This article has been a long, long time coming. I have been planning to write it since last September. It’s not that I have been procrastinating, I have been waiting for the situation to become resolved before writing about it. Now, the situation is basically resolved, so I want to share with my readers what has been going on for the past 6 to 7 months.
Firstly, let me say that I am going to try to be very diplomatic with what I say in this article. There was a time when I planned to use my platform here on LiP to really say some bad things about SmartBro, but through the efforts of Patrick from SmartBro and a team of people whom he assembled, the situation was resolved, and I want to be diplomatic with Smart because of this.
This all started last July when I purchased a SmartBro ShareIt WiFi Modem/Router which took advantage of 3G technology to bring Internet access of up to 2 Mbps to my home. When I purchased the ShareIt unit, I was in heaven. It was great. Then, on September 1st, 2009, suddenly, I had no Internet connection. After talking to the local Smart office and supposedly working out the problem, they told us that our access should be back to normal. Well, it was a bit better, but was still terrible. On September 1, I had no access at all, after working it all out, I had speeds of less than 1 Kbps! I complained to the local Smart office a lot, but they just said that they could not do anything about it.
We asked the local Smart office if we could return the ShareIt unit, since the access had gotten so bad. They refused to even consider giving me a refund or even an exchange for a different unit. They also threatened me that if I did not continue paying the P999 per month, they would take action against me. Well, given that the Internet access was so terrible, and they were forcing me to keep paying for the lack of service, I was not happy. I made complaints through a number of channels. I got offers of help from SmartBro employees, and they seemed to be trying, but nothing ever happened.
Finally, in October, I called the SmartBro hotline to their call center in Manila. I got no help, so I asked to speak to a Supervisor, but they refused to let me talk to anybody, so I told them I would hold until they put on a Supervisor. After holding for more than 30 minutes, finally, they put a Supervisor on the phone and I explained my situation. He seemed to want to help, and promised to call me back in a few hours after he looked into my problem. I did not really think he would call back, based on previous experiences, but to my surprise he called me several times that day.
Over the next few weeks, I talked to this gentleman every day, 5 or 6 days per week. He was always polite, and talked like he was trying to help, but nothing was happening. By December we had gone through a lot of different people trying to solve the problem, but nothing was helping. The fellow in Manila told me he was going to send some Engineers from Davao to my house to see if it was my equipment that was a problem. After missing several appointments the Engineers finally showed up, and found that even with their equipment they could not get a reliable ShareIt connection at my location. They told me that a new Cell tower was under construction near my house and would be online in just a few days. They asked if we could wait for that tower to be completed and see if that helped my connectivity. I agreed.
After a few more missed appointments at my house, the engineers finally showed up again, but even with the new tower, the Internet connectivity on the ShareIt unit was nearly non-existent. At that time, they told me that ShareIt would not work at my location. Funny that it worked great for the first 2 months that I had it, but then suddenly stopped, though.
The man in Manila called me again, in mid-December, after the engineers determined that the ShareIt would not work at my location. He agreed with what I had been requesting for months – let me return the ShareIt and get a SmartBro Canopy unit. I already had a Canopy at my house and it worked great. I wanted to get a 2nd Canopy system and just be done with it, but until that time, Smart had refused. So, in mid-December they agreed to let me trade for a 2nd Canopy.
Well, we went through the rest of December, January and February with no action from Smart. They kept telling me that we had to wait for approval on my new Canopy, and told me that it might take “a long time” although they would never say how long that might be.
Finally, on March 5, Patrick from SmartBro left a comment here on LiP, on Paul’s SmartBro Update article. Patrick also contacted me privately by e-mail and I explained to him what had been going on with my SmartBro ShareIt account. To be honest, Patrick had my situation resolved within 24 hours after I contacted him. As it turned out, there was a problem with the antenna that they installed after Patrick contacted me, but that was also fixed within 48 hours, and I had my new Canopy and it was working great.
