Exchange fault renders 10,000 phone lines useless

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Exchange fault renders 10,000 phone lines useless

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#113879 1-Mar-2008 08:20

Well, 8 days later and this morning the last of the problems appear to have been fixed. Not the best performance from Telecom on this one. Telecom's name is certainly mud in this small town at the moment. Hopefully the switch will remain stable and some faith can be restored in Telecom's ability to run a 21st century communications system.

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#113884 1-Mar-2008 08:55

C'est la vie. I'm sure they did the best they could given the circumstances.

hairy1

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#113890 1-Mar-2008 09:23

Yes, I would say there would have been some big hours put in by the Telecom guys and girls! I did speak too soon though , it is not entirely fixed but must be getting close.

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pressF1

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#114013 1-Mar-2008 22:35

adamj: C'est la vie. I'm sure they did the best they could given the circumstances.

Are you serious? 8 days to fix the problem is OK in your book? Dare I guess you weren't running a business there?
And if my high school French serves me, "such is life".....ahhh, no I think most Telco's would disagree and say "such is bad investment and backup of records"

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#114014 1-Mar-2008 22:48

pressF1:
Are you serious? 8 days to fix the problem is OK in your book? Dare I guess you weren't running a business there?
And if my high school French serves me, "such is life".....ahhh, no I think most Telco's would disagree and say "such is bad investment and backup of records"

And aren't businesses supposed to have back up plans just for issues like this?

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#114024 2-Mar-2008 00:23

cokemaster:
pressF1:
Are you serious? 8 days to fix the problem is OK in your book? Dare I guess you weren't running a business there?
And if my high school French serves me, "such is life".....ahhh, no I think most Telco's would disagree and say "such is bad investment and backup of records"

And aren't businesses supposed to have back up plans just for issues like this?

what kind of backup plan can there be when the exchange and all the copper is Telecom's (correct me if i'm wrong). Unless there's a Telco that has created their own network, any other suppliers are still going over the Telecom copper and exchange.

The only real backup I can think of is cellphones surely?

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#114034 2-Mar-2008 02:12

http://www.compass.net.nz/residential/internet/lineofsight.asp

Pukekohe Areas covered: Pukekohe

Line of sight required: The antennae on the large radio mast at the top of Pukekohe Hill.

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#114046 2-Mar-2008 08:11

I am in Pukekohe using Compass and had my Pukekohe phone number ported to VFX which is a great system and works really well however, with the Pukekohe fault my number got disconnected. So much for not being affected by Telecom!

Counties Power also ran a whole lot of fibre optic through Pukekohe when they started the Wired Country business which was bought by Compass. I am not sure who owns the fibre now but the advertising for that has stopped.

My views (except when I am looking out their windows) are not those of my employer.

PhoenixNZ

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#114047 2-Mar-2008 08:16

One thing that should be noted is that this fault has had nothing to do with the copper lines between houses and exchanges or from the exchange back to Telecom.

This was a software fault, the result of computers not doing their jobs right. It has nothing to do with the copper network and it could have happened to anyone. Software will never be perfect and faults with software are a fact of life.

I dont doubt that Telecom is working 24/7 to get this fault resolved and unless you know about the fault itself and the software involved its unfair to say whether 8 days is/isn't quick enough to get it fixed.

I have my own mind which is not that of my company. As such do not mistake my opinions as being those of any company you may or may not think I work for.

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#114076 2-Mar-2008 11:06

Exactly PhoenixNZ .

gehenna:
what kind of backup plan can there be when the exchange and all the copper is Telecom's (correct me if i'm wrong).

The only real backup I can think of is cellphones surely?

You just pointed it out. Cellphones were still working. Without contradicting what PheonixNZ said:

If you advertised the mobile number, or even had an 0800 number set up to divert to your mobile (as opposed to your landline) you could keep receiving calls - abeit at a higher cost, but you'd still have communications.

Email is another possibility too.

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PhoenixNZ

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#114077 2-Mar-2008 11:12

In this day in age I would think it would be way more inconvinient for a cell service to go down rather than landline.

From what I understand this fault didn't affect broadband service, just the landline.

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pressF1

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#114099 2-Mar-2008 13:44

gehenna:
cokemaster:
pressF1:
Are you serious? 8 days to fix the problem is OK in your book? Dare I guess you weren't running a business there?
And if my high school French serves me, "such is life".....ahhh, no I think most Telco's would disagree and say "such is bad investment and backup of records"

And aren't businesses supposed to have back up plans just for issues like this?

what kind of backup plan can there be when the exchange and all the copper is Telecom's (correct me if i'm wrong). Unless there's a Telco that has created their own network, any other suppliers are still going over the Telecom copper and exchange.

The only real backup I can think of is cellphones surely?

Actually I think we need to consider backup in the computer sense, rather than the network sense. For Telecom to state they restored to a 2005 version of the exchanges software to avoid the fault occuring again makes me wonder if they think we're all moron's. Hands up anyone out there who runs a critical software system which has a DB backup that is 2-3 years out of date???

I dont doubt that Telecom is working 24/7 to get this fault resolved and unless you know about the fault itself and the software involved its unfair to say whether 8 days is/isn't quick enough to get it fixed.

No one is questioning how hard they are working to fix it what I am saying is that 8 days for a critical system (irrespective of it being telecom, telstra or vodafone) is BAD!!! Would you bank with a financial institution who you thought might not back up their data for 3 years and then have the system go down so it took 8 days for you to withdraw any cash?? [/OTT example]

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#114117 2-Mar-2008 14:24

They do obviously keep back ups, otherwise it would be difficult to restore peoples access.

However the reasons why they had to go back to a 2005 set up haven't been revealed and probably won't be. Speculating is great and all, but remember that outages are expensive - in both money, publicity and income (one month credit to those affected) - its not something they'd like to occur just because of skipping 'cheap' back ups.

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PhoenixNZ

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#114119 2-Mar-2008 14:34

I would suspect they used older backups simply to ensure that the problem didn't occur again.

In this day and age I dont consider a basic landline to a be a critical service given how many have mobiles and broadband (neither which were affected by the outage).

Those who didn't have mobiles were offered loan mobiles to ensure in case of an emergency they could get in touch with someone.

I have my own mind which is not that of my company. As such do not mistake my opinions as being those of any company you may or may not think I work for.

hairy1

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#114122 2-Mar-2008 15:12

PhoenixNZ: I would suspect they used older backups simply to ensure that the problem didn't occur again.

In this day and age I dont consider a basic landline to a be a critical service given how many have mobiles and broadband (neither which were affected by the outage).

Those who didn't have mobiles were offered loan mobiles to ensure in case of an emergency they could get in touch with someone.

It doesn't sound as though you have an EFT-POS machine attached to your landline. It seemed quite critical at the time for those businesses in Pukekohe who couldn't process EFT-POS.

My views (except when I am looking out their windows) are not those of my employer.

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