I've been using AVG Anti-Virus products for many years. Make that HAD been using AVG for many years, up until about a week ago.
As far as protecting my computer, I had no complaints when it came to AVG. Everything seemed to work fine. Easy to download, regular updates, no nasty "bugs" that couldn't be taken care of quickly and completely...all was well. Until....
About a month ago, one of those expiry notifications started popping up with AVG, saying that my protection was about to expire (in October). So, as is usually the case, I headed over to TrialPay to see what kind of "freebie" I could get, with the purchase of another year of AVG. If you haven't tried Trial Pay, it's a great service. There are mixed reviews online about TrialPay, but in my experience (and I've used it several times) it's been nothing but positive. You can find out more at their site.
So, back to AVG. I'm over at the TrialPay site when I notice on my list of past orders with them that the AVG I purchased last was only due to expire in December of this year, not October. Why was I getting these expiry notices now, if that was the case? This is where things started falling apart.
I then contacted TrialPay about this and they tried to help but since it was an AVG product, I ended up being referred back to AVG to get this sorted out. Well, sorted out isn't what happened. Wasting LOADS of my time is what did!
After wading through the options on how to contact AVG, I tried their chat-online technical support option.
Signing on, I was put in a queue where I started at 50! So back and forth, back and forth....checking while I tried to get something else accomplished online while I waited for someone to start chatting! Finally, almost 2 hours later, someone did.
I explained in detail what had happened re: the date issues with my service. And it was a very slow process! I don't know what these people are doing, while you are waiting for them to type a reply but it was just ridiculous how long the pauses were, to answer my very basic questions. That first attempt wasted about 3 hours of my time altogether. But at least at the point, I thought it was going to be rectified as I was assured it would be, with a follow-up email from the sales department pending for for the following week. This was on a Saturday btw.
The following week, came and went, with no email from the sales department. And still the expiry pop-up showed up from AVG, with the days being counted down. No quick fix there!
By the following Saturday, I gave up and tried again. Again, another long wait in the queue before someone came online. Then I had to go over it all again. And the assurance again that an email would be on it's way soon and that it was in the works with the sales department. I had heard all this before and at that point I was down to just 5 days remaining for my AVG protection, or so the pop-up told me!
Talk about wasting time and nothing getting rectified!
By this point, I had had enough of it all. I went in search of another anti-virus option and happily found MS Security Essentials, which I have been using for the past week. It's working just fine. Seems to have all the requirements I was looking for. And best of all, it's FREE! Easy to install, easy to understand instructions at their site....and a comprehensive program that I feel good about using.
So after all this unneeded stress with AVG, who by the way has still not replied as of today about this mistake on their part, my anti-virus story does have a happy ending. It doesn't make up for all the wasted time with AVG or the frustration of having to write several emails, chat and chat again with no results. But it did free me from wasting any more time with them in the future. I did note several other reviews online about AVG that documented similar experiences to the one I had, in terms of lots of wasted time and very poor follow-up from this company.
My days of using AVG are over!
It's all well and good to provide software that works. But without the support to back it up when there is an issue (big or small) it's not a good product/company to choose. I didn't appreciate all this wasted time and hassle. I hope my review helps other people to avoid an experience like I had with AVG.
Overall rating for this product: Unsatisfactory. 1 out of 5.
