Silicon Valley, home of the SLOWEST 4G LTE Verizon data speeds

[c1ph3r2u]

NW 1st St. & Trimble area in San Jose, 4G LTE data speeds have been <0.5Mbps down & <0.2Mbps up for over a week.  Switching phone to 3G yields similar, slightly faster data speeds.  Same results on all of my coworker's phones (Galaxy Nexus, Galaxy S4, iPhone).  My phone has normal LTE speeds at home 10 miles away.

I can't find any other way to report this issue online.  I attempted to call *611, but gave up after waiting 15 minutes on hold. 

There should be an easier way to report service outages!!!!!

[c1ph3r2u]

Status update after I returned back to work:

That's an astonishing level of suckage you're providing to your 4G customers Verizon!  One month after reporting this issue and we now have ping times to the local cell tower that are slower than a ping time to reach a server in India!

Verizon, UPDATE US PLEASE!!! It's been over a month and this outage is still impacting your customers.

nicholasb_vzw - What happened to your promised updates?

The early termination fee is $350 less $10 per month of service for smartphones, correct?  Looks like ~$350 total in ETF for all my phones.  The ROI in paying ETF plus the extra costs in procuring new phones would pay off in 2 months based on the time impact to my ability to get my work done. At this point, I believe I have legitimate justification to forego the ETF payment as Verizon is unable to provide contractual service in San Jose.

[shadokastur]

You can ask Verizon to submit an investigation ticket and if their coverage department determines you do indeed have marginal coverage they will allow you to disconnect without an ETF.  This has happened to me before.

[c1ph3r2u]

Thank you for this info.  Do you know if an "investigation ticket" is different than a support ticket number that starts with "NRB"?

[shadokastur]

Yes, they are the same.  The process can take a while.  How long ago did you file it?  When did you get the NRB number?

[c1ph3r2u]

- NRB ticket number received on July 19th.  When you say "can take a while", how long do you mean?

Any process suggestions you'd recommend I follow?

[vzw_customer_support]

Thanks for your continued status updates c1ph3r2u. What make and model device are you using? What is your main zip code of use? Have you reported these concerns to us previously via another support channel? We definitely want to ensure we investigate as thoroughly as possible.

JonathanK_VZW
VZW Support
Follow Us on Twitter@VZWSupport

[c1ph3r2u]

- Thank you for checking in.  Yes, I have an unresolved NBR ticket submitted on July 19th.  Ticket followup has been non-existent aside from nicholasb_vzw giving brief assistance.

Personally, I'm using a Galaxy Nexus device and zip code 95131 is especially problematic for Verizon customers.  Please do understand however that my colleagues and friends are seeing all of the reported issues listed on this thread on their various Samsung, Motorola, and Apple phones.  It's not a single phone type of issue, it's a network provider issue.

I've marked your account as "Followed" in case you need any additional information to provide follow up details. 

[vzw_customer_support]

Thank you c1ph3r2u. I've reached out to the representatives who you've worked with previously so we can ensure you get the follow up you've been expecting. We'll be following up with you later today and appreciate your continued patience.

Thank you

JenniferH_VZW

 

Please follow us on Twitter @vzwsupport

[chronoglass]

zip code: 94105 on a new droid maxx

Speedtest results after 6 failed runs (communication issues)

ping: 531, 782, failed, failed, failed, 825

down: 21kbps, failed, failed, failed, failed, failed

up: failed, failed, failed, failed, failed, failed

10:34 am

I can say, at 7 am my speeds are noticeably  better, will try a speedtest tomorrow morning i suppose.

[chronoglass]

a few tests at my location

lat 37.79293

long -12239752

7:59am 3491k down 1545 up ping 57ms

8:42am 312k down 1554 up ping 74ms

8:47am 207k down 129k up ping 116ms

8:49am 136k down 94k up ping 289ms

as it creeps ever closer to 9am here in San Francisco, Verizon service creeps ever closer to unusable.

[c1ph3r2u]

Outage report - no signal available, 3G or 4G.  No data connectivity.

Lion Market

1031 East Capitol Expressway

San Jose, CA 95121

[c1ph3r2u]

Outage report - Dead zone, voice calls are dropped and no data connectivity.

San Jose, zip code 95136

Hwy 87 near Branham Ln overpass

[Japan8]

Outage report - Dead zone, voice calls are dropped and no data connectivity.

San Jose, zip code 95136

Hwy 87 near Branham Ln overpass

Ditto this!

I am seeing this same issue and unfortunately it's near my home.  Verizon, when are you going to fix this?

[c1ph3r2u]

Outage report: no signal available 3G & 4G, no data connectivity.  Phone tries to burn a hole in my pocket attempting a connection to a cell tower.