In addition to getting my new Canopy system up and running, Smart has also issued me a credit for 5 months worth of payments on my ShareIt account, so for the next 5 months I will not have to pay anything for my Canopy. This was the right thing to do, since I had been making payments for non-existent services in the past, and I would like to thank Patrick for getting this done. I am quite sure that Patrick will read this article, and I appreciate his responsiveness and determination to do the right thing. The truth is that over the past 7 or 8 months, I dealt with a lot of Smart employees, and Patrick is the only one who actually got anything done, so I appreciate his efforts greatly.
Now, I will say, Smart did ask me not to write this article. However, I have promised the readers on this site that I would write it, so I decided to go ahead with it. Let me say that in the end, I am happy with SmartBro’s resolution. It took way too long, and I am not sure that it would be resolved if I didn’t have this site. The truth is that Smart basically told me that it is because of the popularity of LiP that they were quick to take action once they decided to get it done. So, for the “average Joe” he might still be suffering with no Internet connection. But, in my case, I am finally happy and satisfied with SmartBro. I hope that things continue to go well with them.
BRAVO !!! I applaud your diplomacy on the article Bob…I admire your fortitude and graceful way you wrote about it , wish I had that finese. Good to hear your back in the late 19th century internet speed !!:)
Ha ha… thanks, brian. It feels good to be back into the 19th century again! No, seriously, the speeds I am getting now are quite good, and I’m very happy.
Hi Bob;
If only there were more guys like Patrick!
I’m on line only by hanging my Nokia 3G cell phone out the window, using a USB connection. There is an array of cell towers that are line-of-sight to my house higher up the mountain, both Smart and Globe tell me that no internet service is available in my area. But I have a diabolical plan, I plan to live into the next century, or until those two companies fix their ongoing Y2K problem. Could the world have entered the new millennium ten years ago, and no one informed Globe or Smart?
Hi Paul – I have to hand it to Patrick, he really did do what he promised, and he did it quickly. Honestly, Smart needs a lot more people like him!
Hi Bob,
I must say Bob, you have the patience of a saint. I don’t think I would have been so understanding. I think I will have to work on that before I move there:)
Hi hudson – Over the 7 months or so… I must admit… I lost my cool a time or two! 😉
Hi Bob, you certainly have more patience than me. SmartBro cut off my connection after over a year of usage claiming I did not pay their bill. After producing proofs that the account was never past due, they still have not reconnected me. They tried the same tricks – switching me back and forth to different people, never made the promised return calls, gave me several other reasons, etc etc. I just returned their unit, made somebody sign that I have returned the unit and switched to Globe. This was a blessing in disguise because Globe had better connection speed. When I was using Smart bro, I tolerated their inconsistencies in speed – mostly very slow.
Hi Ellen – Been a while since I’ve heard from you, I’m glad to see you here! Yeah, the shuffle from person to person, etc with Smart is very frustrating. It’s not only poor customer service, it’s no customer service at all! I had a very similar situation about 7 or 8 years ago with Smart on our cellphones. We had post paid accounts with them, and almost every month they would cut off our phones, claiming that we did not pay the bill. We would have to go there with our receipts to show that it was already paid. We finally just gave up on the accounts and went prepaid, and did that on Globe instead. Frustrating… actually infuriating!
Hmm, so you went through the same things before. I tend to think that it is poor management and poor record keeping staff. If they made errors in recording customer payments, then all the more I am upset for smart to assume it is the customer that is at fault, and making customers suffer. They should investigate internally their own system first if this is the case. That is not very smart of Smart!! 🙂
Hi Ellen – Ha ha… not very smart of Smart indeed. Yeah, I have experienced this kind of problem with them a number of times in the past. When we had accounts with Smart for our cellphones, it happened almost every month, very frustrating! As big of a company as they are, I certainly would think they could improve their operations.
