I just noticed, on Facebook, that brambleton is saying there will be a special announcement for residents tomorrow about Verizon. I Hope we are getting more free HD stations.

Or I hope they finally allow us to use all of the VZ capabilities outside of brambleton..

It's definitely cool.

The announcement? Speak!

How about they stop charging for units/homes that aren't occupied anymore? Instead of every other unit subsidizing it and paying Verizon.

Cupcakes for everyone!

I told you never to call me "cupcake" in public!

Cupcakes could win my vote. Are they running for the board also? My hope is that they are going to announce better customer service coupled with free cupcakes.

But...but...that's my name!

Post from the Facebook Page:

At no extra charge to Brambletonians will be upgraded to Verizon HD Extreme this weekend (you will now get 376 channels included in your HOA fee) - please note that residents who currently have the bulk bundle (voice and HD upgrade) or the upgraded Sports package will be contacted individually by Verizon to ensure that changes to your billing will be handled correctly.

And THIS:

Also, at no extra charge all Brambletonians are now qualified to upgrade their data speeds to 25/25 mbps by simply calling Verizon at 800-501-1172 (Mon-Fri, 8AM to 8PM). YOU MUST CALL to receive these faster speeds!

Really? They're going to contact me? I'll believe it when it happens.

Just called and the rep didn't know anything about this. She put me on hold for a couple mins and it was taken care of. I was 20/5 (did a speed test and was getting 15/5). They said they need to make the change at the CO, will check it this afternoon.

I'm on the phone now. The internet service order is being placed but the Rep. I'm on the phone with doesn't know anything about the TV part yet. I will wait for the call.

Hmm, wonder if that was what phone call i recd. while on another line. Thought it was their typical sales call and told them to call back later, that i was on another line. Hope they call again.

On the phone with them now also. They seem a little frantic. I told them you will likely get 2200 calls this morning on it. She was a little surprised.

EDIT- Took 3 1/2 minutes. Not bad.

Ever since Verizon announced their new packages I've been talking to Keith about this. Now the question is are we going to be able to upgrade to the Ultimate HD package. Not sure how many people saw this but back in January Verizon redid their packages and now have 3 levels Prime, Extreme, and Ultimate. They do not correlate to the old packages that we had.

On hold....

Why should we have to call to get upgraded speeds? They should just do it. I have the extreme HD package now, could someone remind me how much extra a month it is?

And done...

Pretty cool, I'd say.

I think the lady told me it was $10/month. Since we already have it too, that amount will simply be deducted from our bill.

Well I spoke too soon. What a pain. Get this, when we moved in back in Aug I told them that I didn't need/want to the video portion. I have directv. I thought I would try it out for a month and if I didn't like it I could cancel the video portion (the rep said I could do this, no problem). So I got the HD box, didn't care for it, it was ok, but no diff than DirecTv and the big part was I didn't get the NFL ticket. So I called up and they canceled the service and turned in the box at the town center, no problems.

So the rep I talked to this am called me back bc she couldn't get the 'upgrade' to go in. This is the outcome, which is a crock (sry). She's saying I need to have video on my package and to have video I have to have a box (reg or HD). I also must pay for this box $5.95 for reg and $10 for HD. The contract the HOA has with Verizon is that we need to have video and a box (first I heard of this, why didn't the rep who told me I could return the box tell me this). For the upgraded speed I really don't mind paying but really don't think I should have to. But this kicker is that to get the upgraded speed I need to have all my services canceled and then established as a new customer?!??! There's a chance I could lose internet services for up to 24hrs. I want the extra speed so they are going call me later today to setup the appt.

So this free upgrade is going to cost me a few $$ a month, well until I return the box next month! Should be interesting when I get my ooma and cancel the local/ld service with them. Gotta love Verizon, not!

Hope no one else runs into this...

Tom

The HD package is an extra $10 a month. We added it in a few months back to qualify for the triple play discount on our phone line (phone, internet, and extreme hd).

And now on hold at 10:40 am. All reps are busy. No doubt because everyone in the hood is calling in for more speed!

Update: 10:49: Off the phone and my account is updated. Per the rep I spoke to, the speed upgrade will happen sometime today.
Didn't even have to provide my account #- she was able to pull it from my name. Amazing!

Update: 10:56: And I spoke to soon. Patty from Verizon called me back to say that because I have a "bundle" they are still figuring out how to apply the speed upgrade. She promised a call back later today.

Even if you handed in your boxes, you would have had TV service. Unfortunately, you can't cancel your TV or internet service; it's locked in in the HOA fee. Now, if you don't have a box, you'll only get a few local channels if you plug your TV into the connection. Were you speaking with a Brambleton rep?

Not even that anymore, right? You need the digital converter?

If you have a QAM tuner on your TV you can get all the locals in HD and SD.

Also, if you have CableCard support, you can get that.

Sure. But I guess if I had a TV w/ all that jazz, I'd have a HD box for it.

Nope was speaking to a rep from Verizon. She made it sound like I needed to get a box, even if I didn't want the TV service...

I thought it was like 10 bucks.

Same here but instead they said you will get a call next week Mon. or Tues.

Again, why do we have to call and why does this need them calling us back? They don't need to come into our homes to give us the upgrade, do they? Also, for those in condo's if they do one unit in the building why not do all of them?

Is the purpose of the phone call to justify the jobs at the call center?

+1 Thank goodness there are ONLY 2200 homes.

Its for people that already have the service...Guess they want to make sure you know that you will be no longer charged for it.

Yes, in my case, they are going to charge us $10 less each month, so they need to "notify" me.

hmm I was looking at what the ultimate HD has vs Extreme. And the major difference I see is the inclusion of movie channels (like showtime).

The posting didnt say we had to call to get the charge taken off it was to get the upgraded speeds. We shouldn't have to call to get upgraded.

Ok, what happened to the "pinned" posting with the VZ contact numbers for brambleton?

You shouldn't need the box, especially as you don't plan to use your service. However, I think you miss my point: You have TV service even if you don't use it. You cannot cancel your service in Brambleton. You might not use it but it's there and you're paying for it.

Conspiracy to make your life more difficult.

It was unpinned, should be in the list further down in the tech forum.

Thats a long list, can we pin it again?

it's back now. 800-501-1172.

25 minutes: 22 minutes on hold and 3 minutes speaking to the rep. But who's counting...it's not like I have a burning desire to go outside and play in the gale force winds or anything...

For what it's worth, they are able do the upgrade very quickly. For me, once they realized they were able to do the upgrade for free (which took a solid 10 minutes waiting on hold), it took about a minute to create the order, and 15 minutes before it was done. Everything disconnected for about 10 seconds, and came back with the new speeds.

12 minutes and I was done. No wait time.

Just called and 15min later HD channels showed up and Internet speed show 25/25

Took 2 minutes for the order to be placed in the system (waited on hold for about 5 seconds) before the very nice lady I spoke with (who knew about the upgrade btw) answered the phone. She was exceptionally good humored about the whole deal.

They are getting slammed with calls and I apparently just picked a lucky timeframe when all the rest of you are out drinking or something. So be nice to these people. Think about it, they are just trying to do their job and it isn't their fault if the supervisors didn't clue them in on time. I am just glad I don't have a job where I have to take calls from 'onians until 8 pm on a Friday night.

Which channels are the new HD channels?

Anyone test their speeds? I'm not seeing anything close to 25 Mbps uplink, seems to still be about 5-10. The Speakeasy test showed 7 just now, but the dslreports one showed 15. Upload and download speeds to Palo Alto were much worse, 6 up and .757 down.

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The speakeasy test just gave me 215MB down and 11 up....I'm not sure I trust them.