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VerK's avatar
VerK
New Contributor III
3 years ago

Obvious upload speed cutoff time!

Cox has decided that instead of upgrading their network to handle more traffic they will drop my area's upload speed to under 1.00Mbps right at 4pm on the dot every day. This ends at roughly 10:30pm. You cannot play games at this speed. I have a technician coming out Monday but it feels pointless. When you can time it to the minute when your upload speed with be useless you just know cox is throttling, no that's not the right word, basically cutting off upload speeds during peak times simply because they can't handle the traffic. They are basically giving you less than 1.00Mbps just so they can say you do have an up connection. I really think that if they could they would just cutoff all upload traffic entirely. Some people I know do not get this insane drop between 4:30pm and 10:30pm so I know its just my area at the moment but I fear many more are experiencing this garbage. So, basically I cannot use the service I pay for when I want to. This is absurd and makes me so mad. Just knowing it is deliberate and they feel they can just treat customers this way enrages me. It's a huge middle finger to their paying customers. When the technician leaves and tells me nothing is wrong I am filing a complaint with the FCC. I encourage anyone who isn't getting what they pay for to do the same. This abuse has to stop.

Here is a link to the form you can fill out to file a complaint against Cox or any internet provider. https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=38824

5 Replies

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  • quasibrain's avatar
    quasibrain
    New Contributor II
    3 years ago

    I live in Pride north of Central and have been fighting this all year with Cox. I have submitted complaints on the FCC website. Someone nice calls me and apologizes and they even gave me a partial refund but the upload speeds are exactly as you describe it. I have not tried to keep records of time of day when the upload speed is low but the times you quote seem right. I have security cameras at my place that are basically useless when they decrease the upload speed. I am very frustrated. Wish there was an alternative high speed internet provider in my area.

    • VerK's avatar
      VerK
      New Contributor III
      3 years ago

      I am in Central actually myself. I feel your pain, I really do. Nothing seems to change it though and nothing seems to push cox to show they even really care. They know we have no other options and really abuse that fact. I would definitely encourage you to file an FCC complaint and start documenting the times they drop UP speeds. If enough of us file complaints then they will be forced to do something.

      When they give me reasons why this happens its all standard cookie cutter answers. If the service was messed up by a bad line or my equipment then I wouldn't ever get the speeds I pay for. It just wouldn't work at all, period. You can definitely see that during high traffic hours they limit the up speeds, as well as the down speeds, to as little as legally possible. 

  • thecbass's avatar
    thecbass
    New Contributor II
    3 years ago

    I will fill this in as well. Its absolutely ridiculous that we pay almost $100 a month for a service that year after year just keeps deteriorating. For the past 4 years we have had this same issue with random but frequent enough upload speeds been cut down from 35mbps to about 3mbps. Have used multiple combinations of modems and routers, have had technicians come in to check this and that. They have even changed lines to the house and to the poles behind the house and the issue persists. Sometimes they blame the equipment, sometimes they blame the weather or service outage, but from time and time the common denominator is the *** upload speed. How i wish ISP would have not screwed google over expanding their fiber service because this stuff just keeps getting worse and COX's inability to upgrade their infrastructure is finally catching up to them. 

    • VerK's avatar
      VerK
      New Contributor III
      3 years ago

      I have gone through the same exact issues. New equipment, new lines, new cat cables and yet the problems persist. I have no doubt in my mind that they are 100% cutting upload and download speeds simply because they cannot adequately handle the amount of traffic during peak hours. Please file a claim. It's all we can do at this point and if they get enough complaints they wil be forced to do something about it or risk major fines or worse with the FCC. From what I hear the new head of the FCC isn't messing around with this kind of stuff and take it quite seriously.

      I cannot wait for gigabit Fiber to be available here even if its with AT&T. They really did screw the public over and we all should have access to fiber by now since most of the major ISPs took government money in the 90s to upgrade and provide reliable high speed internet to all or to at least future prep their networks for more reliable speeds and services. Instead they pocketed most of that money and left the customer to deal with the problems and lack of options.

      Cox just needs to add more nodes to be able to handle more traffic. It's as simple as that.

      Hope you have better luck in the future.

  • VerK's avatar
    VerK
    New Contributor III
    3 years ago

    Well here we go, almost 4pm here. These are my current speeds. TERRIBLE Download speeds, I pay for gigabit. Will post new speeds after 4pm as proof of throttling.