Sounds like business as normal in the Philippines. MWay too many companies take the approach that we need them more than they need us. This is not a forward thinking country and customer service as you have pointed out countless times is wanting. The current power situation here in the Philippines is a total joke and 100% the fault of the existing utility companies and YES their GREEDY old line family owners. They make little to no investment in infastructure or take advantage of the growing benefits of wind power to generare additional sources of power. Nevertheless, congratulations on your Smart Bro outcome but the internal (invisible) toll it has taken on you far outweighs the positive benefit of finally actually getting what you paid for to begin with. A shallow victory at best sorry to say and I don’t really understand why you have to be so nice or apologetic for an article that should have been scathing from A to B despite the outcome.
Hi richard – Hmm… I don’t think I was “apologetic” at all in the article. Where did I ever say I was sorry? I think that it is crazy the way Smart handled the situation, poor customer service, arrogant and stupid. However, I do give kudos to Patrick for actually getting it done. In the end, things were taken care of. The fact that it took 7 months, and also the fact that I believe it was only taken care of because I have a large public following is not right, and actually shameful. I sure am not apologetic about my feelings. If you think you read that somewhere in my article, you are dreaming, richard.
“Firstly, let me say that I am going to try to be very diplomatic with what I say in this article. There was a time when I planned to use my platform here on LiP to really say some bad things about SmartBro, but through the efforts of Patrick from SmartBro and a team of people whom he assembled, the situation was resolved, and I want to be diplomatic with Smart because of this”
Sorry Bob……wrong semantics on my part.
I mean to say your being diplomatic was not necessary I mean after seven months is was already quite ridiculous I would have read them the riot act and done anything to embarrasss the heck out of them. This is how companies learn through negative PR on sites like yours otherwise it is business as usual and nothing gets learned or changed.
Another thing I don’t understand is why you get involved in any of these things yourself and not leave it to Feyma. I do understand your desire to integrate yourself into this society but I think you will always be a Kano and not given the respect you truly deserve by people here. All my friends in the country have people to get things done for them and this aleviates unneeded stress and thay have many kissues just like yours with smartbro. I on the other hand leave everything to my wife and she has not failed in anything we have had issues with many of them major as well. She is beloved by people in general and with her dynamic personality no one says no to her.
richard – being diplomatic and being sorry are not even close to being the same thing. I am not sorry to Smart at all, why should I be sorry, it is them who should be sorry. I decided to write the article in a diplomatic way, though, because in the end they did get it done.
Richard, the way you choose to live your life is your choice, but I am not forced to live my life as you do. I am a big boy, and I get to choose how I want to live. There was a day when I let Feyma take care of everything, or I let one of my nieces handle it, or I sent the maid to take care of stuff. I still do to some extent, but I also am able to handle things myself too, and I choose to do that sometimes. The fact is that on this SmartBro situation, I did let other people handle it for several months and nothing got done. When I stepped in and made a bit of noise, well, things got done. I did it my way, richard. If that is not how you would choose to do it, well, no skin off of my nose.
Relax Bob I am not lecturing you or telling you how to live your life. Your position on that subject is always very clear. You open this site to the public and with that you invite opinions of all sorts and with that comes many that you will not agree with.
Another thing Bob is we are generous tippers. We had an internet installation the other day and we gave the 4 person team 1,000P tip and they were like shell shoocked. They told us if we had any probelms no matter how big they would take care of us PERSONALLY! In almost any situation we have had with equipment failure or service related the response to our problems have always been swift and successful. Money is one universal language that works particularly well here with the underappreciated and compensated typical employee.
Hi richard – Have I ever written anything that would make you think that I do not employ the use of tips to get things done? Ha ha… if you think I don’t use tips and rewards to get things done, you are wrong. I’ve been around the block a few times, richard, and I understand how to make things happen here.
Hi Bob – Glad everything appears to be settled successfully there in Davao. Up here, we’re still monitoring things. There have been speed and connectivity improvements, but there have also been some set-backs.
