Are you an Astound cable customer? Do you get an annoying black screen that comes on and lasts for a few seconds (with the audio cutting out) in the middle of a tv program? We've had an Astound technician check it out and tried to fix it but he clearly had no idea of what was causing it. If you have experienced the problem and found a fix, I would appreciate hearing from you. Thank you. read more

Here's what they did. Had one-gig service for three years, cost $100/month. Then speed went down and after 6 months I took a look at my account - they had downgraded me to 500 Mb, without telling me or asking me, and continued to charge me $100/month. I then called them but their phone system wanted me on hold for 27 minutes - nope! I immediately switched to Xfinity, got 1.2 Gigs for $20 less. Day later the RCN customer service called me and just talked over me, did not listen, and essentially berated me and then hung up on me. Where do they find these people!? Way to run a competitive business! They make comcast(!) look good. read more

RCN's customer service is the worst I have ever experienced with any company in my entire lifetime. Yep, worse than DMV and the post office. Unless someone can prove to me otherwise, I am convinced that their agents' are all named Alexa. Two agents I spoke to acknowledged and confirmed that we were overcharged on our bill, which I already knew and did not need them to tell me that. Both would not or could not do anything about it, nothing at all. All of the options I presented were declined. I asked them to present a solution that they thought was fair- the answer was "is there anything else I can help you with?" My answer was "yes, there is something you can help with: Provide me with a fair solution to resolve the issue". Their response was "Is there anything else I can help you with?" After a few more repeated attempts, I was expecting Alexa to say "sorry, I didn't quite get that.." read more

Simply Trash.Gianna one of there employees that handles the early termination fees is one of the biggest liers i have ever delt with if not the biggest. Multiple times told me to.be certain places to give me the money. Literally going out of my way leaving work early. She always blew it off​. Then she said she added a 25 doller gift card for my troubles. Dast forward over a year and a half she has stopped answering my calls all together and I've called Astound 3 times and complained and was promised a email.....haven't even got that, let alone my money. This place is a joke. read more

RCN is a horrible service, they raise your bill and say it's because your "promo is ending". They send promos for new customers to my house and tell me it's not something they can apply to my bill - meanwhile I'm paying $113/mo for 100 MBPS, but they're advertising $35/mo for 600 MBPS. I called and they can't offer me a remotely fair deal, and I've been a customer for over a decade. They're rude, I was hung up on after my conversation today, and there was no clear explanation. read more

RCN is a horrible service, they raise your bill and say it's because your "promo is ending". They send promos for new customers to my house and tell me it's not something they can apply to my bill - meanwhile I'm paying $113/mo for 100 MBPS, but they're advertising $35/mo for 600 MBPS. I called and they can't offer me a remotely fair deal, and I've been a customer for over a decade. They're rude, I was hung up on after my conversation today, and there was no clear explanation. read more

Was happy enough with the former RCN Services. Even happier to get away from Verizon after 22 years. The prices at RCN LL(VOIP) & Internet were great. Streaming was fast and reliable w/out a TV Bundle. My 2 yr. p was early Feb.2023, my costs have nearly doubled. When I lose one service all 3 go down, not good for a solo senior with Life Alert. I can't call Astound for a reboot if I have no service. My Mobile provider is not Astound but when wifi goes down, I have no cell service, either. It's a shame that I've begun to start researching another service providers bc Astound prices have increased to the point of unaffordability. read more

Sorry to say I had to jump ship because of bad internet service, increasing bills and inconsistant information given by representatives on the phone. Had a problem with autopay that went on for four months---got penalties for THEIR system being screwed up. I had to call constantly to get credit back--ugh! But to top it off, when I returned the equipment, the woman at Mass Ave location in Arlington MA, could not have been nastier! Good bye and thanks for the lousy memories! read more

Ive been using Astound Broadband (RCN) for cable and internet for several years. We are seasonal customers living in the Boston area during summer months. Every year, it is a lengthly struggle to suspend service with this company. Depending on the rep you chat with, you will get a different new monthly rate with new regulations making it more difficult for customers to be seasonal. They seem to have great difficulty when we ask them to suspend cable but keep wifi enabled for our home security. I don't know if it is technical limitations or human incompetence but they cannot get our account suspended without long hold times. It typically takes me hours and multiple attempts every year to simply suspend service. If I thought another cable provider was any better, I would switch in a heartbeat because RCN is absolutely horrible to deal with. BTW, our internet and DirecTV companies in our other state have no dificulty suspending service. read more

