Great signal but Incredibly Slow speeds - Useless Fivespot

Question

I have a 10 gb plan with a Fivespot.  This occurs when used as a modem or a WiFi.  My EVDo signal strength is always around -77dBm.  I am in a rural Maryville Tn community (Greenback).

In the mornings I get speeds of about 1.3 Mbps.

Starting around 5pm the speeds drop to an absolutely useless speed of .03 Mbps.  It takes about 2-3 minutes at best to load a typical web page.  Often it just times out.

I restart, remove the battery, connect as a direct modem, etc.  Nothing helps.

I have a cell tower in direct line of sight from me about 1/4 to 1/2 mile from me.  However, I do not know how to tell if its Verizon.

I signed a two year contract for a device that only works half the day.

Can anyone tell me what I can do to get Verizon to look into this -- or even respond to this?

Thanks.

molaker · Accepted Answer

Have you called tech support?  I've been having a similar problem and TS has been very helpful in working this out.

The nearby tower may or may not be Verizon, as you say.  TS can easily determine where the closest VZ tower is.  In my case, I am an old Alltel customer (bought out by VZ) and the closet tower was an Alltel tower that has not yet been upgraded to 3g.  The closet VZ tower with 3g is in roughly the same line of sight, but a mile or so further away.  It is normal for the signal reach (signal level) to withdraw a bit when the tower gets heavy traffic and can cause fringe customers (like me) to lose 3g and switch to 1XRTT (slow).  What was happening to me was when this occurred, my MiFi would switch towers and lock onto the closer old Alltel tower.  Once this occurred, it would seldom go back to the VZ tower without me actually disconnecting and reconnecting.  Your situation could be similar and calling tech support might establish that.  If the closest tower is not VZ, then you may need a special PRL (hybrid PRL) to handle it.

But, you'll never know and VZ won't be able to help if you don't call them.