Work continues here, up north, to enhance service. For a few weeks, we were connecting to the internet via Laoag City, but have dropped back to connecting via Vigan, Ilocos Sur. Speeds and connectivity suffer when you have two provinces sharing access.
3G service is still scheduled for this year, but I won’t avail of it. As you found out, when the “crowd catches on,” availability and speed goes down with enhanced backhaul activity.
New monitoring is focusing on days of the week. Sunday appears notoriously bad, with service interruptions and average speeds of 500 Kbps or lower. Other days of the week, no service interruptions and average speeds exceed 1,500 Kbps. Since most users are probably free to surf on Sundays, I’m sure the backhaul is the problem. Hurry on upgrade – connect us via Laoag!
As for any credits for the poor at best, non-exsistent as norm service during the final quarter of last year, I’ve given up. I’ll most likely never receive any credit for the documented weeks with single day, L-O-W speed connectivity. Chalk it up as tuition to the School of Hard Knocks! 😉
Hi Paul – I feel your pain, brother! My best advice to you would be to try to work through Patrick – I am pretty sure you have his contact info since he originally commented on your post – he can get it done, and I believe he is hard working and honest. Good luck, my friend!
It’s interesting that one guy is able to cut through the bureaucracy and actually get things done. Not only that, he reached out via a comment on LIP. Raises a number of questions.
Hi Gary – Hmm… I am not sure I am following you. What kind of questions are you thinking of?
Well, like what level within Smart or PLDT does one have to be in order to have the empowerment to cut through the bureaucracy and actually offer customer service? Why would initial contact from the one person it seems at the requisite level be via a comment to Paul K’s LIP article?
Hi Gary – OK, now I see what you mean, thanks for clarifying. To be honest, I do not know what Patrick’s position is with Smart. However, seeing the actions of him and his team, I believe that he has a rather high position, because he can indeed get things done. Also, I believe that Smart has a team of people who cruise the net looking for any mentions of service problems at Smart, and they try to take action on those problems. I have seen this a number of times, sometimes successfully and sometimes not. Whatever the position of Patrick is, all I know is that when he stepped in, I had access in less than 24 hours.
Bob I’ve been lucky not to experience these kinds of serious problems – and I’m sure luck is all it is – but I’m far from satisfied with the connection I get from Smart. The question is – would Globe be any better? Ellen’s comment suggests “Yes” and I’d be interested in other opinions.
BTW a neighbour here has PLDT landline broadband and also has random disconnections over incorrect “You haven’t paid the bill” claims. I wonder if the root cause lies in bad procedures in the bayad centres where most people pay bills? Not that that explains your sorry story of course.
Big business transactions here seem to be grounded in deep mistrust of the customer. Maybe there is good reason for it, I don’t know, but it makes dealing with them very trying. Small businesses on the other hand are generally terrific and often give a level of personal service that you seldom get in the first world. So I don’t believe the problem lies in Filipino culture but in the systems and attitudes of the big corporations.
Hi Ken – I have tried Globe and not gotten better results, so I think it’s kind of hit and miss. Actually, when it comes to speed and uninterrupted connectivity, I am pretty happy with SmartBro. I’ve been using them for about 2 years now with very few problems on that end. Now, the fiasco that I described in this article was certainly a problem, but in terms of connection speed and such, when it works, it works well for me.
I have also found that when dealing with big companies here in the Philippines, there tends to be a “customer is always wrong” attitude and approach to things. Sometimes you almost feel like a criminal just trying to buy something in a store here! 😉
I agree with you Ken, similar situations happen here in the USA all the time. It is the Big Corporations. The company is always right and the customer is always wrong, or, ” It must be Your equipemnt that is at fault ” happens all the time her. I’ll elaborate on this a bit further down the page.
