From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishall too oftenall too often (also only too often)TOO/TOO MUCH used to say that something sad, disappointing, or annoying happens too much All too often doctors are too busy to explain the treatment to their patients. This type of accident happens only too often. → often
Examples from the Corpus
all too often• I've seen cases of this kind of child abuse all too often.• The first time they're a novelty, after that they're all too often an irritation.• Sadly, their struggles all too often end up in disillusionment and sometimes, in death.• In regard to the use of field interviewers, the social and psychological aspects of studies are all too often ignored.• But what should be a happy and fulfilling experience all too often is not.• Successful experiments all too often remain marginal, if they have no political clout.• It is somehow reassuring that, all too often, there is a not a table to be had.• Yet gays turning to churches and other institutions for help all too often were told not to worry.• Farmers still have the problem of overcoming the stigma which all too often young people attach to working on the land. 