EarthLink

Approval Rate: 29%

29%Approval ratio

Reviews 48

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  • by

    johntoo

    Wed Mar 24 2010

    I have had a problem with Spam getting through the Highest level of my Earthlink provided Spamblocker for about 2 months now. After denying the problem for about a month. They now are "working on it" BUT have been unable to fix it AND have stopped returning my emails. DO NOT consider Earthlink when looking for an ISP!!!!

  • by

    moomoocowpoo

    Tue Aug 04 2009

    Well, I am not gonna lie, when you first sign up and are on contract, everything is amazing. They do what they can to help. However, when you are off of contract, they treat you like shit. Why I stuck around, I do not know. I thought the speeds were fast (8Mbps/768Kbps) however I think I should have switched over to Verizon or Comcast before. They would make your lines drop, lower your speeds, and everything they could to make my life hell. I STRONGLY WARN you NOT to go with earthlink. I am indian, and all their Techs are indian and get so annoying sometimes. They barely ever keep good records. I am sorry, but I have had a terrible time with earthlink.

  • by

    muswell310

    Wed Nov 26 2008

    Absolute rubbish! I've tried to raise their attention to an id-theft issue on their whois records and depsite calling, emailing and chatting to a technician, they are utterly incapable of performing the most basic problem resolution. I'm not a customer, but all I can say is 'Thank God for that'.

  • by

    derf123777

    Fri Aug 22 2008

    Earthlink is by far the worst internet provider out there. If you have any choice do not go with earthlink. Their customer service tell you different things every time you contact them. And they have done very well as a company at seperating all their departments. So if you have an issue no one is responsible and it takes hours to get anything fixed. If they have made a mistake they make no amends to make it better. I am switching providers.

  • by

    amternpft

    Thu Jul 03 2008

    on 6-30-08 I get an email from Earthlink regarding my DSL account: Our records indicate that you were provided a Static IP address with your DSL account. Due to a system error, we have not billed your account for this additional service. Please reply to this email and indicate whether or not you would like to keep your Static IP address. Canceling the Static IP will not affect your DSL account or Internet service. ...more... The thing is I never asked for a static IP. I also have logs of the IP addresses I've had due to using INADYN (linux program) to update my dynamic DNS. Those logs clearly show I've had hundreds of different IP addresses since Aug. 2006 when I signed up. In other words, they are lying when they say I've had a static IP address. So basically, Earthlink manufactured a problem report, and sent it to me hoping I would purchase additional services. I replied saying I didn't want static IP address and that this sounded like a scam. The ... Read more

  • by

    michelew48

    Tue Jun 17 2008

    Earthlink is by far the WORST internet service out there. They should be shut down for their practices. Customer service said they were going to mail me a $30 amazon gift card for signing up with them. I never got it. I called to complain about their awful customer service and cancel my internet with them and they told me they were mailing me out my gift card and that they would mail me my last bill. Well a month later I got the bill and No gift card. I called today they said my account was closed so I do not get a gift card but that I owe $30 on the account. They said I could reactivate my account to get my gift card. I asked to speak with a manager and they said one was not available for closed account holders. To finally get me off the phone again they took my name and number and told me they would have a manager call me back. Yeah right!!!!!

  • by

    lowtherd

    Wed May 21 2008

    Agree with many of the reviews below. Poor connectivity (continually dropping connection) and their support is absent. They have yet to remedy my issues. I regret switching to them to save some money. Now I have to go shopping for a new ISP again.

  • by

    db6976c5

    Sun Apr 06 2008

    A free 6 months trial of Earthlink Dial-Up came with my new Dell, so even though I had DSL for $12.99/month at home, having free dial-up on my laptop when traveling sounded good. I contacted Earthlink and was advised that they did not honor the free trial shipped with Dell computers, but that I could get a 6-month trial for a one-time charge of $9.95. After verifying 3 times that there would only be a single charge of $9.95, I signed up. During the second month my credit card was billed another $9.95, and when I called Earthlink I was told that my plan indeed was a $9.95 one-time charge for 6 months and that I'd be credited back the second $9.95 charge. I used the service 3 times in the past 5 months, and found the connection speed OK but got disconnected all three times. On my last credit card statement I noticed a charge from Earthlink for another $9.95 and started getting suspicious. Upon checking, I found that I had been billed $9.95 six times in the past 5 months, and month ... Read more

  • by

    swarma36

    Mon Mar 24 2008

    Good for average surfing only, but not reliable. I should have stopped when the site did not accept my initial order. Then I "chatted" to order which was painful. No communication sent to me except to my earthlink email, which I was not even using because my service did not start. (They should mail or email to your primary address contracts!) I was using the DSL service for VOIP, but the modem kept needing reset and I had to pry out of second level support that they changed settings on their end and assured no further issues. NOT!

