Verizon Throttles Firefighters during California’s Largest Blaze

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Despite Verizon’s so-called rule granting first responders unlimited data during public safety emergencies, Santa Clara County firefighters had their data drastically slowed down by the communications giant as they battled the Mendocino Complex blaze in Northern California. Fire officials later revealed they were forced to pay for a more expensive plan to keep the public safe. Verizon has apologized and lifted all caps, insisting it was a “mistake” by customer service representatives.

The Santa Clara County Central Fire Protection District saw its data flow “throttled” down to 1/200th of its usual speed as it fought the complex — now the biggest wildfire in state history — because Verizon officials said it had exceeded its plan limit, district Fire Chief Anthony Bowden wrote. Verizon responded by suggesting the department upgrade its service by more than doubling its bill to $99.99 a month — saying “they would only remove throttling after we contacted the Department that handles billing and switched to the new data plan.”
 
Wonder what is going to happen the next time a Verizon executive calls a local fire department when his or her house is on fire. Gee, sorry we cannot put it out faster but the water coming out of our pumper trucks and hydrants is throttled. Hope you bought the more expensive insurance plan.
 
ya blame it on the CSR's.

If I were Santa Clara County Firefighters i'd be asking to switch to more reliable provider.
 
Throttling is not throttling.
Even Tesla had the common decency to increase vehicle distance during Hurricane Irma.

Fire fighters rely on real time fire maps and heaven forbid they might need to do their job during an emergency.
Way to go verizon, you guys suck.
 
Well... were they or were they not paying for an adequate plan for their need?

You could also call that the fire department not anticipating their own data needs.
 
if they were using a zero rated verizon service the free data would flow like wine.

too bad they were just trying to save peoples lives.
 
Be interesting if some folks who lost houses in the area being defended by the Santa Clara County firefighters sue Verizon for "Hindering First Responders in an Emergency" as a contributing cause for their home/property loses. Verizon has basically gone on public record as admitting that their own policy on handling First Responder service issues wasn't followed, causing the loss of data access for the Santa Clara County firefighters.
 
We all complain about throttling and ridiculously overpriced internet but what will we do when the internet runs out because of abuse by internet guzzling first responders?
 
It makes me /smh; if CSRs had a bit more flexibility in their flow chart, provided to them by corporate, they could have easily avoided this potential fiasco. Or at least allowed to move stuff up the chain that should be "common sense".

Bell Canada had a similar thing with the forest fires in Canada. They were giving out TVs to the temporary camps, all the while disconnecting the phone lines of people who had lost their homes... What a PR disaster.
 
Looks like Verizon is trying to take on Comcast to surpass them as the countries most hated company...
 
I think I read this article and Verizon had actually offered these guys a real unlimited plan but they didn't want to pay for it. I know people here love to hate the ISPs. but lets get this hammered out a little.

Nothing in life is really unlimited for cheap. Anytime for any reason someone offers you unlimited there are limits and you would think if it was important to you, you would investigate those limits. For instance if you got to an unlimited buffet you cant take food home. See there is a catch, and typically the food isnt good unless you go to something nice like the wicked spoon in vegas but then you will pay alot more than the 12.99 buffet. Unlimited web hosting, good luck with that when you actually start to use it. Unlimited internet, same deal. There are people usually businesses that have to have 100% uptime, I would think a fire department would be one of them, and for these people there are specific plans and SLAs in place to provide them with something that is not going to go down or get throttled. I would be very surprised if Verizon did not have some plans like this. But guess what, they wont be the same cheap price and you might have to pay for metered data instead of "unlimited". For instance I once looked into getting a comcast business line so I could get faster speeds and no throttling. It was going to be about 250% more expensive per month, and I was almost going to pay it but they also wanted a 2 year agreement.
 
rudy said:
I think I read this article and Verizon had actually offered these guys a real unlimited plan but they didn't want to pay for it. I know people here love to hate the ISPs. but lets get this hammered out a little.
Click to expand...

