First 6 months free on 12 month Broadband Plan (New Customers) @ Skinny

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › First 6 months free on 12 month Broadband Plan (New Customers) @ Skinny

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#2812193 13-Nov-2021 10:38

PANiCnz:

Signed up to this deal with Skinny on 10/11. Got a confirmation email at 5:50pm confirming my switch over on 24/11. But at 5:48 on 10/11 my fixed IP with Bigpipe changed. I'm not too worried about losing the fixed IP as I made provisions to live without it on Skinny, but it does seem like too much of a coincidence. Have yet to notify Bigpipe I am leaving.

@PANiCnz You do not have to notify Bigpipe you are leaving

gmball

568 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2812211 13-Nov-2021 10:52

I am in the middle of transitioning from one broadband provider to a different provider.

As with many others on Geekzone it seems to be an unnecessarily difficult and worrying transition.
From other posts I have read, the broadband providers, and possibly Chorus seem to be incredibly touchy and pedantic as to how the request to leave and be reconnected is framed.

Timing seems overly critical/pedantic as to dates and who to tell first or second. There are various opinions on this. The providers or Chorus seem to go off in a huff if the procedure is not followed in the way they or their competitors deem to be correct.

It seems obvious if you ask for one to disconnect and another to connect that they would talk to each other and sort the timing etc. out between themselves.

I get the feeling , which may be wrong, that the losing service provider makes it difficult so that the winning provider looks bad and gives the customer, in the middle, the feeling that they made a wrong decision by leaving them. In effect telling the customer off

Completely agree. I'm very surprised having gone through this process myself, at how odd and inefficient the whole process seems, and there isn't anything available on the websites of providers to advise how to go about the process. Not to mention the additional complexity when you're supposed to give your existing provider 30 days notice prior to disconnection.

For me it resulted in multiple calls to both ISP's, as I originally phoned my existing provider 2Degrees to provide my 30 day notice period. Unknown to me, this resulted in a disconnection request being placed with Chorus, which ultimately blocks a new provider from submitting a request.

After signing up with Skinny, they advised me that due to the disconnection request, they would have to wait for my 2Degrees connection to be completely disconnected before they could submit a connection request, and this would likely result in a period of downtime.

Skinny suggested that a transition request would be the best option to avoid downtime.

So I phoned 2Degrees, who agreed to remove the disconnection request, and would not charge me for an additional month provided the transition is done before the 22nd of this month, which is when my billing period ends.

Have now contacted Skinny again who can see that the 2Degrees disconnection request is sitting in an 'intent to cancel' stage, and hoping Skinny can process the transition before the 22nd.

I imagine I'm not the only one doing this back and forth, due to my own fault at not knowing the complexity of the process (probably like 4 million+ other Kiwi's).

I dont think the blame here lies with the ISP, but more with how Chorus handle this process. If Chorus could design their system to be able to permit a disconnection request from one provider, and a connection request from another provider, surely their system should be able to process this without involvement from a customer, and realistically shouldn't all requests be transition requests with minimal downtime where customers are moving from fibre with one provider to fibre with another provider?

chevrolux

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#2812275 13-Nov-2021 13:03

extech:
As with many others on Geekzone it seems to be an unnecessarily difficult and worrying transition
**snipped ***

Its just not hard at all. The issue isn't with Chorus at all. A primary transfer is the simplest thing you can order. It's all up to how the RSPs deal with it. The LSP gets a message to say its done, and should just deal with it accordingly. You'll pay the old LSP until the end of the month, and that's all there is to it.

People on here tend to overthink transferring providers all to save $30 of fees. Whereas if you just book the transfer at the end of your billing cycle (clearly printed on any provider's invoice) you don't need to worry.

gmball

568 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2812284 13-Nov-2021 13:23

chevrolux:
extech:

As with many others on Geekzone it seems to be an unnecessarily difficult and worrying transition
**snipped ***

Its just not hard at all. The issue isn't with Chorus at all. A primary transfer is the simplest thing you can order. It's all up to how the RSPs deal with it. The LSP gets a message to say its done, and should just deal with it accordingly. You'll pay the old LSP until the end of the month, and that's all there is to it.