  • by

    mightyafrodyti_e

    Tue Feb 19 2008

    The actual connectivity and the speed at which equipment ships are the only good things I have to say about Earthlink. Customer service is nightmarish! It wasn't always so in the beginning, but the last 2-3 years have been pure consumer hell. From the interface that is completely user undfriendly and don't even get me started about the phone service! Don't do it!

  • by

    sundiszno

    Thu Jan 31 2008

    I tried Earthlink for a couple of months, and all I had was trouble.  E-mail was totally hosed, and I couldn't get a decent explanation as to what was wrong from their support people.  I highly unrecommend it.

  • by

    happyfirefly

    Fri Sep 21 2007

    If I could give zero stars, I would. I would rather poke out my eyes with sharp sticks than ever use Earthlink again. It took me six weeks AFTER cancelling my service with them to get them to release my phone line so I could get another DSL service provider. Even after that, they are STILL CHARGING ME. Not only are they charging me for DSL, they are also charging me for dial-up service! I don't even have a dial-up modem in my computer! Unreal.

  • by

    shortyer23

    Mon Sep 17 2007

    I got Earthlink Wi-fi in conjunction with the City of Philadelphia. The service was awful since I signed up for the service. Connecting via wi-fi I always got poor reception, but it was promised to improve once I purchased a $70 modem. The service didn't improve, and I even had to unplug the modem to get internet connection to find a number to cancel the service. Once I wanted to cancel the service, that was another battle. I tried to contact earthlink via IM, email and phone and there was always some problem keeping me from canceling. Upon calling at 7:00am to avoid high volume calling, I was told the wi-fi specific line would open in "1 or 2 hours" and to call back yet again. This service is a scam and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone!

  • by

    paulyp

    Mon Sep 03 2007

    Earthlink is the worst. Where I live, my entire street is "owned" by TimeWarner, so I don't even have the option to choose a different provider. The people at TimeWarner know this and could care less if I cancel my service. They've overcharged me on several occasions. I would cancel my service but have no choice! This company should be fined (again) for their unscrupulousness.

  • by

    sarimoore

    Thu Aug 23 2007

    I have had the worst cs experiance of my life with Earthlink. I ordered DSL service from them about 30 days ago . It's not "always on" its almost always off in fact every three min. my connection dumps. I have spent 30+ hours on the phone with EL trying to get the solution to this problem , most of it on hold . My average hold time is 2+ HOURS . I keep getting cut off , transfered , and ignored. In fact I keep getting told to "live chat" How am I supposed to live chat with only three min. of conncetivity at a time? I have been promised three different times a technician to my home and one has never arrived. I spent 6hours and 7 min on the phone with EL yesterday , only to be promised once again a technician will be here next week . This is incredibally frustrating. The phone techs keep having me do the same tests over and over with no results. I have told many reps that I wanted to cancel the service only to be ignored , and any question I asked is met with a "what I need you to do no... Read more

  • by

    dolphin8

    Tue Aug 21 2007

    I would have rather jumped off a bridge than get Earthlink. They are rude, over charged me, and still refuse to refund all their mistakes. NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER GET EARTHLINK!

  • by

    la69c4c4

    Sat Jul 21 2007

    I've had Earthlink dial-up since 1993 when they first came to my area (I'm rural, and Centurytel (my phone company) doesn't even offer it out here). I have had a generally good experience (as good as one can get at a lousy 28.8 kps-and it is alot slower at times) with one exception: the idiots from India that don't know their ass from a hole in the ground-and they are all named Mike or Rick(Reek). They ought to be sued for false advertisement for the tv commercial showing American techs saying how they work hard to solve your problems. If I could try anybody else-I would!!

  • by

    davidpd315

    Thu Jun 14 2007

    I had Earthlink DSL and home phone service for 2 months. It was the worst experience that I have ever had with any company. Service was unreliable and customer service was ineffective. The customer service agents waste your time by having you perform varying ineffective tests. The agents then tell you to hang up so they can perform some tests and call back in 4 hours. When you call back you are asked the same questions and to perform the same tests again, but still no results. After the phone and DSL service went out for the 6th time I canceled service. When the service was working the phone line was not clear but DSL seemed to work fine. Overall, I will never do business with this company again.

