Switching from Cox to U-verse

I live in a small, 12-house semi-rural area where the lots are all at least 2 acres. Kinda country-ish, the only consistent traffic are the municipal trash/recycling trucks. In the three years living here I recall reading about the deployment of fiber but suspected our meager ‘development’ would be far down the list of scheduled installs. We (it’s my sister and brother-in-law’s house) began with Cox TV and AT&T DSL and phone. On discovering he no longer could watch LSU sports my brother in law changed over to DirecTv. At the time it was a night-and-day revelation for me, as DTV broadcast in true HD. Fiber was still a pipe dream. Having fulfilled our 2-year obligation to DTV, my brother in law was looking for ways to reduce his TV bill (who isn't?). I forget the percentage of savings, but we went back to Cox, bundling TV, data and phone. That was about 4 months ago. Earlier this week the brother in law mentioned that some AT&T guys who were canvassing the neighborhood came by to pitch him on switching. A technophobe who only uses his iPhone 3 for YouTube, phone calls and texting, he suggested they come back later on that day to speak with me. I remembered having seen a U-verse forum here so that’s where I went. Since it’s not my house nor is my name on any of the recurring bills, making a switch like this is not my call but no doubt I was being counted on to ask certain questions. Thanks to the forum here, one was whether the service was FTTN or FTTP; it’s to the node. The channel lineups offered were very comparable, almost identical. All boxes installed will be DVRs (two out of the five we now have with Cox are). Four (as opposed to Cox' Contour six) programs can be simultaneously recorded. Like our current Cox setup, the data device will be a gateway (modem/router combo) with four ethernet ports. The AT&T rep was knocked for a loop when I produced a Cox Baton Rouge channel lineup with my favorites highlighted. Phone would be landline once again, a good thing to have in case of a power outage (we still have an old Princess phone). Internet—well, at first it was to have been 45MB down, until it was discovered that our street was a couple hundred feet from where that service terminated; it would be 18MB, capped at 250GB with a $15 overage fee. What surprised me most was the more than 30% savings (total for services less taxes & fees) the ultimate bill from AT&T was to have been over staying with Cox. In our case that translated to almost $800 a year (we like our HBO, Showtime, Starz and Encore). Price is to be honored for 24 months according to the rep, and the cancellation fee from Cox should be more than made up by rebate/promo Visa cards, courtesy of AT&T in a piggy-back referral system. Up to now we’ve been on a Preferred internet plan with Cox, with speeds ranging from 22 to 32 down. It’s rumored that Cox is planning to double that at no further charge to subscribers. Needless to say I was more than a bit disappointed to learn that that potential increase would have to be abandoned. A day after the initial meeting I began to have second thoughts about AT&T’s internet offering so I called the rep to cancel the data portion of the bundle. As it turns out, all the perks, channel benes and Visa cards are contingent on AT&T getting the entire business bundle enchilada. I have a Roku in my room and watch a few offerings from Netflix and Amazon Prime. 18MB should be adequate for streaming, especially if what the rep said is to be believed, that its’ 18 is a dedicated, constant pipeline, shared with no one else. Although a 30% savings is nothing to sneeze at, especially when you’re on a fixed income like my brother in law and I are, I keep focussing on the less-than-pleased threads and reviews in this forum. Here’s hoping we get a more-than-competent installer this Thursday. Time to tackle another cable remote/TV menu learning curve!