordings mostly. Also, sometimes the tv screen would just go black and I have to change the channel to get it to work again.

Either a bad box or bad hard drive. Shaw doesn't really have much to do with your recordings yourself as they are all stored locally.