  • by

    pzbrawl

    Thu May 10 2007

    DSL service intermittently is unusably slow. Absolutely incompetent and useless technical support. Use another DSL service if you possibly can.

  • by

    nat55418

    Fri Apr 06 2007

    I feel like I'm part of a club of people who have been ripped off by Earthlink TrueVoice. Initially, to set up the account, they said I have to enter a credit card number but that it wouldn't be used. Sure enough, without my permission, there was a charge from Earthlink on my next bill. The quality was horrible. There was a terrible echo on my end, and everyone I talked to told me they could barely hear me through the static. I called and complained and they just referred me to their web site for help, which didn't solve the problem. I sent five letters to their corporate office making complaints about several issues, including unathorized charges on my bill, and I still have not received a response. In the meantime, they keep charging me an extra $2 a month to send me a paper bill that I dispute. WARNING: Do not give Earthlink a credit card number. They will use it without authorization and will not respond when you make a complaint about it. Remove the number off of ... Read more

  • by

    19andcounting

    Fri Mar 16 2007

    wow! I could easily duplicate what was written on earlier on the 3/15/07 post on earthlink. Let's see after getting off the phone with their customer service today, I will never ever do business with them again. After canceling my account with them last month because their update programs kept shutting down my computer, I called tech support and after 30 minutes discussing the problem with them nothing was resolved, and I was told someone else would call me withing the next hour and never heard from anyone period. Then I am billed on my credit card after I have canceled with them, which they refuse to credit my account. This of course after the fact that their system was down for 4/5 days where they could not cancel my account back in February and I would have to call back. So in short I have spent 2 hours of phone time and have been charged one months service for a service that has been canceled and not used. Is this the kind of company you would prefer to give your money to that do... Read more

  • by

    earthlinkisthe_worst

    Thu Mar 15 2007

    Earthlink is terrible. Slimey billing tactics, long hold times, reps that don't speak english. It's an absolute joke and a mockery of people's time and money. I will never, ever deal with them again and I will tell everybody I can that they are corner-cutting rip-off merchants.

  • by

    earthlinksucks_beyondbelief

    Fri Oct 06 2006

    These guys stink!!! Endless call centers Nobody knows what anybody else is doing. The sales people will promise you what they can't deliver.

  • by

    rick77

    Mon Jul 10 2006

    I signed up at Frys and was promised a $25 gift certificate. After 6 months of effort I gave up.

  • by

    asdfff

    Wed Jun 21 2006

    THERE ARE MUCH BETTER ISP'S...Horrible dsl,customer service, tech support, and beware of the schemes. It is very apparent they do not care about their customers. I imagine most people use them for a year and then leave as soon as humanly possible. Don't go through the terrible ordeal I have dealt with the past year.

  • by

    schmooze

    Wed Mar 22 2006

    I hate Earthlink. Sadly, they also are my webhost. Email sent to me through my domain name - is often lost because Earthlink web servers are overloaded and often crash, therefore email sent to your domain does not get forwarded to the underlying earthlink mailbox. "Customer Service" is all foreign based and if you want to speak to anyone connected to earthlink in America, you only get to do this if you want to buy an Earthlink service or product. Their service website is useless and if you get to chat - the call always ends up that "unfortunately, you will have to call in." It used to be a great ISP but now - the only thing that they remain good at is selling you more services. The biggest thing they sell you is a line of bull. They overload their servers and are not commmitted to serving their clients. Their goal is to get you off the phone and transfer you to someone else who says that they are not the ones to speak to either. Hate them

  • by

    win29228

    Mon Mar 13 2006

    Earthlink is the worst company I've ever done business with on this planet. I've had an on going problem with them that goes back over 15 months. Today I was close to getting a refund for the entire amount I've spent with them. I was on the phone with them for almost 2 hours when the rep said all she had to do was contact TRON their technical division to declare and validate that my DSL service was unresovable. Instead she transfers me to a guy in India who answers the phone and says. Can I help you? This is after I was on the line with her for almost 2 hours. I had made so many phone calls and emails to Earthlink that I couldn't even begin to count. Often they never even acknowledged the emails. The most who get is robots reading and apologizing from a script and in the end they resolve nothing! Don't do business with them if you haven't had a problem yet you will, as they can't provide service and rely on third parties to handle customer issues and it simply doesn't work.

