want to love sonic; install process is extremely frustrating

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by joemiller » Fri Jun 10, 2022 1:33 pm
I have been waiting to get sonic for nearly a decade of living in the bay. I pre-ordered in 2019 when I found that option. And finally earlier this year our neighborhood became available. Also, found out I was getting 10gbps instead of 1gbps! Great! All good so far.

The install process has been extremely frustrating and working with Sonic support has been disappointing. I really want to love this company.

I am the first customer in the building. It's a 12 unit apartment building. Not large.

March 3rd -
First install attempt. About an hour into the install the building landlord comes outside and stops the install. She had no idea what was going on and had not approved anything. I was disappointed but I understood. I had explicitly asked the Sonic tech if they had contacted the landlord and they said yes. In hindsight I realize now that the tech was just assuming this was the case.

We end the install. My landlord talks to the Sonic MDU department a couple weeks later. It sounds like everything is a go.

April 30th -
Second install attempt. It's finally happening. Super excited. The tech spends about 4.5hr doing the install. Everything is great. He leaves and I'm on the multi-gigabit super highway.

About a week later the landlord calls me very upset. The tech ran the line all over the building and across the roof with slack wire flapping about on the roof. Landlord informs me this is not what was discussed between her and the MDU department. Demands I call Sonic and have them come fix it.

So, I call sonic tech support. They inform me that it will cost $75 for 1st half hour and $50 for each additional half hour. This sucks. I try to get through to someone in the MDU department to understand what was discussed between my landlord and Sonic. This is impossible it seems. They won't transfer and won't give me a number. I hang up and ask the landlord to call Sonic. She does and I have a new appointment scheduled shortly after.

June 9th -
Third visit. This time to re-run the wire to the specs agreed upon by landlord and MDU department. Unfortunately the tech could not arrive until 3:30pm. We spend about 1.5hr discussing details of how the install should go. But he does not have all the materials he needs and it's already 5pm for a job that will probably take 2-4 hours. He gives us his card and says to call and schedule to have him come back, that is no problem. We work from home so ideally we're trying to get a Saturday or Friday appointment when the internet will be out for multiple hours.

Well, I talk to support to schedule a return visit. They cannot guarantee the same tech will come back. :(

At this point I'm expecting the 4th visit will be a totally new person who shows up with no idea what the plan is and no idea what any previous install tech or MDU relations employee discussed. We will spend another 1+ hours discussing the install the landlord had approved with multiple other Sonic employees and then hopefully they will have time to do the work. It probably won't even be the last visit from a tech to get this sorted out.

This has been super frustrating, especially being stuck in the middle between our landlord and Sonic. A few things have become clear to me. In particular, there is very little communication between departments (at least installers and MDU relations department), and even very little communication between support and the techs. Each tech shows up and says "so what's the request?". That could have been a note on the dispatch request, I would hope. My only advice is do not expect information you provide to one Sonic employee will make it to another one. I don't really know how to handle this other than try to be super patient, maybe write everything down, get pictures. I don't know. And at this point I expect an enormous bill from these "truck rolls", all because of lack of communications between people and departments.

I REALLY want to love Sonic. I've waited a decade for gigabit+ service and this is very disappointing so far.
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