Mediacom Iowa I don't want to move because Mediacom has a monopoly of lousy service. Burlington, Iowa

I feel like Mediacom has sucked out five years of my life since last October. I have spent more time on the phone with them than anyone else. I've been lied to, I've been hung up on, I've been blamed, my computer's been blamed--it's anyone's fault but theirs that their service is so very horrid. This is life in a corporate monopoly.

I started service a year ago on their $29.99 bundled internet (blazing speed!), phone, and TV. I had just moved in, and it took seven service calls to even get my service to run. The final call was answered by two tech. supervisors, rather than their underpaid/sweatshop subcontractors; you can't blame these guys for trying to make a living. I had one spill his guts one day, and I wondered what third world country we are living in. He was being paid $25 for each service call, no matter how long it took--even if he had to rewire a house. I was told the wiring on my place was very wrong, and should have been upgraded years ago.

I made my first call a month later. "Well I can see your modem working." Yes, it is now but it wasn't 5 minutes ago. "Why didn't you call when it wasn't working?" Duh, my phone is connected to the internet. "Don't you have a cell phone (gasp)?" In fact, I spent a whole week with the phone/internet going off and on every 5-10 minutes. Unfortunately, this sort of 'service interruptus' is not counted as an outage, and not eligible for a credit.

I've continued to make at least two calls per week for the past year. At times, I get someone in the middle of the night who is willing to 'spill their guts' about some of the things I've been told--quite enlightening. This is the information that will cause Tech. Support to hang up on you--you know too much, and they can't baffle you with BS.

 I was told that my internet speed cannot fluctuate at different times of the day. The line is 'dedicated' to me only (makes one feel special huh?)-BS. After talking to techies and doing some research, I've found out a lot of things they tell people just to get them off their backs. Some of it is so ludicrous it would make your head explode.

I was told they have no way to see my connection speed-BS. They keep a log of your connection, and someone finally told me my connection has been running at 1/3 speed for the past year. In fact, you can go to your local office and request a copy of this printout. May be useful in a class action lawsuit.

I was told to call every single time one of my services went out so I could get a credit for the down time. Good luck, those are the times they shut down their phones and turn on their robot service. Another time I was told there was no credit to be had unless the service was down for 24 hours straight! I cannot count the number of times I've heard 'who told you that?'

I was told in order to get 'Real' support that I needed to call over and over which would finally escalate the service call to 'TECH 4' level. At that point you finally get the people who know what's going on. At the very least, they're smart enough to keep their story straight.

I told them a month in advance of the end of my promotion period that I would be, to put it nicely 'giving them back their TV for a satellite dish, and their phone for a Vonage box.' I had called Mediacom to inquire about the price of internet if I did this. From what I was told, I would be saving myself $15 mo. over the regular price of their bundled garbage. I also told them it would be the end of the blame game when they're down to a simple modem box, and if they can't handle that...

Then I find I was quoted the wrong price, and then there are the unpublished fees for turning the stuff off. Did I mention their rate increase? No notification ahead of time--it was just there. Isn't there an FCC regulation about sneaky stuff like that? Still, I would rather pay the extra it's going to cost me to another company than continue to support these greedy slugs.

In regard to someone else's recent Mediacom post: she stated she'd taken off work and sat all day waiting for a service call that never happened. The same thing happened to me on the 14th of September. I wish I'd found the fine print buried deep in the bowels of the Mediacom website that says 'we will issue a $20 credit for any service call no show'.

I got so frustrated that I spent 1am-7am moving all my files, and totally wiping my computer clean the other day. I was so tired of them blaming my computer. Alas, it changed nothing, but it did strip them of an excuse!

I have another service call tomorrow in my continued attempt to raise my lack of service to the 'Tech 4' level. I hope the person they send lives through it. My computer is clean. 'If it's the lines in your home it will cost you' is not a problem--three inches of cable coming through the wall from the outside. I did call them today to ask if they'd like to bring the trencher and a large spool of cable before, or after the ground is frozen.

I know this post is a disjointed mess. If I had spent the past year taking notes and putting them in proper order I would be at the publishing house by now.

Mediacom I want you to know: I will NOT accept this just because you have a monopoly where I live. Your haggard, nasty employees will continue to see me at the counter once a week. I do NOT care anymore if they roll their eyes and think 'here comes that crazy woman again'. They know the truth. I will begin keeping daily records of outages--some of them your people admit to, some not. Letters to the Editor will begin to appear in my local paper. If I have to save up for a full page ad--sue me! My congress critters will also begin to receive regular correspondence. You better get your website in order and post FULL disclosure of your underhanded practices. I will contact the FCC, and if necessary will go to any expense to begin a class-action lawsuit against you.

Mediacom I hope your shareholders are happy raking in their bucks. You are corporate slime, and things are only going to get worse for you. Your infrastructure was able to handle TV, but it is not able to handle TV and computers. The generation that didn't own computers in large numbers is dying out, the baby boomers are retiring, and YOU have certainly not been spending your money to keep up with the increase in households with computers. Whoever jumped the gun and thought it a good idea to add telephone to this mix is a moron.