Bob: Dealing with Smart is infuriating, at best. I’ve probably logged 30 phone calls to them in 2 months, things get better for a day or two, then back to the routine. I’ve been with them over 2 years now, and it seems to come in spurts… every 6 months or so is fine, then a whole slew of problems. It’s not so much the outages that bother me, but the complete lack of straight answers I am given and the standard, sighed, “We’re working on it Sirrrrrrrrr… I apologize for your inconvenience.” That phrase, by the way, really is what ticks me off… What in the hell do they know about my inconvenience? I’m trying to operate my business here! I’m not sitting around just playing games!
The thing is, that in most cases, you have limited options, whether phone, Internet, Cable, or whatever. With NET, PLDT has an 8 month waiting list for DSL, Globe has about the same problems as Smart, Sky Cable is not available here yet, and neither is Sun. My solution: I’m on everyone’s waiting list and will have a backup in case one goes down. An extra 1,000 p per month for a second line is small change compared to lost productivity.
Hi John – I am in a similar situation as you. Basically, the only broadband services available where I live are SmartBro or PLDT DSL. None of the others are available in my location. So, it kind of limits what you can do, and you have to play the game, as frustrating as it may be. The other problem is that every one of the providers plays the same game too, so what can you do? I am just happy that I am now able to have things working, for now at least. I currently have two different SmartBro Canopy systems, and they each point at different cell towers, providing a bit of redundancy. I am hoping to get a third account soon, through PLDT. We shall see!
Just for my info. Bob, what exactly is a “canopy system”? Is that using a satelite dish?
I’m feeling it tough here in Queensland Australia at the moment, having left behind a fibre optic setup that offered up to 10Mbps and never ever dropped below 7.5. Here I have a 3g modem which offers a delightful 500Kbps (on a good day, and often drops down to GPRS, which is when I switch off and open another beer). The funny thing is I can often get an UPLOAD speed of over 1Mmps, which I never had in the UK. Fortunately, we will be moving from this temporary accommodation to our own house next week, and I gather we can get something called ADSL2+. If I can get 2Mbps most of the time, I’ll learn to live with that. I hear that fibre optic is being rolled out here too, but it seems not to be available in many areas at present.
I have to say, I admire greatly your resilience and patience in dealing with these kind of issues (as well as dealing with Richard), and I think it is certainly one of the main virtues that one would have to learn in order to be able to settle in a place like the Phils. If you can bite your tongue and batten down the temper hatches, that’s a very good starting point! Bravo.
Hi Jim – Nah, the canopy system does not use a satellite dish, it actually uses an antenna to connect to the cell tower. It’s not 3G though. To be honest, I don’t know the exact technology, but I do not believe that it is through the cell network, just through some other system that has a transceiver on the cell tower. It works well, and consistently delivers 700 Kbps to 1 Mbps for me.
It is my understanding that the age of the internet, though having been around for a while, has been embraced over the past couple of years like never before. Perhaps, the service providers are simply “snowed under”? The PLDT always reminded me of the national postal system in Canada; a bureaucracy unto itself. Hopefully, the competition of service providers grows to the point where excuses will result in a consumer being able to switch isp’s immediately. Glad to see that you people are getting the kinks worked out, prior to my arrival(hahaha).
Mike2
Hi Mike – Nah, I don’t really think this has anything to do with them being snowed under. It’s just the way things work here.
Bob, I can certainly appreciate your frustration and I am glad to read that finally your persistence has paid off. When I have encountered similar situations here in the USA I do a combination of what I call ” Telephone Roulette ” ( I started using that term when rotary dial phones were still popular ) and then ” Mailbox Mania “, not with E Mail but with written hard copy letters sent through the Postal Service.
When ever I have gotten the run-a-round from a utility or other big company getting nowhere with their customer service departments ( these days it’s call centers where the people on the phone only know what is on their computer screen usually ) I start accumilating phone numbers and postal addresses of the companys corporate offices and just about any other address I can find for them. I start sending letters through the mail. These days it seems real letters sent through the postal service command the attention not always found in E Mails that too easily can be clicked off the screen and deleted.
