Clear Corporation Clear CLWR wireless Internet service provider ISPbilling customer review

Clear Corporation Clear CLWR wireless Internet service provider ISP
billing customer review

I got into a relationship with Clearwire Corporation this morning (at
www.clear.com). I smelled a bear, but hey, I like bears. I will use
this thread to post what happens with my CLEAR Service Plan WiMAX
Unlimited Mobile Internet.

Ordered the service online early Saturday morning. Like with most
merchants, they charged my card immediately. They signed me up for
automatic payments without asking first. The charge to my bank account
was supposed to be $189, but for some strange reason they withdrew
$215. I called customer service and was told that they only withdrew
$189. That's the first time in my history of using a bankcard that the
amount taken from my account is different than the amount the merchant
says it took.

(E-Mail Removed) wrote:
> Ordered the service online early Saturday morning. Like with most
> merchants, they charged my card immediately. They signed me up for
> automatic payments without asking first. The charge to my bank account
> was supposed to be $189, but for some strange reason they withdrew
> $215. I called customer service and was told that they only withdrew
> $189. That's the first time in my history of using a bankcard that the
> amount taken from my account is different than the amount the merchant
> says it took.

Taxes and government fees?

On Oct 2, 6:58*am, LouB <L...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> ultrap...@mail.com wrote:
> > Ordered the service online early Saturday morning. Like with most
> > merchants, they charged my card immediately. They signed me up for
> > automatic payments without asking first. The charge to my bank account
> > was supposed to be $189, but for some strange reason they withdrew
> > $215. I called customer service and was told that they only withdrew
> > $189. That's the first time in my history of using a bankcard that the
> > amount taken from my account is different than the amount the merchant
> > says it took.
>
> Taxes and government fees?

The invoice says 179+ $10 in taxes. The overcharge was about $26. I
cannot explain why they don't even know what the actual amount taken
from my bank is. A wild guess would be the $26 is for overnight
shipping. But the shipping was suppose to be free.

On Sat, 1 Oct 2011 18:30:33 -0700 (PDT), (E-Mail Removed) wrote:

>... The charge to my bank account
>was supposed to be $189, but for some strange reason they withdrew
>$215. I called customer service and was told that they only withdrew
>$189.

<http://www.clear.com/support/faq/billingaccount/payment-types/why-am-i-seeing-multiple-payments-to-clearwire-for-my-monthly-charges>

--
Jeff Liebermann (E-Mail Removed)
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On Oct 2, 1:50*pm, Jeff Liebermann <je...@cruzio.com> wrote:
> On Sat, 1 Oct 2011 18:30:33 -0700 (PDT), ultrap...@mail.com wrote:
> >... The charge to my bank account
> >was supposed to be $189, but for some strange reason they withdrew
> >$215. I called customer service and was told that they only withdrew
> >$189.
>
> <http://www.clear.com/support/faq/billingaccount/payment-types/why-am-...>

Yes, they made those charges too. Those are separate charges for one
dollar. The overcharge I am talking about is for $26, as part of the
legitimate charge. It is not the usual inquiry/hold.

On Oct 2, 4:18*pm, ultrap...@mail.com wrote:
> On Oct 2, 1:50*pm, Jeff Liebermann <je...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
> > On Sat, 1 Oct 2011 18:30:33 -0700 (PDT), ultrap...@mail.com wrote:
> > >... The charge to my bank account
> > >was supposed to be $189, but for some strange reason they withdrew
> > >$215. I called customer service and was told that they only withdrew
> > >$189.
>
> > <http://www.clear.com/support/faq/billingaccount/payment-types/why-am-....>
>
> Yes, they made those charges too. Those are separate charges for one
> dollar. The overcharge I am talking about is for $26, as part of the
> legitimate charge. It is not the usual inquiry/hold.

Apparently they included overnight shipping when asking my bank to
hold the money. They deducted that amount before finalizing the
charge.

The equipment is scheduled to arrive on time today, three days after
the billing period started.

On 10/4/2011 7:03 AM, (E-Mail Removed) wrote:
> Apparently they included overnight shipping when asking my bank to
> hold the money. They deducted that amount before finalizing the
> charge.
>
> The equipment is scheduled to arrive on time today, three days after
> the billing period started.


Ask them to prorate the monthly fee.

Got the equipment. Amazing how easy setting up stuff is these
days, it took very little thought and no troubleshooting.

My understanding of how their system works... They are trying to
accommodate two different types of users. Daytime/business users
who need fast access to data, and off-hours users who want to
download lots of big files. Apparently, if you download tens of
gigabytes over their wireless connection, they will slap you with
slow speeds during the daytime. Partly out of curiosity, I would
like to know whether all downloads are treated the same, whether
downloading large files in off-hours counts the same as
downloading large files during the daytime.

The connection in my big city is fine. Currently, my PC speeds are
much faster than DSL here, about 6 Mbps during the daytime. The
upload speed seemed kind of weird, it seemed to vary during the
test. I guess the average was about .5 Mbps, if the test was
accurate. My connected iPhone WiFi DSL Reports speed test says the
latency is about 160 ms and the speed is somewhere between 1500
and 2000 kbps.

Something I don't understand is people complaining about 100 ms
being high latency. As a real-time strategy gamer, 100 ms is
great. The above test shows that latency was reduced from AT&T 3G
400 ms down to Clear 4G 160 ms. (That is for comparison, I'm not
saying that total latency while gaming will be the same.)

The service is portable, for $45 per month. I guess there won't be
much to post until they throttle me or increase the monthly
charge. Except maybe to tell whether and how much speeds increase
during the off-hours. Also, I may comment about online gaming
performance. I don't sell anything for anybody. If and when things
go wrong, I will tell.

Too bad they don't subscribe to WatchESPN. Apparently they have
24,139 customers. Maybe that's a fraction of what AT&T and Time
Warner cable have, so they don't want the additional expense
(however small), and maybe they don't want to encourage streaming
media that way. If you enjoy minor sports, WatchESPN is cool. With
production costs so low, maybe they will increase the coverage.

Good luck and have fun.





--
Some of that is opinion, I don't feel like arguing, too much other
stuff to do right now. Hopefully the statements of fact are correct.