  • by

    turquine

    Sat Mar 11 2006

    Varies a lot. Occasionally it's not horrible; usually it's so slow as to be almost unusable. It takes 10 minutes to check my gmail account. Any long page will fail to load and take you to earthlink's error page, which simply says the page doesn't exist, even though it does. This is the only "customer service" page they have when their software screws up. Total Access is the buggiest software ever; locks up all the time. Shuts down randomly. Worst ISP ever.

  • by

    rae38c43

    Wed Mar 01 2006

    Horrible Service from Earthlink. Ten months of pure hell. Repetitive technical support - no better than troubleshooting on Earthlink's web site. Hours of wasted time. Ask technical support why IP doesn't ping or lost of packets and they totally ignore you. Looking for new DSL company, South Florida.

  • by

    proffessorsix

    Wed Dec 21 2005

    Earthlink is a pathetic joke. Every time I try to sign on there is some problem- such as their network is down, their server is broken, or their entire internet service just kind of bleeped out of existence. Parental controls are a pain in the you-know-what to configure and change, internet is as slow as frozen molasses, and they just got rid of Reuters (a very good news reporting company) on their home page. Stay away from this company! Even their tech support is a talking advertisment!!!

  • by

    jaredford

    Thu Nov 17 2005

    EarthSTINK! They opened an account "for me" after I purchased a Dell laptop. I was unaware of this until my bank account was tapped for a monthly fee. I called customer service and was told it would be fixed that day...apologies, etc. It was not. I called again and was told that it had already been fixed and I had my money back, which I did not. Then I was told by a line supervisor that I would have it in 7-10 days, which for some reason I just did not feel I should rely upon at that point. I called Atlanta to complain and was told yet another tale; it will take up to a month for a "refund" on an account that I did not sign up for. They tried to convince me that somehow I did sign up but forgot about it, however knowing what an unscrupulous and oppressive company EarthSTINK is, there is no way I would do that...but what the heck, like everyone else, I love when people insult my intelligence and blab gibberish at me hoping that I will be lost in the ambiguities of their speech. ... Read more

  • by

    avalone

    Fri Oct 21 2005

    I'd been trying to connect to earthlink for the last hour, and then i decided to use totalaccess, usually it would be a mistake, but well nothing would come up, and then i used my defalt dial-up connection and so far it's working but i'm not holding my breath.

  • by

    jeanschweitzer

    Tue Aug 30 2005

    Earthlink DSL is extremeny slow, and earthlink e- mail is so slow as to be almost unusable. I can't contact them, and one of their help sites Support, has a non usable site. Like I say, I can't even get in touch with this company thru any of their sites. It is too bad, I've had this company for a long time, but this year has certainly been problems...maybe it is bugs, but I got enough bug killer on this. Can't even contact them.

  • by

    mtiger_87

    Mon Jun 27 2005

    Of the available Dial-up ISP's, this one is the best I've ever used. Always connected on first try. Hardly ever dropped. Great features, add-on's, etc... If I were to ever do dial up again for whatever reason, this is who I'd use.

  • by

    speedband_suck_s

    Fri Jan 07 2005

    Worst service ever, disconnects and busy signals a normal occurence. Cancelled after 1 month.

  • by

    alpepper

    Mon Aug 23 2004

    I've been an Earthlink dial-up subscriber since 1999. For the first few years, I did not care for it. Initial Dial-up access was a coin flip each time and the software corrupted once (had to reload it to get it back to work). I am happy to say that the reliability in the past year has been outstanding. I get on everytime these days, never get knocked off, and Downloads are going at a true 56k. One of these days, I'll get broadband. However, Earthlink is infinitely better than those fiends at AOL.

  • by

    mariusqeldroma

    Mon Jul 26 2004

    Fairly stable as dialup ISPs go, but still no broadband service. Good price for dialup compared with AO-hell and MSN.

  • by

    roller

    Wed Jul 14 2004

    SLOW. no busy signals on dialup. disconnects do happen a lot. Not a very good service provider.

  • by

    jade213

    Wed Jun 30 2004

    I have been a customer of mindspring and then they merged with earthlink for well over 6 years now. I have had nothing but good experience with them. My online connection is stable - out of the 6 years i have been with them - i probably lost connection due to their server maintenance no more than 3 or 4 times. I think they have professional support and I have always received proper assistance from them.

