Start.ca Reviews 82

I wish I could leave less than one star.

Who is this company? Start.ca? Koodo? Altima? It says all three on one bill. But you call one and they direct you to another.

God forbid you you have to call Start.ca because you will be on hold for EVER! And then you reach a representative and they are not authorized to do anything!

I pd. a bill via my online banking and two weeks later they shut my internet off saying they hadn't received my payment! Even though I had the bank transfer # and the bank confirm it was sent! I had to wait four more days before it was re-set.

The people on the phone can do nothing to help you.

I would give 0 stars but it isn't an option. Used to be great but with switching companies repeatedly has decreased its reliability. I have lost connection 5 times in the last 3 days now. Tell is absolutely garbage and always has been. I will be switching at the end of the current month. There should be a refund option for poor service

I was with Start for over 20 years. Last year, after jacking up their rates, I called and they offered me $55 per month for the top package for "customer loyalty". I was told that since I was with them for over 20 years, I was a customer they wanted to hold on to. Then, without notification, they doubled my rate to $110 per month. When I called to inquire, I was told they never offered that to me, they only put through a price match which was only good for 12 months. When I informed them that Oxio was only $55 per month, they said "ok, well we can offer you $89 per month. That is 62% higher than their competition for the exact same service. They were a decent company until Telus bought them out. Now customer loyalty and retention means nothing. Avoid this company at all costs. If you're paying the same as Rogers, Cogeco, etc, why would you use a 3rd party provider? Makes no sense.

This company has been a nightmare to deal with. I moved and had to ship back my router, which I did to a drop off location in London Ontario. They conveniently did not receive it. After sending photos to prove my drop off and opening an investigation into the matter they went into my bank and automatically withdrew money for the router. They stole from me. I have contacted the BBB of Ontario and will be taking this matter further. Terrible for a company to treat their customers so poorly and take what they want from them. They have lost my business forever and I will caution others to stay away.

Worst Customer Service I have ever had with this company.

I have been a customer for 8+ years, I have never missed a payment ,it was automatically withdrawn but since being purchased by Telus I send it via TD bill payee, on the second of every month. Well they still haven’t gotten my payment that I sent February 2nd so they shut my service off on Saturday Feb 21. So I called to inform them I did in fact already send payment and here is the bank confirmation number from the 2nd when I did it. 40 min wait time, 5min call. Well apparently that means nothing to them without the actual money they refuse to turn your service back on. They told me to call my bank and ask them why the money hasn’t been processed yet to which my bank told me that it has completed and that’s what their confirmation number is for, bank call was a 2 second wait to speak to a person. Called Start back to tell them this, 25 min wait, they still refuse so I ask to speak to a supervisor. I was told they do not have direct lines to a supervisor and all they can do is put in a request for one to call me and are unable to tell me how long that might take. He says bye have a wonderful day and hangs up. It is now the next morning and I still haven’t received any phone calls from them to sort this out. So much for a nice relaxing weekend to decompress from work and personal life stress. I used to tell ppl how great Start internet is but that is so not true anymore. Which is funny because Telus has one of the best customer service departments.

Telling you I’m pissed is an understatement.. changing companies this week and Start can keep waiting for my money to appear. That is the last time they get a dime from me. I have the highest package you can get too, been a loyal customer for years but they can’t trust my word at least till Monday.. when banks are fully open and money moves around on weekdays not weekends.

Used to be good. But Koodo bought it, and it appears like they fired all the service reps, switched to a staticy VOIP phone system and made it impossible to register to use the self-serve online account. I'd like to cancel and switch providers now if I can ever get through to a service representative to do so...

Worst company ever! Customer service has their hands tied by ownership! This is why people like me use illegal streams!!

been on hold for 5 hours. this company has gone completely downhill since the acquisition. Called for a simple issue, I am now still on hold and will be cancelling all services.