People on here tend to overthink transferring providers all to save $30 of fees. Whereas if you just book the transfer at the end of your billing cycle (clearly printed on any provider's invoice) you don't need to worry.

Where does it say anywhere that you need to place an order with a new provider in advance of providing notice to your current provider?

Personally for me, it was nothing about $$ saving when changing connections, it was about minimising downtime and being without a connection. A $30 saving didn't cross my mind.

I dont think its a case of people on here over complicating anything. You realise that the vast majority of Kiwi's dont come to Geekzone to share their experience, its clear that what some of us are experiencing is indicative of a bigger issue.

I dont even know what a primary transfer is. When I signed up with Skinny, you sign up for a new connection, you dont indicate anywhere whether you want a so called 'primary transfer', or even a 'transition request'. Likewise when you advise your current provider you are connecting with a new provider, they submit a disconnection request, at no stage did 2Degrees advise me that a 'transition' option was available, or that I should sign up with Skinny before they put through their disconnection request. When I phoned 2Degrees, my current provider, to advise them I would be signing up with another provider, nothing was mentioned about a disconnection request blocking a new providers connection request.

What am I missing, if its as simple as you suggest?

everettpsycho

614 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2812318 13-Nov-2021 15:56

chevrolux:
extech:
As with many others on Geekzone it seems to be an unnecessarily difficult and worrying transition
**snipped ***

Its just not hard at all. The issue isn't with Chorus at all. A primary transfer is the simplest thing you can order. It's all up to how the RSPs deal with it. The LSP gets a message to say its done, and should just deal with it accordingly. You'll pay the old LSP until the end of the month, and that's all there is to it.

People on here tend to overthink transferring providers all to save $30 of fees. Whereas if you just book the transfer at the end of your billing cycle (clearly printed on any provider's invoice) you don't need to worry.

While in principle you are right the problem is the service providers often do not order a customer transfer. I moved from orcon to stuff and now stuff to skinny and at no point did the new providers order the right product from enable for this process to happen.

Skinny this time in particular asked when I signed up asked if it was a transfer but didn't list stuff as a provider so I put down other but definitely said it's a transfer. They then emailed me saying your address has an active service is it yours to which I responded with all the details including my stuff customer number to process it as a transfer and they still didn't tell enable I was transferring service.

It's totally on me to time my change over from one provider to another and know my contract to avoid charges, had skinny set the right date and done a transfer it would have been absolutely fine but they didn't despite asking for the details twice. I like to think I'm fairly clued up on this and did get it sorted out but it was absolutely harder than it should have been had they just ordered the correct options from enable.

chevrolux

4962 posts

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Inactive user

#2812319 13-Nov-2021 16:06

My point is not that YOU dont need to know what to order, the RSP should.

You ring your new provider, and say "connect me on this date" and that's it. You don't need to contact your old provider, because they will sort it all out. People just need to trust the process works.

What I would admit though is that some RSP (like the big red one) have terrible provisioning processes where billing issues can occur. But that still doesn't stop the initial change happening in the first place, just a little bit of account stuff to sort later down the track.

rugrat

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#2812324 13-Nov-2021 16:26

chevrolux: My point is not that YOU dont need to know what to order, the RSP should.

You ring your new provider, and say "connect me on this date" and that's it. You don't need to contact your old provider, because they will sort it all out. People just need to trust the process .

If you don’t contact your old provider then with a lot of contracts, will end up paying for two internet connections, and once do notify previous provider they will keep charging for another 30 days.

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gmball

568 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2812331 13-Nov-2021 16:33

rugrat:
chevrolux: My point is not that YOU dont need to know what to order, the RSP should.

You ring your new provider, and say "connect me on this date" and that's it. You don't need to contact your old provider, because they will sort it all out. People just need to trust the process .

If you don’t contact your old provider then with a lot of contracts, will end up paying for two internet connections, and once do notify previous provider they will keep charging for another 30 days.

Correct, with 2Degrees, they require 30 days notice, if you don’t provide that, you continue to be billed. Likewise if you click over into a new billing period by 1 day, your charged for an entire month.

cokemaster

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#2812334 13-Nov-2021 16:43

It’s a deliberate strategy by telcos to increase the fraction for churning and to squeeze a extra period of rental.

