Customers still waiting for Internet, cable services to return

Published 5:05 pm Tuesday, November 6, 2018

As of Tuesday, 5,100 Mediacom customers in Georgia and another 5,800 in Florida are still without cable and internet service from the telecommunications company.

According to Mediacom, recovery efforts following Hurricane Michael are steady, with 80 percent of services restored to impacted homes and businesses in the Bainbridge area. Still, power outages, downed lines and damaged structures are keeping many from having their services restored.

In the Bainbridge area, localized fiber optic lines are damaged, downed drops to individual locations and scattered commercial power outages are the current holdups. Mediacom called line damage “significant” in the South Georgia area. Full restoration is expected by Nov. 21, with actual repair times being shorter or longer.

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Residents on Douglas Drive, Lake Douglas Road and Pineland all indicated they still did not have internet or cable service from Mediacom nearly one month from the date of Hurricane Michael.

Emily Yent said she does not have Mediacom service at home yet, but has received a bill. She called and asked how they could send her a bill when she hadn’t had service for nearly a month. They said they were having to take care of the credits case by case, and they credited her account on the spot while she spoke with them. But she still has no service.

Marjorie Mayfield had a similar story. Both women have working AT&T at their offices.

Dr. Jack Leverett and Vance Custer said their Mediacom service has not yet been restored, and one of them had given up and installed Direct TV on Sunday.

It was the belief that Ted Mauldin’s service was not restored until last Friday night.

Information was also given that Haisten Wilkinson who lives on Simms Street still does not have internet service, and that Danimer has been without for weeks.

Margueritte Jackson said she “fired” Mediacom after she advised them she had to have internet service to conduct her business and gave them what she thought was a reasonable deadline to get it done. They did not meet her deadline, so she went with another provider.

According to Mediacom’s website, free community Wi-Fi is offered at locations in Valdosta, Albany, Americus, Cordele, Fitzgerald and McRae, but not in Bainbridge.