Think twice before choosing Reliance Broadband Services

When it comes to choosing high speed internet broadband connections, there are many service providers who will bend over backwards to attract new customers! Some even go the extent of giving many false promises or coerce you with blatant lies! I shall share the bitter experience that I had with the Reliance Communications' wireless offering called Reliance Netconnect+ (which is supposed to provide speeds of 3.1 Mbps) on this post. It is a direct study in contrast with screen-shots of comparative speeds offered by Airtel Broadband (which is a 512 Kbps cable connection).

Opting to upgrade my connection from a supposedly slower 512 Kbps cable connection (fixed) to a wireless and supposedly superior 3.1 Mbps proved to be a nightmare of sorts and in fact, it was a real eye-opener about the scam called Reliance Communications and their offerings, their lies and incapable customer service and technical support teams.

✎ The salesman was the first 'moment of truth' - The free home delivery of the data-card was charged Rs. 50/- as a service charge! And on payment of Rs. 1,300/- for the device - no receipt or confirmation of payment was provided!

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* Image from the Company Website - Notice the fine print - Speeds up to 3.1 Mbps - It could be anything above zero and may touch 3.1 Mbps (in your wild dreams!)


✎ The 'honest' salesman was candid in advising me that the speeds that I can expect would be 3.1 Mbps only till the first 9 Gb of usage and thereafter the speed would be reduced to 512 Kbps! (Which seemed very acceptable - Scroll down to realize the truth!)

✎ Of course, the device was not active till the next day (27th Sept 2011) and the speed on offer was a mind-numbing 183.3 Kbps!:

My Airtel connection was still active then (I had called in to cancel the line by then!) and when I compared the speed using the same speedtest.in it was 1006.1 Kbps!

✎ The same moment I called the Reliance customer care number and the agent explained that the network is congested due to too many users being connected at the same time and suggested that I try later at another time! He hesitantly took my complaint and raised a service request and promised prompt action within 5 days!

✎ Meanwhile I decided to record the speeds each day till I got a resolution and called back Airtel to cancel my termination request. Here are the comparative speeds of Airtel and Reliance on 28th September 2011:

Reliance 3.1 Mbps connection: Speed registered - 591.4 Kbps (A great improvement!)

Airtel 512 Kbps connection: Speed registered - 1.42 Mbps

✎ Continued the testing on 29th September 2011 (No call from Reliance):

Reliance 3.1 Mbps connection: Speed registered - 677.6 Kbps (Improving! Or so I thought!)

Airtel 512 Kbps connection: Speed registered - 1.17 Mbps (Remember - this is a 512 Kbps line!)

✎ Continued the testing on 29th September 2011 (No call from Reliance Service team - But I get a call at 6 PM asking me to confirm my billing address!):

Reliance 3.1 Mbps connection: Speed registered - 665.6 Kbps (Seems to have peaked!)

Airtel 512 Kbps connection: Speed registered - 1.09 Mbps

✎ Irritated that nothing was happening since the last 3 1/2 days, I called customer care only to receive a big sorry from a new employee to the company and with no Supervisor or Manager willing to take the call, I decided it was a lost cause and wanted to ensure that the sham called Reliance does not treat customers like trash and make mountains of money by cheating hapless individuals! I am sure not many are aware that the internet speed provided by the service provider can be checked and many are being victimized and tons of money is being robbed from the users! (I will provide a list of the testing sites for speed at the bottom of this post).


✎ On the 1st of October 2011, a tech guy of Reliance Communications called in at 4:30 PM and the connection speed comparison from that time is below:


Reliance 3.1 Mbps connection: Speed registered - 307.5 Kbps (Unbelievable - but true!)

Airtel 512 Kbps connection: Speed registered - 1.34 Mbps!

✎ When the comparative results were read out to the tech service guy from Reliance, he was candid in admitting that the speeds are the best the Reliance can provide!

✎ The worst part was, when I called to terminate the request, the customer support person stated that the service termination request will take 15 days to process and that I would be billed for this nonsense till that time! What a sad way to make money!

✎ As a reader or a user of any internet service please be aware of the fine print and use your discretion and better judgement before deciding to throw money at these big mega-moneymaking behemoths!


✎ Check your internet speeds regularly using the following sites:

cnet.com

speedtest.net

speedtest.in

Shall post any updates as and when available. Best wishes!