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World Online
by DeusXM For those of you who want to get to the meat of the review, here's a quick summary. Tiscali/WorldOnline/Screaming.net is THE most appalling ISP ever created, and I've used AOL, so that's something. Let's have a look at why this is the case, by going through my experience with the Great Net 'n' ... Web Swindle. September 1999. I see something in The Times about a new ISP called screaming.net. Apparently, this new ISP does not only offer free subscription, but also FREE CALLS OFF-PEAK!!! Wow! One catch. You have to change your phone company to LocalTel, but they're basically a BT reseller, so it's not really any hassle, and the change-over takes a week. 3 months later, my line is transferred to Localtel. I then connect to the wonderful, all-you-can-eat free buffet that is the Information Superhighway. Except it's not so much of a superhighway, but more of super-stairlift, that only works once every 40 times. I dial the ISP god knows how many times to listen to a recorded voice tell me the line is busy. And of course, because it's not an engage tone, my modem isn't bright enough to redial again. I have never, ever experienced the internet this slow before. An ordinary web page takes about 5 minutes to load. My downloads are at the very best, 0.2kb/s. I accept this. They're new, they're going to have teething problems. The ISP teethes for about a year, and eventually, the service improves. Then one day, I get a phone bill from WorldOnline. What's this? I go and have a look on their page, and after ages of searching, I find out something interesting. Apparently, LocalTel were bought by WorldOnline, and conveniently, both companies forgot to tell me this. An enquiry to WorldOnline brings absolutely no response, not even an automated reply. They also inform me that now I'm going to have to pay £15 for the 'privilege' of using their service. Two weeks later, I get a doleful letter informing me that they've decided to change their minds about this. I find out that around 90% of the screaming.net users rang WorldOnline and demanded to cancel their account, and WorldOnline realised it couldn't do what it liked. The service is now alright, but still exceptionally slow compared to any other ISP. Now here comes the real crunch. In 2000, WorldOnline is bought by Tiscali, a European ISP. They're going to charge me £3.99 a month of 50 hours free access at any time, and now Servista (who?) is going to provide my phone connection. Then they decide they're going to charge me £6.99 a month for access (on top of line rental), and they?re not even going to send me a bill anymore, they're just going to take my money by direct debit and I can check my bill online. Well, I would if the service had any speed. Put simply, ANYONE could run a better ISP by using cups and string. Disconnections are rife on Tiscali, and usually they're also the sort that manages to crash your PC, necessitating a reboot. Multiplayer gaming? Forget it. I swear that Tiscali monitor what you are doing, and seem to regard anything apart from looking at webpages as a waste of time. Downloads, gaming, shockwave, all are great times to be disconnected. Sometimes you can't even connect, because they frequently have trouble with their password servers, and e-mail is just a joke, regardless of what account address I put to download in Outlook, I still get my dad's e-mail. Bottom line? There's no such thing as a free lunch. Don't even waste your time with this piss-awful bunch of cowboys. Stick with BT, or better still, get cable broadband. Tiscali would have been poor service in 1995, and in 2001, it's just plain illegal. Read the complete review |
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World Online
by marandina I always planned to come back and update this as promised. When I came to look how prominent it was in it's category, I was rather surprised to find it as the "top opinion". This gave me an extra incentive to include the latest developments, which are detailed below. Bear in mind that this was originally written ... around Christmas time, which gives you the context to the seasonal feel to it. Just before you start, you should know that the latest incarnation of Screaming Net/World Online is Tiscali. I'm not saying that Tiscali will be guilty by default but I sincerely hope that their approach is more customer-orientated than their predecessors. Tiscali S.p.A was founded by Renato Soru, Chairman and CEO, in January 1998 following the liberalization of the Italian telecommunications market. In 2001 the company bought out the LineOne ISP along with World Online. At present, Tiscali has the most interconnected network in Europe with over 350 tier 1 peering agreements and a connection to the USA. As of December 2001 Tiscali has 7.3 million active users, and is the first European web property with 14.7 million unique visitors that in Q4 2001 generated 10.4 billion minutes of Internet traffic in the 14 countries in which it is present. OK, here's the rant plus update at the end. Hang on to yer hats!! It's time for a post-Christmas RANT. Yeah, I know it's the season to be jolly but I just have to get this one of my chest. It's a story of intrigue, double-crossing and thorough caddishness. Many moons ago I decided to change my ISP to Screaming Net. Heard of 'em? Well, they were one of the first companies to offer free off-peak Internet access. Too good to be true? Absolutely! The deal was that you switched over your telephone service to them and took advantage of their soooo competitive rates (actually they were you moaning git). Screaming Net worked on the premise of b uilding up a client bank to the point where volume would equal profit. Along with AOL, BT and others, the experiment was doomed to failure. Do you know it's all so distant now...can't even remember who I was with before? Anyway, as you'd expect, NO CHANCE of getting through on a dial up. I changed my settings to automatically re-dial up to a 100 times and even this went round the clock sometimes. This went on for a while so I wrote to OFTEL to complain. They wrote back to say that they had named and shamed a number of telephone operators and that SN were one of the worst offenders. However, they didn't have the power to actually help in individual cases but had written to SN to draw their attention to my complaint. You see, on top of the c$*p service via the Net, my phone bills were all over the place as well. It was common practice to be billed for phone calls made 6 months previously. Sometime last year, World Online bought up SN's customer