Was told internet fee of $82.00per month and they charged me $89.00. Also told me l would get Buffalo NY stations as we live close to border, none available! $20.00 TV light nothing worth watching, cancelling! As of this moment have sent Start.Ca an email, tried a chat, and have been on hold with NO answer yet for 56 minutes. Satisfied with the internet speed and easy operation, TV sucks!

Start used to be amazing. Since they were bought out customer service is horrendous. I've been on hold for 3+ hours the last 2 days and still haven't been able to reach anyone. Tried the online chat option on 3 different days and there are always exactly 4 people ahead of me and the queue never changes. Suspicious. Choose any service but Telus/Start.

The worst customer service. Takes forever to get through to customer service. Changing plans and replacing modem totally unacceptable. They just pass the buck. Since they gotten taken over by Telus the company stinks

Nov. 2025. For Internet Service Only - Start went down my street with new (buried) fibre optic cable late last year. My internet service from Bell was through a 1970's telephone line. Basically 3mbps and dropping over the last year from 5 mbps. Bell would not do anything. I called Start for information. Sales was easy to reach and gave me all the information I needed, and answered all my subsequent questions. Bell charged me $113 incl tax per month for service that hardly worked at all. Start is charging me $45 plus tax for 100 mbps. The tech came to the house as arranged, competently set things up for us (including codes in devices - we are older seniors) and now we have FANTASTIC internet service. If you have fibre optic cable on your street, make the move! As for telephone, we are looking at that too....but arent sure if we want to lose our landline in the even of a power outage combined with an emergency.

They were fantastic. Easy to contact and never any issues... then Telus took over and it's been one giant pain after another. They've intentionally made it nearly impossible to cancel your service as well. This is so incredibly frustrating when these giant companies take over and stop caring about customer service and quality of service altogether because they don't have to. I would recommend nearly ANY other ISP. I will go entirely without internet service before continuing with Start/Telus. Thanks Altimatelecom for ruining what was an otherwise perfect service provider. If you had the ability to feel shame I would suggest that you do, but clearly you're entirely souless.

UPDATE: We had to call hydro to remove the line on the street because Start.ca NEVER GOT BACK TO ME. Thank goodness hydro was nice enough to tie up the line to our house (Start.ca responsibility legally) but we will need to switch providers because this is the second time Ive sat on the phone for over an hour to request a tech service and the company NEVER SHOWED UP OR EVEN UPDATED ME.

Used to love Start before Telus but now this is so BAD. I moved recently and made a scheduled appointment for a technician to come set up my internet. The tech just didn't show up for absolutely no reason, support just said "sorry". Now my utility line is down on our street because of a storm and I cannot reach anyone to fix it. Also, TELUS won't stop spam calling me now. MULTIPLE times a day and I've requested they remove me from their lists.

cogeco are an evl horrible company that likes to bilk people for all theyre worth, i think theyre owned by a crime synicate. id stay away from the crooks unless ou lie being ripped off

Poor customer service infact the guy recommended there compation witch is funny because he blamed Bell there compation for disruption I can't recommend start even though I have been with them 5 years they in past year don't care about you at all don't expect any service they just don't care horrible company don't recommend

I’ve been a customer for awhile no problem loved it so now Telus has taken over what a shit show over 2 hrs waiting for tech support called today to cancel its 6 hours still waiting to talk to someone I do not recommend to anyone please take my advice don’t go there big companies take over and there done

Customer support is abysmal. Telus made an exceptional provider into a below average provider. Sad.

An hour and 40 min waiting to talk to someone!?!?! The online assistant is not available anymore, customer/billing services unavailable over the phone, this is unacceptable. How can one cancel/change services if there is no accountability from the company itself.

Used to be a good company. Telus bought em out, now it's dogshit. Just a shell company to funnel people to Telus own brand. Absolutely no chat support, no phone support, was forced to cancel my internet by telling my CC company to deny payments to them then when they called looking for payment I told them to cancel the plan since they refused to assist me. Teksavvy is far better. Don't give these troglodytes the business, Even Rogers is better at this rate