How long would you tolerate your business internet being down ?
 

Tomorrow will be 7 days, I feel like I am getting the run around from my provider.
Try to run a business in this world without it. I cant invoice, buy parts, message customers.
Worst part, is no pelican parts

10 seconds.

I have them go right to WiFi hotspot (work cell) if the main internet goes down.

It is comcast, isn't it. I feel your pain, phone out all day at office.

Ours too. After my office manager spent 90 minutes on hold we found out it's a nationwide outage. No incoming calls.

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And that's why if you have business class internet, there should be SLAs on how much it can be down before they have to start paying you (or at least stop charging you).

And, if you are absolutely relying on your Internet, it's good to have 2 sources, ie comcast and ATT or whatever.

But, if that cost is too high, and your Internet is mostly up enough to not justify the cost, then you're stuck when the occasional big issue hits. Yeah, some way to use a cell network short term, like a T-mobile hotspot device or whatever your carrier of choice is, turn it on for a month when your stuff is down for more than a day or two.

One day would be my pain threshold. Even that would be a fairly big inconvenience.

I hope you get it figured out, Fred!

I'd be raising hell. Get someone in the next building to call and ask about how long it would take to become a new customer - betcha it is quick :)

If 'net access was truly critical, I'd certainly have a plan B. If another small business is close enough, you could pair together and each subscribe to a different service. One gets knocked out, fire up some wireless and change some IP address info around. Or split costs and go co-op and get a real connection with a real SLA. Won't be cheap, but split between a few businesses it may not be bad for a "payments must process" connection. Route web browsing, etc. out a cheaper, faster connection.

Quick google shows a T1 being from 212 to 1200/mo - yes, they are only 1.5mb, but you can add in 23 phone lines with it as well. And it comes with the SLA. Might be worth looking into....

Internet is one thing, but voice? How many people needed 911 during this?

If Internet is critical to your business we always recommend another provider service, like cellular as a backup.

https://www.cnet.com/news/comcast-service-is-reportedly-down-across-the-united-states/

A relative just switched because Comcast started bumping up bills on a relatively new account.
Maybe they were trying to take advantage of the elderly.

If you search for "worst company award" year after year": https://consumerist.com/tag/worst-company-in-america/

I work for a large bank. I would not be surprised if our contracts were for better than 5 nines, or 5.26 minutes per year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_availability#Percentage_calculation

^^^^ Corporate Intranets (with Internet access) is a different scenario than most are talkng about here. An hour is a freakin' eternity...

You guys are being jerked around....down for days?

I guess a better answer would be this: 3 days SLA. If I was a small business owner, I would tolerate a 3 day SLA to the business. AND I would ensure that my business was cloud based enough that where I'm connecting from is not relevant.

Move your stuff online. Do business from an ipad, get 4 square (or payment system of your choice). Yeah, it will be a process. There is a reason all these mobile food stands just have an ipad for a 'cash register'.

Maybe for the second coming I could tolerate an hour. But it is taking food out of your mouth.

wait until you have an issue with your credit card machine.....even worse service

I got through pretty quickly, 34 minutes

Found out using the online chat thing fairly quickly, though the guy on the other end was dumb as a sack of hammers.

I like the wifi hotspot thing for the computer. I don't think the VPN would like it when I tried to log on to my med records software.

We tried VOIP for a month or so.

Dropped it when, during a troubleshooting session (I was losing calls left and right) my tech guy says the service provider listened to a few of my prior phone calls and everything sounded great.

They did what?!

Yep.

Every business reliant on the internet should have a plan B. All you can eat wireless is usually your best bet. It will likely be slower than a land line, but at least your not completely down.

7 days is nuts. Only time ours has been down(more than a few hours) was the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, and it actually came back before the power.

Is it the whole neighborhood or just you? Could it be your router or modem?

You better get a free month for this. Had you a credit card machine tied to the line you woud've been screwed. No way to get paid.

For business use, clarify if there's a SLA - Service Level Agreement- if they eff up, you get something for it.

Rjp