  • by

    nightraven

    Wed May 26 2004

    I had earthlink for about 2 weeks, extremely slow speeds when I used it. It doesn't load 15 pages in the time it takes AOL to load 1, that's bullcrap. It's not as bad as AOL, but it's still bad.

  • by

    sue2000q

    Tue Oct 07 2003

    EARTHLINK HAS THE WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!! Sales reps that don't know ANYTHING, THEY LOVE TO TRANSFER YOU!! TRANSFER- TRANSFER!!! I got transfered to another company-- THE WORST EVER! DON"T do Business with this company, you will be happier with anyone else other than this horrible company.

  • by

    opinion74

    Fri Sep 19 2003

    I have been a customer of Earthlink ever since they bought out Springmail many years ago. Over 2 years ago I switched from dial-up to DSL. It took forever. Had to call back for them to get it set-up and installed several times. I estimated that I wasted 4 hours of my time trying to make sure that my order was actually placed in the system (some how it kept getting lost). Once I finally got the DSL up and running and never had to deal with them, I had no problems. A year later I moved to a new apt and moved my DSL as well. Once again, major headaches with Earthlink. They managed to lose more order AGAIN. The day after the DSL was supposed to start, I called and they said they had no indication that I had put an order in. Meanwhile, I was living off of dial-up through them, but they were charging me for the DSL connection instead of the dial-up connection. Since I was being charged for DSL rates and using dial-up, I went over their 20 hour maximum per month dial-up use and end... Read more

  • by

    cloudddae

    Wed Aug 27 2003

    I have been a coustomer for about a year, They are always happy to help solve any problems that come up. Waiting on hold for a while is a pain...but all in all EarthLink has been great.

  • by

    bluto19e

    Thu Jul 03 2003

    All I can say is 26.4K.....Earthlink stinks!

  • by

    marilynw

    Mon Jun 23 2003

    Every question or problem is answered by saying it is the fault of - something other than their problem - such as - unable to use the dial-up connection - tech said it was because I have ZoneAlarm. Uninstalled ZoneAlarm, still did not work, said my IE version was too old. Said their system does not work with Netscape. Said I needed to uninstall windows and reinstall because must have a bad modem line in code. Well, I have AOL (which is insidious and I don't like it) and was able to use dial-up and complete needed tasks. Could site at least a dozen examples where Earthlink failed but they excuse their service by blaming something else. Wonder if anyone else has had this experience. I intend to fire them when I return home.

  • by

    benlhd51

    Thu Jun 19 2003

    Earthlink has absolutely **THE WORST** customer service. I have moved my web site to Doteasy.com, and changed my DSL service to SBC -- both of which save me money for the exact same services. Avoid the nightmare I went through, and do not do business with Earthlink.

  • by

    wardrtclcadc

    Fri Feb 07 2003

    My god what an awful ISP. I went with them because they were indorsed by Apple. BIG MISTAKE! I've had nothing but problems since signing up. People I email report that what they receive from me is filled with letters, numbers, and codes that make my emails barely readible. Emails I receive end abruptly before completion. My work around was to get my complete email messages from web mail, but then I got locked out and couldn't access web mail. I latter figured out on my own a backdoor way in but discovered that my web mail was now totally empty. I contacted technical support repeatedly by email and live chat. It seem like they were clueless regarding the problems I was experiencing. None of their fixes worked. I finally figured out that all my problems were on their end and not on mine. It appears that their engineering department is systematically making changes to Earthlink but is not telling technical support what they are doing. Tonight, emails I were expecting did not do... Read more

  • by

    kelvingrove

    Sun Jan 26 2003

    Earthlink used to be good when I first signed up two years ago. My only gripe was when I installed the firewall programme ZoneAlarm, I found out that a number of the programmes that come with the software were accessing other computers. When I called technical support to find out what these were, they had no idea. Naturally I blocked the programmes from passing the firewall. However, over the past three months, although I can connect everytime, I get kicked off one or twice a day. Worse than that about half the time I am on the internet I cannot get to webpages; they just timeout. What is the point in paying $20 when you can only surf the web half the time? When I called tech support, and got through after 20 minutes, they blamed Internet Explorer, ZoneAlarm and my TCP/IP settings, i.e. everything except the possibility that their service might be bad. I think it is time to switch ISP...