book. Could things start to improve? What do you think? Almost immediately a charging structure came in for Net access. Admittedly it was only £3 per month to start with but this was to prove to be the thin end of the wedge. More importantly they took over my telephone service. Here again, phone bills all over the shop. Itemised calls over 6 months old rattled through my letterbox at regular intervals. The shark then ate the sprat having been eaten by the mackerel. Tiscali (one of Europe's biggest ISPs) bought out World Online earlier this year. Cilla Black time again – surprise, surprise – the charging structure changed to £7 per month. Where was it all going to end? By now I was thoroughly p*ss$d off with the phone bill side of things and when NTL turned up in my street, an opportunity arose. I'm not keen on my paths being turned into permanent molehills but I'll forgive 'em that. May 2001 – read the literature, spoke to my neighbour, sw itched to NTL. OK, OK, let's get Tiscali/World Online/Screaming Net or whatever you are called off my back once and for all. So I sent an e-mail to Tiscali to confirm the date of disconnection and that I had received and PAID MY FINAL BILL. E-mail reply confirmed the necessary – I'M FREEEE!!! Oh yes I am; oh no you're not (seasonal, eh?). The dreaded phone bills kept coming. My payment method was a credit card direct debit, which, apparently, couldn't be cancelled. My credit card people did say to contact them if there were any problems. I duly referred the subsequent bills and they gave me a refund and issued a notice of dispute to World Online. The coup de gras – about 2 weeks ago I had a letter from a debt collection agency threatening to take me to court over outstanding bills. Yes, a whopping £14 would blight my credit score and insult my pride. Strangely, the agency was very helpful when I rang them (always thought that they went round with croquet mallets stuffed inside sheepskin coats) and said to send in my documentation and they'd refer the stuff back to their client. That's the latest as I'm still waiting to here back. ***My points are thus*** Screaming Net and World Online are truly terrible. Why do companies try and shaft people over such trivial amounts of money? Are all debt collection agencies as nice as this one? You may have guessed that this is a matter of honour by now, as I'm not prepared to pay up. However, I really am not going to allow a CCJ to be registered against me either. The exciting conclusion will take the form of an update maybe in the New Year. RANT over for now, right; let's get ready for New Year's Eve. Marandina. ***Update March 2002*** We are now into March and I've had a final summons from Direct Legal & Collections a couple of months ago. They agreed to take my copy correspondence and refer it back to World Online. I've had a solicitors letter threatening to take me to court if I don't pay up. As I was in Leeds all week I had to pay as I couldn't meet their 5 day pay or contact demands. I'm still gonna take it up with my Credit Card company after I've paid them their poultry sum. My final word is that World Online/Tiscali suck like a Dyson with Mick Jagger lips. I'm considering employing my good friend, King Herrod who is an active lawyer and promised me a good deal (only kidding, Nick!) BTW: I'm not usually like this. Just that some things really frustrate me. This being one of them!! Read the complete review |
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World Online
by bruleo I have never seen a company change policy and services so much! I joined World-Online long before they were taken over by Tiscali and originally took up the unmetered option with the transfer of my telephone services to them, only to be told that this was being withdrawn and would be replaced with the 100 hours per month ... 'Freedom' package. After a certain amount of scrutiny, I decided that it wasn't so bad as the unused minutes carried over and I was unlikely to use the full allocation any how. Not so long later, World-online decided that it was no longer going to operate telephone services! This time I was pretty disgusted, but after looking into Servista (Worldonline's recommended supplier), I realised that they offered a better deal anyway. However, I was still annoyed with World-online as I felt that I was constantly being messed around. I tried to contact World Online several times with my concerns, but despite attempting email, snail-mail and telephone, I just could not get any response from them. Now, several months later, even though I am on the 100 hours package, I find my connection being dropped after just 2 continuous hours of internet use. I was never informed of this action and what the hell is the point of it anyway? After all, I would have to pay for my calls if I went over the 100 hours?! Again, I am unable to contact them. Consequently, I shall soon write them one final letter, signed and witnessed by a solicitor, to the following affect. "...Please take this letter as official notification of intended closure of my internet account... (..account details etc..)...I will be terminating my direct debit agreement with you forthwith. If I hear nothing within 30 days of this letter, then I will asume that no more monies are due to your company. Indeed, it is now your legal reponsibility to respond to this letter if monies are due.... ....I have on numerous occasions trie d to contact your company through both electronic and conventional means, but have received no response regardless. I take this as Worldonline / Tiscali having no concern for their customers and as a result I shall be looking elsewhere for a non-Tiscali owned Internet Service Provider. Indeed, as a direct result of your company policy, I shall seek to discourage people from using your services...." etc etc. I think that should do the trick!! As an extra point, I do believe the Tiscali should be thouroughly investigated by the Monopolies commision as well as Trading Standards. Also, I am serious thinking of sending my concerns to BBC watchdog!! Can anyone out there recommend a service provider that offers a service with out dropped connections, similar to the 100 hour package that was offered by Worldonline / Tiscali?? Read the complete review |
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78 reviews Telecommunications Service / |
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2 reviews Telecommunications Service / |
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| World Online Telecommunications Service Recommendations 1 | ||
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