At our cabin we have 24Kbps dial-up service. That's right! 24,000 bits per second when even 5,000,000 bps is a bit slow for many websites. I have given up on many a page while trying to be online at our cabin.
A year or so ago, DSL availability finally reached our cabin. The introductory price then was $24.99 plus $5.00 modem rental plus taxes and fees. For two or three evenings a week, it is just not worth it on top of the bills already for cabin phone, cell phone, home phone, and home DSL.
My eyes popped a bit when Frontier offered DSL for $14.99 a month. The first page I saw this on had no link for more details, just the invitation to Call Now! Sorry, I don't call just to ask questions when I know the representative is going to be more interested in closing a sale than providing full information. The second page I saw the offer on had a link to more details.
You guessed it, the fine print was for one year and then rates in effect, such rates very unspecified. Not even current rates. The fine print also gave the speed, 1Mbps. Now maybe 40 times as fast might be a good deal. It might be if I were in Brimson full time, or if I had a business to run. But for checking email and writing these little diatribes, it's way too much. I'll just have to rely on the radio for news rather than reading papers from around the world.
Then to add insult to injury, Frontier makes sending them email intrusive. I am already logged in but to send a web form, I have to provide my phone number, birthdate, last four digits of my Social Security number, and my password. I'll take the hint, you don't want comments.
Maybe I'll send them a paper copy of this blog entry.
Oh! I don't have to. While looking for an address to send the paper copy to, I found the names, addresses, and email addresses of many of the regional officers. I just clicked on the email address of the regional president, and voila! I had an Outlook mail window for me to type my message to him. Maybe Frontier should hire a more liberal set of lawyers who will recommend streamlining its web mail form page.