San Jose, Oakridge Mall on side near Sears store.  Target side of mall however is fine with 2 bars of 4G and data connectivity is functional.

943 Blossom Hill Rd

San Jose, CA 95123

[Japan8]

Outage report: no signal available 3G & 4G, no data connectivity.  Phone tries to burn a hole in my pocket attempting a connection to a cell tower.

San Jose, Oakridge Mall on side near Sears store.  Target side of mall however is fine with 2 bars of 4G and data connectivity is functional.

943 Blossom Hill Rd

San Jose, CA 95123

Again, I can confirm this as well.

If Verizon keeps underdelivering, a provider change will be in order.

[c1ph3r2u]

Outage report:  Intermittent data connectivity with frequent time out and data loss.

Hwy 101 between North San Jose and San Mateo during business hours.

A year ago, Verizon data connectivity on all Silicon Valley highways was robust and stable, both for 3G and 4G.  Nowadays, it's about as reliable as the US Congress to reach a consensus. 

[t2mobile]

These were from today. Financial District in SF. (300 Ft from Verizon store).   This is starting to be the standard speeds I've been getting.  A majority of the tests I've been doing don't even complete. If they do, I have a full grown beard by the time they're done.

[c1ph3r2u]

@t2mobile Wow!!!  Simply WOW!  I didn't think it could get any worse at my location, but you've proved me wrong on just how bad it can get. 

Yes indeed, Verizon is providing to their premium paying customers Grade F- service as seen above. 

Account retention specialists, care to comment???  Your silence says volumes. 

[c1ph3r2u]

called me back as promised and unfortunately had to be the bearer of bad news.  I'm very grateful that she followed up on this issue so we all can fully understand what is happening.

Update on the issues in San Jose near 1st Street and Trimble Rd:

A Samsung R&D center where phone development occurs at Orchard Parkway and Plumeria Dr. is flooding the local cell tower with data and the tower is completely oversubscribed during business hours.  Verizon has confirmed this as the root cause at this location and has started the process of getting an additional tower installed.  The ETA for this new cell tower to come online is unknown; ever tried to get a permit from the city, county, and state?  SWAG would be in the ballpark of 1 year, but there are too many variables to commit on that length of time. 

In a nutshell, this issue will remain for at least another year.

Want to feel a bit better?  Be thankful you're not on Sprint.  Only a few of my colleagues are on Sprint and they are getting ping times of 1.4 seconds, 40kbps down, 8kpbs up.  Is Samsung R&D mostly creating issues for CDMA phones?

Colleagues with T-Mobile service on Samsung GS4 devices are getting ping < 100ms, ~3Mbps down, ~1Mbps up at this location.  They typically see 20+Mbps at their residences.  I'm still trying to find some colleagues with AT&T service to test their speeds.  I'll update this thread later if I do find that it's a CDMA vs. GSM issue.

Proactive note for Verizon:

I'd be surprised if Samsung did not move its phone R&D center to the new gigantic campus that it is building at 1st St. and Tasman Rd. in San Jose.  I would strongly recommend that Verizon prepares extra capacity for that location as Cisco has a very substantial employee base there who will be significantly impacted by the Samsung phone R&D group.  (Hint: Thanks to SEO, this thread has the top hit in Google for query "Verizon Silicon Valley" and Cisco employees will know you were warned in advance)

Other Silicon Valley locations with issues I've reported:

has created support tickets for all the locations I've listed in this thread.  Verizon has an internal DB containing locations with known issues in coverage.  Locations I've listed are already in their DB and they are aware of them.  Fix ETA is unknown.

informed me that since I have good service at my home address where my Verizon bill is sent, I am not eligible for having an early termination fee waived.  My work and home are in the same city, but it doesn't matter to Verizon's policies... 

I'm simply waiting for some new Android phones to be released on other carries and I'll be leaving Verizon shortly thereafter.  Their failure to build out an adequate 4G network in the San Francisco Bay Area is quite appalling and I can no longer justify paying a premium for such poor quality of coverage.  The nation's largest carrier is over subscribed in urban areas, future customers should exercise caution.

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[t2mobile]

This is getting insane. Time to go to the press and tech blogs. These were the only tests that completed, all others failed.  This is from haight Ashbury in san Francisco.   Timeouts and dial up speeds seem to be the norm for Verizon here in the city. Every night from 5pm - 11pm  and 830 - noon inconsistent service. Verizon has significantly oversubscribed there network with no estimated dates to upgrade here in this area. Downtown is just as bad..

[TyroneGreen]

It only takes 20 Data subscribers to bring down a tower to a crawl and make connectivity impossible for everyone.