I wanted to update my review and not to backtrack. As my time with RCN has gone on, the service has gotten increasingly more terrible. Support agents have gotten more rude and straight up mean and deceptive. A couple of months ago, mid pandemic, my internet service dropped. This was after internet companies had come out publicly saying they wouldn't turn service off during Covid. I reached out to support and got the service turned back on, and the next month I had a $40 "restoration fee". I reached back out to support and had an agent tell me that my service had been suspended for a way-past-overdue bill. Several things wrong here: I didn't, nor did I ever have, a severely overdue bill. Second, it was the middle of a pandemic and people around the world including myself were laid off from work. They insisted they'd mailed me a suspension notice. They had not. I never got a single piece of mail from RCN. But here's where it gets fun. A different support agent proceeded to tell me that no, my account had NOT been suspended, but then could not explain why they were charging me a $40 fee but would not remove it. They also tried forcing me to pay $55 to end my service because I had no car to be able to drop my equipment off at an RCN store, and didn't live near a place to print a return shipping label. This company has ZERO flexibility during a global health crisis and they are truly pure evil. Thankfully my roommate has a car and can drive the equipment back but the whole situation is absurd. DO NOT, do not, do not, EVER use RCN. They will screw you out of so much money and refuse to explain what they're even charging you for. Add and remove then re-add vague fees at any given time, month to month. read more

Very shady business practices. Representative initially signed up with a certain price with 2 year lock in. When the bill came, it was silently jacked up. When I called the customer service - they said they cannot do anything about it. They would apply all shady business practices to get people to switch over to their network because they know it is not easy for people to swapping networks again and again. I feel cheated and swindled by this company. read more

Very slow download and upload speed. The real download speed is 30Mbps and upload speed is 80 Mbps and I pay for 500 Mbps. Very disappointed with customers' service as well. No one was ready to help me when I wanted to change service plan. I am going to leave this provider and find better one. Would give 0 stars if possible and wouldn't recommend. read more

Trials and tribulations continue. This is one big joke, right? I called 10/10/23 and received a promotion taking my price to $128. Great! I get my bill this month for $139. When I call I'm told I'm no longer on promotion as of 10/19/2023. So you gave me a promotion for 9 days? The rep tells me there is nothing else she can do. I ask to cancel and in the middle of speaking, she puts me back in cue. Completely unprofessional customer service. RCN-thank you for giving me so many reasons to give up on you! read more

This is bar none the WORST internet service ever created by humankind. We were told that we locked in a rate in May. Set up autopay. Looked back in September. Our $51.62/mo rate had somehow ballooned to $139.99. With the overage charges to match. What a joke. Getting these people on the phone to sort through issues takes approximately 40 minutes via chat or via phone. It's a complete and total nightmare. Stay clear. STAY CLEAR. Literally go to any other internet provider. read more

This is one of the worst internet providers I have had, INCLUDING Comcast. I was vastly overcharged from what I signed up for. I was told I would be paying $60 for my internet package and $15 for the router per month. What actually was charged was $105 for internet, $15 for the router, and $15 for "wifi service"! When I called RCN to explain this, customer service was very rude and spoke in a very condescending way as though I could not understand basic math. And in the end, the charges were not corrected to what I signed up for. I am switching to Starry, which is a mere $30 per month instead! And their service is much less rude when you have a problem! I would stay FAR away from RCN. The amount of hidden charges and fees even for the basic installation was ridiculous. For example, an extra $10 was charged for "fees" -- and no one at RCN could explain to me what those "FEES" were! The people you speak to when starting service are actively dishonest about the amount that you will have to pay. If you go with RCN, I recommend keeping a close eye on all your bills, and being prepared to dispute dishonest charges with them month-by-month! read more

