KINGSVILLE, Tx — Many Sparklight customers in Kingsville have expressed their frustrations with the rural cable and internet provider through social media this week. Some said their issues with Sparklight have been a constant battle for years.
Ann Marie Torres is just one of many who said she's been experiencing issues. She said the outage time depends on the situation, but usually is about fifteen to thirty minutes. When the outage occurs, she manually unplugs and reboots her router.
"I can honestly say sometimes I can cook a 30 minute dinner in the process of searching for things because it gets that bogged down," Torres said.
When Torres's internet goes down, she finds herself in a rough spot. She works from home and is also a graduate student. She said it's been hard reaching clients, doing assignments and taking exams.
"A lot of the research is on the internet... Bing (or) Google search. And its difficult when you can’t get that information as quickly as you thought," Torres said.
Oscar Salazar is another Sparklight customer who has been having problems.
"I'm just an amateur YouTuber and vlogger. A lot of times I'll be trying to upload a review or video and the internet goes out. My wife also sometimes will be talking to clients and trying to talk to them about certain vacation packages and if the internet goes out, that's a little embarrassing," Salazar said.
KRIS 6 reached out to Sparklight who said they haven't had any outages in the Kingsville area since Dec 14, 2023. They also add that they address the outages as quickly as possible. But some customers said the quick fix they were told would help just isn't.
"They did tell us for us to not have those problems we had to go to a more expensive package, but we still have those problems," Salazar said.
Some believe they don't have another option when it comes to providers. The City of Kingsville's Information Technology Department said by law as a municipality they cannot give exclusivity to any cable and internet provider, adding they also have not done so.
Sparklight said they will be addressing and contacting some customers who have taken their complaints online.
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