No, the plan was unlimited with throttling when the data cap was hit. In emergency situations, it was not supposed to throttle.

The "true" unlimited mentioned basically had no throttling.

But that's besides the point because they were not supposed to be throttled anyways due to the provisions under emergency situations.
 
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ZiggyDeath said:
No, the plan was unlimited with throttling when the data cap was hit. In emergency situations, it was not supposed to throttle.

The "true" unlimited mentioned basically had no throttling.

But that's besides the point because they were not supposed to be throttled anyways due to the provisions under emergency situations.
Click to expand...

I don't fully understand what you are saying.

This is what I read
Verizon representatives confirmed the throttling, but rather than restoring us to an essential data transfer speed, they indicated that County Fire would have to switch to a new data plan at more than twice the cost, and they would only remove throttling after we contacted the Department that handles billing and switched to the new data plan.
Click to expand...

So the way I read that is that there is a plan that will work better for them which is exactly what I said. If peoples lives were at stake I wouldn't want my fire department cheaping out on a data plan. I get that Verizon said there was suppose to be a lifting the unlimited restrictions in mass emergencies but once again I wouldn't want to rely on when Verizon thinks its an emergency or whatever random customer service representative you are dealing with you should have the appropriate plan at all times to be ready for the emergency.
 
rudy said:
I don't fully understand what you are saying.
Click to expand...

This is the part you may have missed:

"The company had explained earlier in the week that the Santa Clara County firefighters’ data plan was indeed “unlimited,” as firefighters had called it, but that it also had a proviso that when the department reached a certain allotment the data would be slowed down drastically. That had not been adequately explained to the department, managers admitted, and under company policy the throttling was supposed to be canceled in emergency situations — which mistakenly did not happen."
Click to expand...
Unlimited with throttling when data cap reached.
No throttling in emergency situations.

*edited for clarity
 
ZiggyDeath said:
This is the part you may have missed:


Unlimited with throttling when data cap reached.
No throttling in emergency situations.

*edited for clarity
Click to expand...

Ok this is why I am confused because I don't know why you would post that. Unlimited with throttling is a catch and exactly what I was explaining and its why if you do anything important in life you make sure that whatever is important is not limited by some catch. Its a joke of a sentence, ok we will remove throttling in an emergency. LOL its a fire department it is always an emergency. Get them on a plan that never throttles under any circumstance and yes that might mean you have to pay twice as much, it might be metered etc....
 
rudy said:
Ok this is why I am confused because I don't know why you would post that. Unlimited with throttling is a catch and exactly what I was explaining and its why if you do anything important in life you make sure that whatever is important is not limited by some catch. Its a joke of a sentence, ok we will remove throttling in an emergency. LOL its a fire department it is always an emergency. Get them on a plan that never throttles under any circumstance and yes that might mean you have to pay twice as much, it might be metered etc....
Click to expand...

Verizon agreed to the contract. They supposedly didn't inform internal, hence the offer made to upgrade to "real unlimited" when they called in.

Also, I'm pretty sure the provision doesn't apply to a "typical" emergencies. A out of control forest fire that's had been blazing out of control of 2 weeks seems to fit the bill.
 
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ZiggyDeath said:
Verizon agreed to the contract. They supposedly didn't inform internal, hence the offer made to upgrade to "real unlimited" when they called in.

Also, I'm pretty sure the provision doesn't apply to a "typical" emergencies. A out of control forest fire that's had been blazing out of control of 2 weeks seems to fit the bill.
Click to expand...