When I got my first phone line many years ago, I specifically only made 1 outgoing call on that line for the first billing period to make sure the phone company ( in those days it was New York Telephone ) was billing me correctly I got a bill for $471 and change for a call I made to the take out pizza place 1/4 of a mile from my house ! It took me 6 months to get them straightened out and they threatened me with bad credit, etc. if I did not pay my bill. I made numerous phone calls, visited local offices of New York Telephone, etc. They still claimed it was not them.
I went out and bought a budget ” Polaroid Camera ” ( remember them ? ) took photos of all of the installation faults in the apartment complex I was in then and mailed it to the Director of Personell at the main office.
One week later several of their trucks and work crews rewired the entire complex and I finally did get an apology. They had logged someone elses ” local call register ” onto my account instead of mine when they originated my account !
I had another go-around with one of the satellite TV companies here, once again Mailbox Mania paid off and I cancelled my account with them, after they finally admitted it was their fault and not my equipment.
Most recently it was an episode with a world known company cancelling my account and each time I called their 800 number I got an entirely different reason why they instantly cancelled my account. After sending a dozen or more letters to their corporate headquarters addresses and multiple offices, I got an apology and my account was reinstated in about 5 days after I began ” Mailbox Mania ” with them.
I think it is just a matter of getting the attention of the right office or person within the company and you will not always get that in dealing with call center people although you can not always blame them. The call center people only know what shows on their computer screens. With some of those huge companies with multiple worldwide call center locations, all screens are not always updated at the same time and that can account for different responses no matter how many times you call.
Many times you have to go far beyond the call centers and local offices in situations like theses so why not start from the top ( the main or corporate office ) and work your way down from there. Hard copy letters sent through the mail, even today that has brought the results, at least for me.
I can certainly understand your frustrations Bob and also your persistence to keep trying to find the right person in the company that would listen to you, look into the situation and then bring satisfactory resolution to the problem. In your case it was ” Patrick “.
I feel many of these big companies or corporations have one or more ” Patricks “, it is a matter of finding them within those companies and bringing attention to your problem, it is unfortunate that the customer has to go through so much to make that happen.
Although I probably will never use the services of SmartBro ( I am located in the USA ) I would like to applaud Patrick on his efforts and I think he could teach the Customer Service people at all levels in SmartBro how to deal with situations like this.
I agree with you Bob, presenting this information in the most diplomatic way you could is the correct way to go. Although I can perfectly understand a great deal of desire to prompt a ” smear campaign ” ( My words, Not yours ) when something like this happens sometimes it can be more detrimental to all concerned rather than having the potential of being something constructive for everyone.
Hi Bob – Ah, your old “send them a letter” trick rides again! Only one problem here.. the postal system may or may not ever deliver the mail! Ha ha.. I guess you could FedEx the letter or send it LBC or something, though! You do seem to do well with that trick, though.
It sounds like with all of the phone calls you had to make, maybe you have adapted some of the same methods to your part of the world and brought them into the present day age, instead of ” Telephone Roulette ” , I can imagine for you it might be ” Tic Tac Touchtone ” or ” Tic Tac Text ” of all possible numbers you can find for the company in question. Good show Bob !
Hi Bob – The nice thing was that in almost every instance, it was the people at Smart who called me!
Hi Bob,
I have a PLDT account so my wife can call the Philippines. It was set up so that she would have unlimited calling for $55/month. The payment is supposed to be deducted automatically from my bank account every month. Its been about 5 months now, and my wife is making lots of phone calls, but they have yet to withdraw their payment. I don’t have anyway of contacting them as they never sent me anything. I’m so afraid that they will finally figure it out, and take it out in one big lump sum….Thats going to hurt!
Hi Hudson – Wow, that is strange that they just stopped billing you! $55 a month seems like quite expensive for the service they are offering, though!