Around the times that 30 days notices were implemented, there were consultants who were advising certain telcos that this was a strong way to help shore up revenues.

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boland

545 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2812597 14-Nov-2021 14:19

Regarding notice period: I was under the assumption that my old provider would be notified automatically. I was wrong.

I'm currently with Nova and have signed up for Skinny. I told Skinny that I have a 30 day notice period, so we put the date ~35 days ahead. They said Nova would be notified automatically. Well, no, I contacted them, and they had not received anything. If I had not contacted them, I would have paid double during the notice period.

Very customer unfriendly if you'd ask me.

Detruire

1771 posts

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#2812889 14-Nov-2021 21:26

boland:

Regarding notice period: I was under the assumption that my old provider would be notified automatically. I was wrong.

I'm currently with Nova and have signed up for Skinny. I told Skinny that I have a 30 day notice period, so we put the date ~35 days ahead. They said Nova would be notified automatically. Well, no, I contacted them, and they had not received anything. If I had not contacted them, I would have paid double during the notice period.

Very customer unfriendly if you'd ask me.

I believe it's correct that your old provide will be notified, but it happens when you switch, i.e. when/once the switch happens, and is done by Chorus or the LFC. Not by Skinny (or any other ISP) when you sign up.

rm *

cokemaster

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#2812893 14-Nov-2021 21:30

Detruire:

I believe it's correct that your old provide will be notified, but it happens when you switch, i.e. when/once the switch happens, and is done by Chorus or the LFC. Not by Skinny (or any other ISP) when you sign up.

They should get a losing service provider notification earlier. Its one of the ways Spark used to recommend for broadband and mobile - putting in a transfer request NOW but scheduled for 30 days time, otherwise Spark charges upto 30 days notice. Your mileage may vary depending on your provider.

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surfisup1000

5288 posts

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#2812984 15-Nov-2021 08:05

chevrolux:
You ring your new provider, and say "connect me on this date" and that's it.

But it is not easy when from a starting point you have no idea of the process and the ISP's don't exactly explain this to you.

The question most people changing ISP would ask:

How do I transfer to a new ISP (voyager to skinny in my case), allowing for disconnection notice periods, without having to pay two providers simultaneously for the same service, and maintaining continuity of service during the switchover.

This should be at the top of their "FAQ".

Knowing I need to give a months notice, I called voyager and they told me to use their voyager cancellation webpage....there is a tickbox, "Transfer".....no explanation as to what this tickbox does. What does transfer mean?

I phoned voyager again and they said the transfer tick box means you are moving to a new address ...which I'm not , so I didn't tick it. Later on a voyager staff member told me it should be ticked if you are moving to a new ISP.

I then request a new connection with skinny...and start receiving emails saying I have to cancel my disconnection order with voyager. But, how does this reconcile with voyager needing 30 days notice??? I query skinny, they send another note that doesn't answer my question.

Everything is a crap show now, because neither skinny or voyager really seem to be able to clearly explain the whole process ... they will explain a part, but their incomplete explanation raises other questions.

Eventually, it took lots of phoning, and questioning to sort it out.

everettpsycho

614 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2813220 15-Nov-2021 12:57

You'd think the transfer process for the receiving ISP would be something they'd be keen to get right every time and make it as easy and seamless as possible. It doesn't really make you trust your new chosen provider if the first interactions with them is then not having any idea how to just move your service over to them.

Like everyone is saying there is devices to do this from the fibre companies but seemingly it's just not being followed. It should be as a easy as say your old provider details, give a start date that matches your notice period and it just gets dealt with easily. They could even link to the cancellation details of the bigger providers websites to make sure you know where to read up on your notice period from the original source.

spronkey

117 posts

Master Geek

#2813933 16-Nov-2021 16:16

So... what's the consensus? Sign up with Skinny for +30days in future for ISPs that need that notice, then give notice to old ISP?

Skinny just released the Flexi Modem - is that going to be included on these new plans or just the old Arcadyan Smart Modem? Anyone have an opinion on how it compares to the Fritz 7490?

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