Oh I get all that but its besides my point any plan with throttling in any form is not acceptable for an emergency response organization that has data heavy software. The fire department should have made this clear to Verizon and asked for a plan that did not have throttling of any sort at any time. But when your read the articles you cant help but get the feeling someone was trying to save a buck since they specifically mention the other plan costing GASP twice as much. A fire department or other organization like this should pride itself on being careful, thinking about fail safes, etc.... Not expecting a random company like Verizon or their random likely outsourced support to handle special case removing of throttling.
 
rudy said:
Oh I get all that but its besides my point any plan with throttling in any form is not acceptable for an emergency response organization that has data heavy software. The fire department should have made this clear to Verizon and asked for a plan that did not have throttling of any sort at any time. But when your read the articles you cant help but get the feeling someone was trying to save a buck since they specifically mention the other plan costing GASP twice as much. A fire department or other organization like this should pride itself on being careful, thinking about fail safes, etc.... Not expecting a random company like Verizon or their random likely outsourced support to handle special case removing of throttling.
Click to expand...

Okay, I get ya.

I generally agree with the sentiment that emergency services shouldn't be that tight with the purse strings.

Unfortunately that's the world we live in today.

My point was had Verizon abided by their contract, this wouldn't have been an issue.

But clearly their support staff failed (or so they claim).
 
there's a thing called corporate plans that comes with corporate support...

would have thought the state gov would had tendered this out, for a network to support all emergency services...

said network would had gotten a positive pr boost for as long as the plan runs too

this sounds like another case of the blame game playing out in American politics which has become the par behavior for the past decade
 
Public and emergency services should fall under different rules than private and commercial consumers. What if this delay in service led to someone's death?
 
Oh l, c' mon.... Privatization fixes everything. Corporations are people, and its a free market private Utopia. Government sucks and can't do anything right. Plus net neutrality is evil...
Did i cover everything?
 
Public responders (police, fire) have their own radio bands. They are rolling out new services across the country with a much higher speed network. California is usually one of the first areas with the roll out - surprised they are relying so much on consumer servers? (Will admit I don't know a lot about this area - attended a conference hosted by APCO a few years ago - they have some very cool stuff coming out.)
 
Uvaman2 said:
Oh l, c' mon.... Privatization fixes everything. Corporations are people, and its a free market private Utopia. Government sucks and can't do anything right. Plus net neutrality is evil...
Did i cover everything?
Click to expand...

Except this isn't a privatized free market situation. Heavy government regulation and oversight with heavy taxes and fees tacked on to everyone's monthly bill. This is a result of statist corporatism, not free market capitalism. When all the big service provider conglomerates get together to fix pricing and data/speed tiers and offerings and persuade the government to protect this kind of conduct through massive donations and lobbying, that's not free market competition, as the consumer now has zero means of forcing these companies to actually compete with one another.
 
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What’s amazing is this happened in the first place.

So the system throttled based on usage - great.

Someone has the inability to read and understand the terms of the contract - failure

Even when called they try to upsell the contract -failure

Yet we rely on these people to treat us fairly after we give them money. -failure
 
Makaveli@BETA said:
ya blame it on the CSR's.

If I were Santa Clara County Firefighters i'd be asking to switch to more reliable provider.
Click to expand...

Here is the problem they face; Once you get out of the city and away from major freeways, everyone else's coverage except verizon goes to complete shit. I absolutely despise Verizon, but because I spend so much time in rural area's I have no choice. Most of the time among all my coworkers who have ATT, Tmo and others, I'm the only one who has any form of service.
 
Im on the fence on this one. I work for vz in a government noc on the data side. You would be surprised how many government agencies (including public safety) wont pay for prioritized service. And as soon as they have an issue they call in expecting everything else to drop and get immediate resolution. This is the usual threat as well, "well if we arent #1 priority and this isnt fixed immediately, we will go to the news".

Its a shit show on both sides. Vz being vz and government services buying the cheapest package possible and expecting top tier service.
 
schlitzbull said:
Im on the fence on this one. I work for vz in a government noc on the data side. You would be surprised how many government agencies (including public safety) wont pay for prioritized service. And as soon as they have an issue they call in expecting everything else to drop and get immediate resolution. This is the usual threat as well, "well if we arent #1 priority and this isnt fixed immediately, we will go to the news".

