I'm not the type of person to only speak up when there's room for complaint. In fact I have often gone out of my way to contact businesses and inform them of superior quality in service. Unfortunately I cannot say the same for Time Warner and their internet service. I have experienced more interrupted service, billing errors, and inaccessibility to customer service with Time Warner than I could ever say for Verizon, Cox Communications, or any number of technology companies I've dealt with. Network Solutions comes close, but Time Warner takes the cake for consistent fail. On a daily basis I get dropped signals on my modem, and working largely from home, let alone holding video conferences regularly, I've had to apologize more for my shoddy internet provider than one should ever have to. On a billing level, experience has been equally as shady.

Time Warner charges you for the month ahead before you use what you've paid for, and offers different speeds of cable internet. Upon signing up, I was offered their second-tier internet speed, regularly $49 a month, for $39 a month instead (the price of their primary speed). When this three month promotion came to a close, instead of keeping me at $39 a month and giving primary speed, they just assumed I'd keep second-tier speed and bumped my bill up to $49 without warning, for the upcoming month four. I contacted customer service and told them the installer said the opposite would happen (that I would remain at $39 and get primary speed), and I wanted a new bill of $39 for primary. A month goes by and I never receive a new bill. On month five, I got a bill saying I owned them $49 for the month that passed, even though that whole time they had downgraded me to the primary speed. Blatant overcharge. Plus I owed $39 for the upcoming month. Obviously my talk with customer service was completely disregarded. Two months after that I finally got the $10 difference accredited to my account, but ultimately it raises the issue about how $39 a month is an absolute joke to begin with. Unfortunately, since Time Warner monopolized the area I live in, they're my forced choice for internet.

Customer phone service is nearly absent as well, so good luck there. I've never managed to get a human being on their phone line, and it funnels down to online chatting being your only option -- ironic seeing as that, if you can't get internet for some reason, you can't get help.

When I move to another area, making sure I have an option other than Time Warner is going to be quite the deciding factor whether or not I move there.