Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Bezeq Customer? Check Your Internet Speed

In our little country, people are already used to get bad service from the big media providers (TV, ISP, cellphone, etc.). Here's a story.

My wife's parents live in a moshav in the Galilee area. For a few years now they have been paying for a 2.5Mbps Internet connection both to Bezeq and to the ISP. A few weeks ago I noticed that Israeli sites loads pretty slow, so I did a speed test. Unsurprisingly, I found out the the connection was 750kbps.

Upset, we've called Bezeq. After doing some tests they declared that the line in the moshav doesn't support the 2.5Mbps connection speed, and this is the reason the result returns 750kbps.
So we asked the representative (actually, more than one) over the phone "why would they sell a 2.5Mbps service in places where it's not even supported". Bezeq's answer was evasive, to say the least. Moreover, they asked why do we complain only now when the situation is like that for years (?!). For years. So Bezeq knows the 2.5Mbps isn't supported, and was never supported, and yet keeps selling the service.

A money refund was given for the past few months (since February), and that's it.

Actually, this is the second time I encounter a similar issue. About a year ago I noticed at my brother's apartment that the phone line is a bit noisy (the apartment is in a city near Tel Aviv). So I did a speed test and found out that while he's paying for 4Mbps, he receives 1.5Mbps. The technician over the phone said that we're right and that someone will come and replace the phone wiring in the building. Yet again, Bezeq knew (from remote) that the speed being paid for isn't available, and yet kept charging for the higher speed.

My advice to you: If you're a Bezeq ADSL customer - Check your Internet connection speed.

7 comments:

  1. do you have a good way to test the speed ?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Basically, I'm using http://speedtest.net/
    It is good enough in order to get an idea about the speed you're getting.
    Other than that, some ISPs include a speed test on their sites. Usually, it's a file you're supposed to download and time how much it took. Since the file is hosted on the ISP server, it should tell you the exact speed you're getting.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Your can check you internet speed through aafter.com. Simply visit the site and type ‘speedtest:’ and you’ll get your internet speed along with download speed in few seconds. It’s free!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Btw, you can use the @2 connection to work with a better in speed (bezeq vlan). btw do to proxy and dpis you can't be sure about the speed test sites (use encrypted tunnels to test)

    ReplyDelete
  5. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I'm at a moshav in ha Galil too. Tried to upload a 600 Mb (five-minute) video to Youtube. Slow as treacle on a cold day. Would have taken 10 hours. My hostess is in the process of dumping Bezeq for somebody else. I'm astonished that a country this advanced technologically has Internet service this bad. Even more astonished that anybody is willing to pay for it every month.

    ReplyDelete