We have been with rcn since 2003 and during the years especially the last two years it's been a non stop problems with the internet connection lost . When the power goes out you have to reset all the boxes he main one first then the small TiVo boxes . Yesterday I was waiting for over 35 minutes to speak with a rep and finally decided that I'm canceling with them. One of the main reasons why we have been so hesitant is that we have our emails tied to a construction business . Yesterday I asked the rep if they would extend us the curtesy to extend our email for an additional month after I told her I wanted to cancel . She informed me she couldn't do it even though we had been loyal customers dealing with inferior cable service and if we wanted to keep the address it would be an additional 3.95 a month . Terrible customer service she didn't fix the problem it's still not able to connect to the internet. Other providers do not as I found out take away your email . We have it in our letterheads and all our print flyers . read more

Astound | Arlington - This is a constant problem with rcn ! Plus each month we had up to a 450.00 bill now it's about 189. And still not working - Television Service Providers Near Me - Arlington, Massachusetts

Awful, just awful. Apps run slower through astound, if the app you want is even available(no hulu, or hbo max, or disney plus) and an awful app store. Wi-Fi is unreliable, cuts out all the time. The internet in general is bad, i have a hardwired connection for an xbox and it loses connectivity way too often. The cables user interface also leaves much to be desired, being slow and glitchy are just the beginning of the problems. The dvr aspect of this is trash too, if 3 programs are being recorded you are not allowed to watch live tv, I can't even imagine what kind of fool thought that was a good idea. Terrible awful service, and I couldn't be more pissed about it even if you hired a creative team to brainstorm ways for me to be more mad, it would not work, the existing damage is too severe. Save your money go elsewhere for entertainment. read more

Service was excellent, value the best. No hidden costs. They even bought out my existing contract and saved me more

My spouse and I have had RCN for 20 years and we are finally done! It's $260/month and we simply cannot watch TV shows on demand. It's just not worth it. We've regularly called to complain, had the modem reset, had technicians out, and nothing changes. It doesn't matter which channel it is: ABC, A&E, Bravo, whatever - you either get errors when trying to start a show, errors in the middle and it stops playing, episodes missing/disappearing from the menus, or sometimes the picture freezes while the sound keeps rolling - SO frustrating. When we've asked multiple times why they can't provide a series of episodes in order (menus will have something like E1, E3, E6, E10, etc., while missing 2, 4, 5 and the rest of a series) they claim the networks don't send them everything. REALLY? What are we paying for, then? It's especially fun when I go in to watch an "episode 2" that was listed last night - but today, it's GONE from the menu and never comes back. The latest joke was when I called for a service visit two weeks ago and the rep on the phone said that if they came out and swapped the box, this would eliminate the TV errors. A guy came as scheduled but said the new box was the same as the old box, and likely wouldn't fix anything. He was right! We are buying a new TV this weekend and canceling RCN/Astound for good. read more

Update: Switching to (yes) Comcast. Too many rate raises and I'm tired of having to threaten to cancel to get a reasonable rate renewal. I have also noticed service quality has dropped since they became "Astound". The money they spent on that name change could better have been spent on keeping rates down and improving service, but that doesn't give management bigger bonuses. After cancelling I received a message from a sales rep that she could get me "a better deal". Her return number is out of service. read more

So I noticed that RCN was offering new customers a 500mbs bundle for $49.99, and I, as an existing customer, was paying $102.99 for 300mbs service. RCN refused to give me the new customer bundle at the new customer price, because mumble mumble mumble. They did knock 30 bucks off my bundle price, but that's all they can do because mumble mumble mumble mumble, basically they changed the service tiers and of course did not update the existing customers unless they ask. Apparently I can switch to another provider for 90 days, they come back to RCN and I will get the new customer price. That ain't right, RCN. Shame on you. read more

Not a good start with RCN. I set an appointment for installation from 2:00 to 4:00 on a Friday. Since it was during the day on a Friday, installation was free. So far, so good. I took the day off and went to my new place at 2 to wait for the tech. And wait. And wait. At 3:50, I got a call that the tech was held up at another job, and wouldn't arrive until 4:30. Not great, but ok. Since he was arriving outside the appointment window, RCN was giving a $20 credit. Continued waiting. At 4:50, no tech, so called RCN. My appointment, apparently, was changed to an all day appointment, so he could be there any time up until 6:00 PM. The offered only to waive the installation fee, which would have been great, except installation was free. So $20 for three hours and counting. If this is foreshadowing how RCN is going to be, I might need to give Xfinity another try. On a positive note, once the tech got there, he was great. Worked well after dark and after a long day already to get us up and running quickly. read more