Thing is this is the Norm with SmartBro poor service, excuses and then trying to blackmail people into keeping a service that doesnt work. There is a forum that have dealt with these issues in the passed. The Smartbro share-it was a pile of junk. Which I did get to cancel because I went straight to their Cebu office and said it doesnt work and hasn’t since its installation and that they were in breach of their contract by not providing a service. It was stopped on the spot and I left leaving the smart bro share its in the office. 2 weeks later I got the smartbro umbrella installed which I know works as I have that on another property and havent had any problems since. Now here is the funny bit..
I requested a LANDLINE and was told i couldnt have one due to my location and they are unlikely to provide the service in my area. A month after the Smartbro system was installed (umbrella) they called me and asked if i wanted a landline!!
Hi Tropicalpenpals – Let me just say, the ShareIt service works great if you are in a location that has a good solid 3G signal. I’ve used it in places where the 3G is better than at my house, and the speed is reliably between 2 Mbps and 3 Mbps. So, I won’t fault Smart on that, just that I was not in a good location and they did not really do what they should have to take care of that.
hhmmm now that I reflect on all this I can only think of one company that consistantly delivers a quality product on time, everytime with no complaints from me….Sam Miguel 24 bottles in a case..24 hours in a day..coincidence? I think not.
via la San Miguel !!
You’ve got a point there, brian!
The Philippines need more “Patricks”! Bob, Did you treat him to an expensive restaurant for his services? Or did you gave him a big tip? Another interesting article, BOB! I admire you patience in this case.
Cheers and be cool to all my Philippine on-line friends. I heard the temperature in Manila today will be around 38C plus over 70% humidity. The heat index must around 105. Hopefully,there is electrical power to run all your air conditioning units and electric fans. Eat your heart out guys. It will be a nice and comfortable day here in Northernn California, 70F at noon time and no rain.
Hi David – Unfortunately, I have never met Patrick in person before. My only communications with him have been via the Internet and by telephone. I believe he is located in Manila. So, no, I was not able to take him for dinner or give him a tip, due to the fact that we have not met in person before. He certainly did deserve it, though.
The last few days have indeed been HOT here in Davao as well.
I have a problem with SMART customer service. I carry SMART and SUN. When I go into SMART to talk to them, they give me a ticket and have me wait over an hour. They hire these little girls that don’t understand anything about phones and internet, and have difficulty typing in their computers and pulling up account information.
Last time I went in, I wanted to put my phones on international plan. I went to SMART, after the hour wait, they gave me the runaround. I had to go home and come back, wait over an hour again. Same result, I had to come back. The third visit, I got my ticket, walked over to SUN and told them to put my phone and my wife’s phone on International. They typed in the computer, had it done and I walked out after about 15 minutes. I went back to SMART where I waited an hour and finally talked with the clueless little girl at the desk and got it done.
On the internet, we started with Smart Share. I was totally unhappy with the speed and took it back. After many talks they put up a SMART Canopy at my house. I love the Smart Canopy. It’s faster than the DSL I had in the U.S.
I just know that I’ve got to try to get by for the three year contract until I can get rid of SMART completely, and if I have problems, the stupid little girls they hire will never be much help.
Hi Kenneth – Wow! 3 year contract? I never heard of a contract that long with Smart. My contract is only 1 year on my canopy. On my other canopy, it had a 1 year contract, but I have already had it over a year, so I now have no contract.
Good luck, I hope your canopy continues to perform well for you!
A mildly amusing story. We live forty kilometers from the provincial capital. Way back when, when celphones were just being introduced, we could get Globe at our house – if we put up a 75 ft. tower. There was no Smart signal in our area. Since I consult internationally, I needed at connection. So up the tower went. But even so, reception was iffy and every other thing we had to get the man who installed the tower to adjust the dish. As fate would have it, this same man was the Smart manager for our area. He got tired going up our tower. So he proposed that if we would switch to Smart, he would tilt their transmission dish so that our town would be in coverate. That’s how we are on Smart to this day!