Its a shit show on both sides. Vz being vz and government services buying the cheapest package possible and expecting top tier service.
Click to expand...
Why are there 'packages' anyway... In any case I wonder how those 'packages' stack up price wise vs shit offered to corporations.
 
schlitzbull said:
Im on the fence on this one. I work for vz in a government noc on the data side. You would be surprised how many government agencies (including public safety) wont pay for prioritized service. And as soon as they have an issue they call in expecting everything else to drop and get immediate resolution. This is the usual threat as well, "well if we arent #1 priority and this isnt fixed immediately, we will go to the news".

Its a shit show on both sides. Vz being vz and government services buying the cheapest package possible and expecting top tier service.
Click to expand...

Wouldn’t top tier service in this case just getting the service in the contract?

You throttle someone’s service that shouldn’t have been throttled in the first place. That’s not expecting top tier service. That’s expecting you are getting what both agreed to.
 
Gavv said:
Wouldn’t top tier service in this case just getting the service in the contract?

You throttle someone’s service that shouldn’t have been throttled in the first place. That’s not expecting top tier service. That’s expecting you are getting what both agreed to.
Click to expand...

They got the service in the contract, then they used all their contract data and got throttled. Then CSR reps did their job and got blamed for it. Seems to be working as intended.
 
Ocellaris said:
They got the service in the contract, then they used all their contract data and got throttled. Then CSR reps did their job and got blamed for it. Seems to be working as intended.
Click to expand...

Seems the part missing is not throttling in an emergency.
 
everyone can argue everything they want to, but the reality is no one should be able to market anything as "unlimited" when in fact it is absolutely NOT unlimited.
 
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Dekoth-E- said:
Here is the problem they face; Once you get out of the city and away from major freeways, everyone else's coverage except verizon goes to complete shit. I absolutely despise Verizon, but because I spend so much time in rural area's I have no choice. Most of the time among all my coworkers who have ATT, Tmo and others, I'm the only one who has any form of service.
Click to expand...


This is true. These fires rarely occur near the big cities where you have options. Out in the boonies and hills Verizon is the only carrier that has a signal - and that’s only because they used federal dollars to build it out to provide “High speed broadband” in the area (even though it’s the same exact thing these fire fighters are talking about).

You get out where the dozers are on the front line and there is no service; those folks are relying on radio from the command truck.

It looks like CalFire didn’t have the correct plan, but it also sounds like everyone (CalFire and Verizon) all thought it would work, until it didn’t. The folks at CalFire on the ground don’t have any authority to change it; it’s a government thing so it needs all sorts of beaurocratic bullshit to change.
 
ZiggyDeath said:
No, the plan was unlimited with throttling when the data cap was hit. In emergency situations, it was not supposed to throttle.

The "true" unlimited mentioned basically had no throttling.

But that's besides the point because they were not supposed to be throttled anyways due to the provisions under emergency situations.
Click to expand...
Ok, I can't read anymore "free" articles on that site so if it says so in the actual article I apologize. But how does Verizon (or their CSRs) know an emergency situation is going on? Are they contacted by someone in said emergency response department? Or do their GPS register they are near some emergency situation an supposed to auto-unlock? I only ask this because if you look at where the fire was, and where Santa Clara county is you'll see that they are no where near each other, so it's not too surprising to think that perhaps the billing address doesn't match where the emergency is occurring.

That said, you'd think just about anything they do would be considered "emergency" so perhaps they should have it unlocked 24/7. I mean I have how many fucking taxes and fees on my phone line for little things like 911 response, school internet, etc etc, how about making corporations pony up the free service without being able to pass those costs off to consumers, I mean the argument for me as an individual is that even if I don't use those services that the taxes are collected for my life is better off "as a whole" due to them, well I think corporations should be treated like individuals (since they apparently can buy politicians like them) and have their shit taken as well "for the greater good"
 
Taxpayers shouldn't have to pay extra for a better service. Verizon should just give it away because they enjoy taxpayers paying their subsidies.

When they is no such thing as free market risk, sevice providers don't deserve enjoying free market benefits.
 
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