Just as bad as Comcast if not worse! I had been considering trying them out and one day a salesman came to my door to sell me a package. He ended up pushing a package I didn't want. I went to RCN the next week and changed it to what I wanted. This of course, ruined the 'deal' the salesman gave me and changed it so I had no new promo prices/shows. I had to call and explain that to 3 different people until I finally got some worse 'phone' deal, but the Internet speeds i wanted and no landline. Months go by and the price goes up 5$ (random fees they add). After 12 months, my service went up 50$ even though no one mentioned this price we came out to was only for 12 months. The service all year in general too has not been good. It goes out just about every time it rains. Shady Practices, hidden fees (btw there is no such thing as a federal or state mandated fee on ISPs), same crappy customer service. Switching back to comcast i guess for the promo price and i'll just have to keep switching every year until Fios finally comes to my area. read more

I was a customer for three years with RCN and unfortunately wish I would've cancelled my service after year 1. My bill increased each year, which I expected, however this past year my bill went up $48 with no warning or explanation at all. I paid $120 for crappy internet service. Just internet! And the connection was always so bad, going on and off throughout the day. We had multiple techs come out and replace our router to fix connection issues with no improvement. I also called multiple times to see if they could reduce the payment with new offers and conveniently there were no offers to reduce my bill until I made the call the actually cancel my service. You can do better than this, RCN. I gave you plenty of times to try to do better but now I'll go to one of the many other internet providers in hopes it's better. read more

Not sure why most of the review's are negative. I had RC now for 2 years yes the price went up a little bit but I got a much faster internet. And happy to see that I have an option instead of xfinity. For me the internet service was running fine.. some issues in the first moth but everything is great since then. read more

Terrible customer service, they will openly lie to you. They do have lower price at the beginning but it will rise very very quickly. They also have much higher tax and fees than comcast or fios. Stay away !!! I almost forgot, their modems are terrible, I'm on my 3rd and it still have a bad signal ! But if you want to change you have to take a new appointment with a technician... Half a day of work lost ! read more

Direct customer since September 2014 and indirect customer as of January 2014. I'd say that it's average service with slightly below average costs but we do seem to have regular internet outages at least once a month when it will stop working and we need to reset the router. (I tried having Billcutterz help negotiate a lower rate, but I guess this is the cheapest option so far.) I've never really bothered to call them about this since it usually fixed itself within a few hours. Not sure if my roommate was already a long time customer but we were paying for internet and cable and it was ~$120/month. However after he left I took over as a "new customer" and was able to snag the introduction offer of $59/month + fees for Internet, basic cable + HBO (very useful for watching Game of Thrones and all those other good shows). Instead of letting us use the current equipment they actually had a cable guy come by and reset up the connection and they gave us another router which we then had to use after our old one was infected with a virus or something. Ever since 2014 the bill has been steadily going up by either $2 or by $20. It is currently around ~$86/month and I suppose it will continue going up so it might be time to shop around for another provider soon. I've had limited interaction with the customer service mostly about billing. It's ridiculous that paying over the phone incurs an additional $7 processing fee... One of the customer service agents I talked to processed this payment before letting me know of the fee and had to reverse it. What a headache. I have it set on auto pay now to save the headache of extra fees. read more

About a year later and STILL constant loss of streaming and internet.

RCN has official become Comcast. When I signed up they claimed no increases and affordability and now they have randomly increased my rate and trying to get me to enter a two year contact that is more expensive and slower than Comcast. RCN was really great two years ago, but that is no longer the case. I will be canceling my account. read more

have used RcN about 10 years. Recently it changed me extra $20 as bundle service quietly,no any notice. I called customer service, the lady asked me to wait over forty minutes! She can do nothing about my bill, I asked her to speak to supervisor, after waiting another 20 minutes, she said no supervisor tonight, call back tomorrow morning.......! what hell? read more

In the nicest way possible, please avoid this company. I was supposed to get a partial refund for my last month of payment. There supposedly sent a refund check, but it never came in the mail. I asked for the refund check again, and it never came in the mail. I then asked to send it to a different address, and it still never came in the mail. Again, I asked it to be sent again, and the check never came. I was then promised that the refund would be directly deposited to my account, but that never happened. I called again for the refund to be deposited directly in my account, and if it did not arrive, a representative would call. They never called. I got 2 different case number for my situation, and none of it was used to alert the higher authorities. Ultimately, after 6 months of calling 12 times about my case, I was once again promised about my case and that the check would be sent to my mail. It never came. I gave up. I lost money. I was frauded. read more

