No internet light + poor attitude = departing customer

Forums › Orcon and iServe › No internet light + poor attitude = departing customer

nickb99

86 posts

Master Geek

Topic # 94343 8-Dec-2011 14:15
I have the Genius service. It fell over 13 days ago (no internet light, so no home phone line and no internet). It took Orcon a WEEK (and a few calls) to get it back on. Which was bad enough, but then it only worked for two days and failed again with the same problem. Since then I am in a loop. The service works for a short time, then the internet light goes out. I call Orcon, they make me go through the same pointless reset router settings etc which does nothing. Then some hours later I get service back for a few hours after their 2nd line techs do whatever they do. Most recent outage was this morning. And yesterday morning... I have pretty much reached the end of my tether now. If I can get them to waive the quit fee then I will switch to xnet or maybe Telecom. The lousy service aside, the general attitude of some of the Orcon staff has been so BAD. No sympathy at all, pretty much. You-should-thank-us-for-allowing-you-to-be-our-customer kind of thing. "Sorry" still seems to be the hardest word. I don't expect any great improvement from xnet but if all the providers are at the mercy of Chorus techs anyway to fix the problem - as my phone calls to Orcon have suggested - then I can't see myself being worse off. If anyone else has experienced the same technical issue and can suggest a solution that works (and stays working) would love to hear it. Have to post this message quickly before my service drops again...

cyril7

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Reply # 555488 8-Dec-2011 14:20
Hi, I presume you have been down the wiring issues path, loosing DSL signal normally means there is a wiring issue, its very uncommon that fiddling by 2nd tier techs at a infastructure/adjusting DSLAM settings level will make things come and go. So to that end do you have line stats and maybe some details about house wiring, especially is there an alarm installed in the house, monitored or not. Cyril

freitasm

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Reply # 555490 8-Dec-2011 14:21
And if possible WHERE are you located, and if your connection is to the exchange or to a cabinet. Mauricio Freitas (Geekzone Admin, Devil's Advocate, my blog, technology disclosure, my tweets, Web Performance Optimization) Geekzone Price comparison \| Amazon Kindle order page \| How to get the best out of Geekzone \| New Zealand IT Jobs \| Geekzone News \| Jinglebugs

nickb99

86 posts

Master Geek

Reply # 555501 8-Dec-2011 14:46
Thanks for the prompt responses guys. 1. I have considered the wiring issue but given everything worked fine up until the 25th I thought it unlikely. Also it generally comes back online only after I call Orcon, who would not be able to resolve dicky wiring under the house of course. But fair point, I will have it streamlined when the elec next visits as there are a few old unused extensions. 2. I don't have line stats and don't know how to get them. Have attached some screen shots from the router info, does that help? 3. No alarm or anything at the house, just the Genius to the wall and some cordless phones plugged into that. 4. I am in Maori Hill, Dunedin. How do I figure out if I am connected to a exchange or cabinet? Once again, thank you for the prompt responses.

Oldhat

170 posts

Master Geek

Reply # 555724 9-Dec-2011 00:43
You mentioned that the "internet" light is the one going out. If you still have an adsl signal getting through (i.e. the modem still has connection rates) then it would be the ppp session getting dropped. If it keeps happening on such a frequent basis there could be something wrong with the equipment you are connected to and if so changing providers possibly wouldn't help.

techmeister

270 posts

Ultimate Geek

Reply # 555741 9-Dec-2011 07:27
If you put your address in the chorus availability tool http://www.chorus.co.nz/service-availability-tool it will tell you what you are connected to. Stats look reasonably good, bit low on the download speed for the Attenuation figure though. What oldhat says about the PPP session, we need to know ISLAM sync issue or PPP authentication. A screen shot of it not working would be useful. Now on Slingshot Better Network and it's better.

quentinreade

133 posts

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Orcon

Reply # 555759 9-Dec-2011 08:29
First of all, sorry to hear this! Can you please email me account details and we can crack into fixing the issue. quentin.reade@team.orcon.net.nz Cheers. Quentin Reade HEAD OF BRAND AND COMMS ORCON

nickb99

86 posts

Master Geek

Reply # 555777 9-Dec-2011 09:08
Well, the service is down again now. Thanks for the responses guys. I appreciate that changing suppliers might not fix the issue but as I wrote before, if they had a more switched on & appropriate manner when dealing with the issue then I would be more sympathetic. I will email this orcon guy and see what happens. I will also see if I can get the info you need from the router onto my phone to post. Thanks again to all. Its nice to know someone cares.

nickb99

86 posts

Master Geek

Reply # 555997 9-Dec-2011 17:10
Ok, so a day after posting here there was significant progress - thank you geekzone. A Chorus bod phoned to say that he had to change the port at the exchange because he had identified a fault there. There was nothing wrong at my end. He reckoned that would fix the issue permanently - I hope he is right. Although I was really pleased with the help I got via this forum (and also Quentin, thanks mate) why should I have to post here just to get Orcon to do their job properly? Have they no system to spot repeated failures like mine and flag that to someone appropriate? Poor, poor service. I am going to see how it performs over the next couple of weeks and then decide if I will change providers. These events have really reduced my estimation of Orcon, sadly.

freitasm

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Reply # 556043 9-Dec-2011 19:27
nickb99: Although I was really pleased with the help I got via this forum (and also Quentin, thanks mate) why should I have to post here just to get Orcon to do their job properly? Have they no system to spot repeated failures like mine and flag that to someone appropriate? This is something I have asked many, many times before and it's not something that is just Orcon. It happens with all ISPs. They seem to spend a lot of money on call centres but fail to realise they could have some automated intelligence - repeated faults from same line, similar faults from same area/exchange, etc. I asked a couple why people get answers here, Twitter and Facebook but can't get those when they call the help desk. It seems ISPs (and some other industries too) that most customers will first contact their call centres... Trust me, people are not in the business of making customers suffer. But there's such a high rate of failure when it comes to systems and monitoring performance... Obviously people helping here are doing a great job, but it would be a lot less for them to do if the companies worked a better customer service system. Good for you things seem to be going in a good direction though. Mauricio Freitas (Geekzone Admin, Devil's Advocate, my blog, technology disclosure, my tweets, Web Performance Optimization) Geekzone Price comparison \| Amazon Kindle order page \| How to get the best out of Geekzone \| New Zealand IT Jobs \| Geekzone News \| Jinglebugs