TekSavvy, SurfInternet or other?

I know this question gets asked annually, but things change so fast with ISPs it’s worth asking.

I am currently with Shaw for internet and got a sweet deal two years ago with their 150 plan (150Mbit down, 15Mbit up and 1Tb bandwidth). It was $50/month for the first year and $80/month for the 2nd year for a total cost of $1560 + taxes. Frankly, I have been very happy.

Problem is that the current equivalent deal is not so sweet… in fact I will have to pay $500 extra over two years for the identical service. Hence why I am looking at alternatives.

I know folks generally have good things to say about TekSavvy but currently their DSL and Cable prices are not that much different over two years compared to Shaw or Telus (< $200) to be worth the “risk”.

SurfInternet however is a different story. TCO for two years for their 150 plan is the same that I currently pay with Shaw ($1566) and their 75 plan is only $1086. That’s good… but is there a catch?

I would happily sign up with Shaw again for 2 years if they gave me the same deal as I currently get from them, but as that is unlikely what are folks experience with SurfInternet reliability or should I be looking elsewhere?

Thanks in advance for your suggestions
Ian

I just went through this. I was with Shaw for over 15 years. Just over a year ago I spoke with “loyalty” and got the same deal as Teksavvy was offering ~ $50 +tax for 50Mbit down. After the year was up it went to over $100 taxes in.
I called loyalty again and for some reason they couldn’t access my account at the time, so I asked for a call back when they could. Did the on-line survey etc.
Heard nothing from them and ordered Teksavvy 75/15 for $50 +tax a month
Bought the cable modem etc

I called Shaw to cancel my service with them and before I knew it I had “loyalty” call me with a new offer - I declined since I don’t want to do the dance with them every year.
The night before the cut-over I got a call from “retention” offering 150Mbit for $40 for 1 year.
I told then too little too late.
The down side with Shaw is their support - it plain sucks and they are going to layoff 10% of their workforce.
The plus with Shaw which I liked was their Shaw-open hotspots.

I am happy with Teksavvy so far.
I think Shaw needs to be reminded that their prices are too high.

Steve

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Also, beyond the numbers, Teksavvy is a much better company IMO. They fight, pretty hard, for the consumer (they only provide information requests if required to by a court order, which is not the case for many of the other ISP).

I also find their routing paths to be much more favorable when going to the west coast. This has a direct impact on performance to US servers, particularly Seattle (where a bunch of AWS nodes are located).

Lastly, when I go on the phone with Teksavvy, I found that their customer support were people who loved people. While waiting for things to reboot, I had a really cool call with one of their support people who was training to go fly storm chasing planes. I know it is silly, but I don’t feel like I’m in a system when I call them. As someone who works part of their job in a support role, I appreciate a company that can prioritize humans.

Even though my dealings on the internet are very legitimate (I pay for my media, etc), I believe that we need to protect the consumer, even if our websites aren’t. Adding that last bit of data is only going to make the crazy things that analytics and litigious companies do even crazier.

Also, if you sign up with TekSavvy, make sure to get @SteveRoy’s contact info (since he mentioned it first). TekSavvy does have a referral program sometimes. (Also, mine is paid for by my employer, so it wouldn’t help me).

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