UPDATE 2/23/2018: RCN is still the worst and if it didn't cost so much to switch I'd do it right this second. Last month they did something to our box (some update they just NEEDED to do) and it screwed our entire internet and cable up. So they send a guy out. He literally unplugged it and did some other stuff (did NOT require rewiring or anything if the sort). They reassure us that since it was their fault, we wouldn't be charged. WELL low and behold, they charged us an extra $40 for that "service fee." We tried to fight it and got no where. It's like speaking with kindergarteners. I can't even put into words how much I dislike this company and the customer service, rather LACK thereof. As soon as our time is up with these con artists we are OUT. I wish I could give 0 stars. This provider not only has horrible customer service but they are SCAMMERS! Hidden charges every month and they refrain to tell you when anything changes to your package. Im switching my house to Comcast, and advising all my friends to do the same. What a waste of money. Con artists. read more

RCN is overcharging. I should just switch, but also want to share on social media to find out if anyone else has had the same experience. I have internet only, at 250 Mbps. The first 12 months was $ 45. Then 4 months at $ 55. Then 8 months at $ 65. and now we've reached the 2 year mark . . . the price just went up to $ 85. $ 85 dollars per month for 250 Mbps, and not even any other service. I don't think that's reasonable. The price increase is dramatic. read more

Trash, trash and more trash! My service connection has been going in & out for the past 2 weeks! I did a hard reset, called in to get a reset from their end and still nothing. I called again and asked " if there were any interuptions around my area that could have caused this?" "Not a single person" was what I got in response. I have a $0.00 balance. So now we pay full price for shabby service?! ‍ read more

Dearest RCN, You have 6 days or less to retain me as a customer, otherwise I am going to pay a tiny bit more for FAR superior cable offerings, and hopefully for staff that actually care about the customer. I needed to get cable, my significant other was moving in and Netflix and Hulu weren't going to be enough for her. She also sometimes works for home, so she needed faster internet. I went to an online chat with a rep to ask about whether I qualified for the posted prices on the website and I was surprised to find out that since I was adding a new service, I qualified for the new customer pricing. YAY! I found a package that would suit our needs and called to add service. I waited on hold for 10 minutes, and got 20 minutes into subscribing to find out that I was misinformed and did not qualify for new customer pricing, BOO!, nor could I get the free installation, and if I wanted free installation I would need to buy insurance for the equipment, half of which I owned myself. I quickly backed out, feverishly tried to find the transcript of the online chat, and did learn that in it I was actually told that I was considered a new customer. YAY! I called back and had to hold for another 10 minutes, and argue my way through getting new customer pricing, YAY! and then I was told again that I didn't qualify for the free install, BOO!, even though it was listed on the web as a new customer perk. I wound up getting my free install, unfortunately my free install would turn out to be the worst part of this whole expeience. I set up a service window of 12/9 between 2-4pm. He arrived at 3:55pm. When he arrived he told us all the stuff he couldn't do, but not the things he could do. His accent was very heavy and was pretty much un-understandable. He brought in a cable box that sat in setup mode for 15 minutes and then froze. He said "these sometime freeze" . He unplugged it and it froze again. Unplugged it, and restarted it, went to the car to get another cable box. He arrived back with the new box in hand, but this time 15 minutes into initializing it actually started. So he configured a few things, left me the old box that froze, and took out with him the new box. Then he left. The online guide never populated. We watched on-demand for a little bit and was shocked at how little food-network on demand choices there were. She, my signifigant other has Comcast, and the offerings just sucked compared to Comcase, but we recognized that saving some money would be good, so we would suck it up for a bit. We soon found out that this box actually had an issue. It froze mid show, and would be unresponsive to any remote commands. With no buttons or reset on the box, the only thing we could unplug it, replug it, wait for the 15 minute initialization to complete. We did this 3 times, in the course of trying to watch a live hour long news program we missed 45 minutes of it to initializing. I have gone ahead and reattached my over the air antenna, and my smart blu-ray player to watch Hulu and Netflix. I have cancelled my cable retroactively to the date of install, and have asked to cancel my internet to just before it rebills. I will now either have to buy a printer to print a label to stand in line at the post office to return this box, or take time out of my life to find a store and return it in person. If a box "sometimes freezes" on install, but sometimes does not freeze... perhaps the ones that freeze are actually broken and should not be installed in a customer's house. I am pondering of putting this full complaint into the online review boards, as I am EXTREMELY dissatisified, and others should know. Your service guy needs to be let go or retrained. You have lost a satisfied 20 month customer, and lost him in the course of a week. Sincerely, Justin K read more

