Getting Screwed by WildBlue or is it WildScrew Fair Access Policy?

I live and operate my business in an area where cable and DSL high speed services are not available. Actually Qwest DSL stops a couple hundred yards from my house but they have tried but been unable to get a strong enough signal for it to work at my house. The cable company offers television programming in our area but they say that the lines are too old to offer high speed Internet service.  Without high speed service operating a consulting business and my internet business using WordPress or any other format would be very difficult.

For the almost 4 years now I have had Wildblue Satellite “high speed” service. You notice that I put “high speed” in quotes for while it is quicker than dial up when working it is much slower than DSL. With WildBlue or WildScrew which ever it is, I pay for one of their premium plans and not the basic.

One year ago I upgraded to an even more expensive plan when WildBlue cut back on the speed of my service for a month when the bandwidth was exceeded by backing up my computer to an offsite service. This exceeded what they refer to as their usage threshold. My instructions at that time were basically to grab the Vaseline and bend over. Now don’t get me wrong, the employees at WildBlue are very polite and very nice but unfortunately not in a position to do anything for you.

A couple of weeks ago my main computer had to be replaced. This required that I upload all of the information stored off site on to the new computer. The result was that I once again was required to grab the Vaseline and bend over.

Now here is another place WildBlue really screws you. If you do not decrease you Usage Total to 79% or less of the Usage Threshold within the following 30 days this is a second violation and the penalty continues for another month while the charge you the full price.

Here’s another kicker. For the first couple of years that I had the WildBlue service it was regularly down when it rained, snowed, cloudy or windy. I live in Oregon a green but wet state. Did they give me any credit for all the time that I was down? Hell no!!! They kept saying they would issue a credit after they got the satellite working properly.  The truth is they never do get it working and I am still waiting for that credit, so be warned.

When one of these so called high speed satellite companies screws you like this and your business depends on the Internet it makes it nearly impossible to operate.  Presently I am operating on dial up for it is quicker than the so-called “high speed” service of WildBlue. 

I have called Wildblue and told them that if they were unable to restore my service I would be changing companies as they were putting me out of business with this Fair Access Policy. The reaction of the WildBlue “no service department” was polite yet a firm “I am sorry there is nothing I can do about it.” I let them know that while they can do nothing about it I can and I would be looking for the service of another provider. 

I feel that I have received the royal screw and for me WildBlue is now WildScrew. If you are in the same position that I am in and unable to get DSL or cable I would suggest that you do the same thing I am in the process of doing and check out Hughes and the other providers first. You will also find that the other providers do have a Fair Access Policy the difference is that some of them are for a short period of time such as 24 hours.  While these policies can still be unfair for they do not credit you for all the months or years that you use a lot less than your allotted service or the times when their service did not work, they screw you when you do exceed the usage.