Have you ever asked yourself WHY Filipinos are not service oriented in the Philippines, but there are millions of Filipinos in service positionbs abroad?
By the way, we are no visiting my 95 year old Mother in the US for two months. We bought her a water bath foot massager last week and in five days it broke. I’d thrown away the receipt and the box, but brought it back to Walmart anyway to try to get an exchange. NO PROBLEM!
Hi ProfDon – Interesting story about how you were able to get cell coverage in your area! I hope you enjoy your stay in the States. I believe you about the “no hassle” exchange at WalMart. I used to work in retail management, and that is how it works in the States!
Whew! You have a lot more patience than me, Bob. I have SmartBro service on a 50 ft tower I had it built over in Guimaras in Western Visayas. A few months ago I lost my connection. Called SmartBro, and then called my installer. My installer came out days before my scheduled appointment, put a new antenna on my tower, still no connection. SmartBro said it was problem with MY computer. My installer said my computer was NOT the problem. He caught flak from him boss for putting up new antenna, but his boss called the main office in Manila thanks to my installer’s insistence and within a few minutes I had my connection back. Gave my installer a nice tip. Never hurts.
Hi Dave – I’m glad to hear that you got your internet up and running too! Being able to get online is a good thing, and it’s worth a nice tip!
I have a terrible experience with Smart Bro. It crawls so slowly, it almost seems like I’m not connected at all. I’ve tried different times of the day and different days. Awful. It’s basically useless. I need a refund for this one.
Read about my Smart Bro horror stories before you even think about buying a kit! I might just save you money.
Hi Chris – SmartBro offers many different services. The ShareIt was terrible for me, but the Canopy works great and is very fast in my location.
hi!
I just want to ask where i can get a smartbro connection…I’m on Southern Leyte..tnx
Hi John – I live in Davao and have never been to Southern Leyte, so I can’t give you an exact location. However, you should apply at the PLDT office nearest you.
that was an awful experience Bob. I salute Patrick for having solved your problem faster than those Smart engineers and supervisors.
Hi enad – Yes, I am very thankful to Patrick. Now, several months later, I am still enjoying good internet performance from SmartBro.
Hi. Good for you that they took action regarding your internet connection. Where can we find Patrick? My boyfriend has a wifi share it too. He has it since July and it has a very unreliable connection. We tried calling customer service several times and they just say that system is being enhanced and to wait for 48 hrs, but nothing has changed. Having an internet connection should have been convenient, but this one is such a pain and what’s more frustrating is that you can not have it disconnected for a period of time. Personally, i hate talking to a customer service representative hoping that somehow they are really doing something regarding the internet connection.
Smart Broken, it took Smart 2 weeks to repair the base station here in Capas, then about an hour later it was back to the old slow broken self, after repair Ping speed 67 ms 46 KB/s then one hour later ping 617 ms and download speed 5.7 KB/s and when you call the csr’s ” oh it fixed now sir, and when you ask to speak to a manager, oh there busy” and dare you ask for a refund for the 2 weeks
Personally I have found Smart to be totally incompetent. Their whole support system seems to be designed to stall the customer while hoping things get magically fixed. after going round and round they may make it better, but you can almost be assured that within a month or 2, the connection will go back to being supper slow. So slow that it is almost not worth using. I cannot stand Smart. I feel that they overcharge for the service that you are supposed to get, then they fail at giving you that service on a continual basis.
Maybe if the managers would not hide behind lower level customer support people, thing might be better, but I have no faith in Smart. They are 1 of the reasons for all the poverty in the Philippines. Jobs are lost because of the extremely poor service that Smart overcharges for.
Hi JJ – Over the past couple of years, it is my experience that things have improved a lot. Hopefully you have seen that too.