Very difficult to cancel your service. It has been 3 months since I have cancelled and return my router/equipment and I still keep getting billed every month. Customer reps are nice over our multiple phone conversations, but still charge my credit card every month. I am unsure how to proceed with them - but will be filing a fraud charge with my bank. read more

I've been with RCN at 3 different addresses, for over 15 years. Over the years there have been some technical issues and Customer service issues, but most were either resolved of were company-wide and fixed globally. A few were mighty annoying, like internally filtering legitimate emails (e.g.Amazon, Rotten Tomatoes) as spam before they even got to their own servers. I got lots of different answers, none made much sense, and the problem was never resolved. I opened a gmail account to get those emails. Another more recent problem was an RCN contractor who was upgrading my equipment and disconnected my upstairs neighbor's Comcast connection in our cellar, not an accident. I had to go to the Atty Gen consumer hotline, who got me in touch with a good man from the Arlington office, who addressed the issue to our satisfaction. But overall, I stayed with them, because mostly the customer service was good (contrary to other reviews) and service was too--I get the speed I was promised and navigation is fine. Sometimes my email (outlook) demands but won't accept my RCN password, and I don't know why, but customer service fixes it promptly each time. So overall, technology wise, I've had a better experience than some other reviewers. But it's the money. Many times over the years when I complained about a rate increase, the rep would search and find me a promotion or a discount that would result in either no increase or only a few dollars. That happened last Nov or Dec, when it jumped $30 in one month. I ended up getting a lower rate than I had before the increase! Great, right? Now, I know some increases are not under their control--some state and federal taxes and fees,for instance. And they--all the cable companies-- pass on to us the rate increases to them from the content providers. At least that's their explanation for increases in programing rates, and it may or may not be true, because we can't ever tell. But taxes and fees are the smallest line items in rate increases. The largest ones are for TV content. So for starting in Feb, rates jumped about $10/month from all sources for 3 months, meaning I was paying the Dec higher rate before they reduced it. This month my rates went up $42, to $215/month, and note we do NOT have HBO or Showtime! Part of that was the end of a "Customer Loyalty Discount," part of was an increase in the rental cost of a modem I've had for a few years (I flipped out over that), and then the usual increases on content, taxes and fees. Basically my TV rates went up almost $70 from Dec 2018. Yesterday I cut theTV cord. (I kept internet and landline temporarily with RCN, but we're shopping around) I got some digital antennas, chose a streaming service (Sling). We already had Amazon Prime, Netflix and cheapest tier on Hulu. I read an article recently that pointed out that most Cable companies are doing the same thing--ending loyalty and promotional discounts and steadily raising rates. That way they are still profitable even while losing so many customers who are cutting the cord. Hardly seems like a sustainable business model, but there it is. So the bottom line is my 15+ years of loyalty to RCN is worth nothing to them, And so I say to RCN, GFY. read more

We have been customers of RCN and Astound since 2011, both in Washington, DC, and now in Boston. But we have canceled our account for internet and cable TV service because of the exorbitant price increases in recent year. After an internet search, we discovered that Xfinity provided a comparable cable package to what we had from RCN and an internet speed that was twice the speed of RCN's, at roughly half the price. We saw no reason to remain with RCN, especially since there were high prices for a technician's visit. Very disappointing. read more

They charge you whatever they want. When you attempt to fix, they promise you things like a free month and don't deliver. Instead they try to charge you again. Example below. I only have Internet. Which I was told would be 69.99 a month. Here are my statements. read more

After reaching out to them they still don't care and are forcing me to pay a 625!!! Dollar termination fee!!! Absolute scum of a company. I plan to print flyers with this review and send them all over the place. Hope you enjoy taking 625 dollars from me ... it's going to cost your company a lot more in future revenue read more