My mother has AOL problems, can ya help?

[SteamAhead]

Had my mother on the phone earlier ranting about AOHELL. I'm not really sure what to advise, so wondering if any of you know what she could do (asked her to email me of what she said on the phone earlier)

 

Cheers,

Jim

 

p.s

Sorry it's a little long

 

 

Hi James,

 

you said to email you with the problems I'm having with aol. Right where do I start. As you know I've been with aol since 1999 and had no problems up till recently. Back in about June (maybe slightly earlier this year) I had a phone call from aol saying that as I was a value customer (load of old bollocks I know), I could upgrade from bronze to gold and maintain the same price. I think that meant going from around 4meg speed to 8meg speed, all I would need to do was to agree to an 18month contract. Bare in mind that because I'd been with them for so long I had no existing contract with them before this so could have left them at any time. As I say, I was happy with the service that I'd had with them over the years, no particular problems to speak of.

 

I agreed to take out the contract over the phone so didn't sign anything but was told it was a verbal contract.

About a week after the change I noticed if anything my speeds were slower. I did contact aol pointing this out but they just blamed my system, which I pointed out it had never been a problem before, then told me that at certain times of the day when it was busy it would be slower.

 

I still find this hard to believe, as on the previous tariff I was quite happy so a supposedly faster tariff should have been better not worse.

I decided to live with this irritating little problem and made mental note to change the minute the contract was up. But then I had another problem.

 

Trying to log on one day it kept timing out, then saying it could not conect. I phoned aol, went through the usual half an hour jargon, what system, what processor, what version of aol am I using etc etc etc.

After a prolonged conversation and me yelling down the phone at the bloke that it most definitely was not my system and yes I had bloodywell reinstalled aol he talked me through a process that I haven't got a clue how to do again, but ended up with an icon on my desktop which I have attached.

 

So now I have to double click on this, click connect, double click on the aol icon, put in my username and password then if I'm really lucky I can be on line in 5 minutes, woopee doo (sorry about sarcasm).

 

This does seem to work, but now I want to install my new computer, have installed aol on it, and it won't connect, so I suppose I need the other icon to be able to log on.

I've just about had a gutfull of aol, would never ever recommend anyone to go on it unless they have the patience of a saint which you know I most definitely haven't.

Hopefully someone somewhere on one of your forums can help your poor frustrated mother out.

 

Please let me know if anyone comes up with any ideas. Especially if I can get out of this contract.

[ivan]

Tell her to contact the telecoms ombudsman (whatever the hell they call it these days).

[SteamAhead]

I'll let her know, cheers Ivan.

 

Anyone else have much problems with AOL when going on contract with them?

[Daston]

1) delete AOL

2) Get another ISP

 

Sorry cant be much more help than this

[SteamAhead]

1) delete AOL

2) Get another ISP

 

Sorry cant be much more help than this

 

I said to her years ago not to use them, but at the time she said she had no problems. Now after being in a binding contract (that is, over the phone) she's has nothing but problems

 

I'm not really sure if she can get out of this contract, so she can then go with another ISP?