I had Winchester Wireless for about 3 years. Since their initial install (in which they were a no show for the first scheduled appointment) they have been out about 15-20 times to fix my internet.
Now, I paid $150 for "up to 50 Mbps" per their web site where they also state they do not guarantee any speeds. It is all best efforts. If you pay for 50 Mbps and get 3, then it sucks to be you. If you don't like the speed, you can pay $110 for 10 Mbps or $80 for 6. That's quite a drop in speed for the price. The reasoning is they know no one wants 10 for $100 so you are forced to pay $150 and hope to god it works out. Now the prices change if you have broadband available, so if you don't have Fios or Comcast available, then you get the gauged price. For the vast majority of my time with this company, I have gotten about 10 Mbps with frequent daily drops in service. How is charging more for people in areas without internet legal? I wonder how the FCC feels about it.
Now to the first four service calls. After missing the first scheduled repair, their team made all the rest on time that was spread across the next eight months or so. Their team was always friendly and they stay up on my roof adjusting the antenna trying to get me the best signal. Each time they have been here, they had switched my antenna back and forth between 2.4 and 5 GHz. Neither sufficed and my internet would still drop and the speeds were bad. I work a government contract where I need VPN access so this is an incredible hindrance.
After having non-stop issues and becoming frustrated, I left my first review on this company after about 18 months. The company's owner emailed me within an hour claiming to not know of any issues I've ever had. I found him rude and combative in all his emails. He inundated me with emails, first telling me he would only fix my internet if I removed my negative review (which I pointed out is blackmail). He sent so many aggressive emails blaming me for having bad network equipment and sending data usage from previous months, I had to ask him to stop as I felt it was harassment and would delete all emails without reading them. He then stated he would come out to fix it after the blackmail comment. I have spent nearly $2000 on horrific internet and he truly couldn't care less if I was being screwed over or not. The only thing he cared about was the review. I truly believe he does not care about his customers, only getting paid.
True to his word, the owner did show up as planned. He was nice at the door and I told him I would show him how to access the roof. He stated that was ok because he knew it wasn't their end he wouldn't need it. Cut to an hour later, I had 4 more employees here on the roof installing yet another antenna. They admitted they couldn't get past 15 Mbps at best and both 2.4 and 5 GHz were problematic here so they had to install another antenna running on an uncommon frequency. The funniest moment was when their team was done and had told me they couldn't provide me the speeds I paid for, he asked me if I wanted a business account because I have a number of servers. I asked why and he said for better service. I replied you can't come close to giving me what I pay for and you want more? He looked at me, realized the stupidity of his question, and left.
My terrible internet went on for another year and a half. It was constantly dropping, I would email, and I would be told it was my fault or it never happened. I could plug directly into their equipment, bypassing my home router, and have no signal. This is emphatic proof they were down but they would reply back they saw nothing and I was the bad person. They would make every attempt to make me think it wasn't them. Just admit it and I'd be happier. They shut my internet off once and told me my card was no longer on record. When I logged on, there was my card. The constant lies, and catching them in them, was just too much. My email is full of hate mail from the owner, responding to me calling them out on said lies. The same attitude can be seen on his reviews online and he blasts people for negative reviews. The last year of service, the drops were pretty regular and I just tethered to my cell phone all day because it was reliable.
In the end, I ended up switching to Wave2Net and have consistently better signal and speeds for half the cost (getting about 25 Mbps download for $85 a month). I did have issues at first, but amazingly, the company acknowledged they were at fault and left my ticket open for a month, even after it was fixed until a proper resolution was determined. Winchester Wireless just would have told me to F off. When I heard they were running more Comcast lines into the country (including my area this year, hurray), I laughed at knowing their customer base was shrinking. I would never, ever, recommend this company to anyone. Get a Verizon hotspot first, or try Wave2Net. read more
