Jill...re DSL.......
AP News story about DSL disappointing many users.
September 17, 2000
DSL Leaves Some Customers Fuming
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:37 p.m. ET
NEW YORK (AP) -- The ads are all over: Get high-speed Internet through
your phone line!
Baby Bells and Internet service providers are pushing digital subscriber lines,
or DSL, as the way to get the home connected. What the ads don't say is that
DSL installation fails in many cases, leaving customers fuming.
Dana Smith regrets ever ordering DSL for her Brooklyn, N.Y., home. After
five months of struggling with three different companies involved in the
installation process, she still has no high-speed Internet access.
``It's been a nightmare. Everything's a big mess,'' she said.
At its best, DSL is an elegant technology that speeds up Internet downloads
more than 10 times compared to a dial-up modem, yet leaves the phone line
free for regular calls. And it's offered at a price many are willing to pay for a
fast onramp to the Internet: typically $40 to $60 a month after a setup fee of
$100 to $300.
According to analyst Lisa Pierce at Giga Information Group, there were
570,000 DSL users in the United States in March, and the number is
expected to grow to 15 million in five years, making it the most common
form of residential high-speed Internet connection after cable modems.
But many customers find the road to the high-speed Internet is slow and
tortuous. There are Web sites devoted to the grievances of DSL customers,
and newsgroups are full of tales of incompetent tech support, installation
no-shows, and service outages.
A large part of the problem seems to lie in the way DSL often relies on the
cooperation of three companies.
An Internet service provider, or ISP, typically sells the service, then
contracts with one of the three big DSL technology companies, Covad,
Northpoint or Rhythms, to connect the customer. The DSL companies in
turn need the collaboration of the local phone company to do some of the
installation work, and use its facilities for their equipment.
Customers whose installations run into problems often complain that these
companies hardly seem to talk to one another, and pass blame instead of
fixing problems.
Smith ordered DSL in March from the ISP Teliquest, which contracted
Covad. But the installation, which also involved her local phone company,
Verizon, soon bogged down.
``Everybody's pointing the figure at each other, and nobody takes
responsibility,'' Smith said.
One problem DSL customers face, according to Verizon spokeswoman Joan
Rasmussen, is a lack of free phone lines due to the densely populated New
York area.
But there can also be confusion because of the different companies involved.
Rasmussen said the Verizon DSL operation is separate from the rest of the
company, and is treated the same as competing DSL companies like Covad
when it comes to installation requests. Verizon does not deal directly with
Covad customers, who have to pass request and questions through Covad.
Customers can feel like they're getting the run-around. Smith said Verizon
canceled Covad's request to fix problems with the line. When she called to
complain, a Verizon salesperson offered her their own brand of DSL.
Another common complaint is that DSL is unavailable because the facility
that gathers all phone lines in an area, the so-called ``central office,'' is not
properly equipped, or because the copper phone line is too long or poorly
maintained.
``The problems stem from the age of the copper network and what has
happened to the copper network over those hundred years,'' said Judy Reed
Smith, chief executive of analyst group Atlantic-ACM.
Telecommunications industry estimates of the percentage of phone lines that
are technically fit for DSL range from 30 to 60, Reed Smith said. ``You get
the most pessimistic estimates from the people who have been in the industry
the longest.''
But DSL providers tend to go for the low-hanging fruit, the customers with
good phone lines, said Justin Beech, who operates Dslreports.com, where
DSL customers rate their providers.
``They're advertising like crazy, but on the other hand they're not interested in
customers who are on the limit of being able to get DSL,'' he said.
Even when DSL has been installed, it's not always reliable. Giga's Pierce tells
users to expect the connection to be down an average of two days a month,
unless it is a more expensive ``business-class'' account. Keep a regular dial-up
account as a backup, she cautions.
``There's a lot interest out there, that's clear, but a lot of people are finding a
cable modem is less of a hassle,'' said Beech.
Even David Farber, chief technologist of the Federal Communications
Commission, has problems with DSL. In his e-mail newsletter last week, he
said his line had been out for five days, and the chain of companies that
provides it were unable to fix the problem.
``If this is typical then our image of the future of always connected
households ... is just a bad dream,'' he wrote.
Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company |
