Vodafone as an ISP

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shelford

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#147260 13-Jun-2014 17:46

We had a Vodafone man come to our house this evening and basically tried to sell us UFB.

Long story short, for $75 a month we get 10x faster speeds, 80gb (we are on 40gb) bestmates landline calling to 5 mobiles, we don't have to pay for the fibre to the house, only to break out contract with slingshot, which would be about $250 and VF would put $230 credit on our account.

The deal sounds good to me, I just am not sure what VF are like as an ISP and do they have anything similar to slingshots global mode?

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meow
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#1065096 13-Jun-2014 17:54

Anything is better than Slingshot.

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shelford

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#1065098 13-Jun-2014 17:56

michaelmurfy: Anything is better than Slingshot.

Really? We have been with them since november and have had no problems with them.

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#1065102 13-Jun-2014 18:00

michaelmurfy: Anything is better than Slingshot.

Based on what?

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#1065107 13-Jun-2014 18:09

Sounddude:
michaelmurfy: Anything is better than Slingshot.

Based on what?

True, there are worse companies now you suggested it ;)

freitasm

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#1065141 13-Jun-2014 19:21

If you are going to give an opinion, at least put some basis to it. Otherwise it's trolling...

No, Vodafone does not have a Global Mode - you would have to use third party services such as DNS or VPN to access content from overseas.

Overall performance is good, even better if on cable. Online customer service (as in Twitter, Geekzone) is great, but phone support is slow and always busy. Sometimes slow to respond to market demand (as in to bring new products/services, fix things that shouldn't be broken in first place).

YMMV.

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mattbush

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#1065152 13-Jun-2014 19:43

freitasm: If you are going to give an opinion, at least put some basis to it. Otherwise it's trolling...

No, Vodafone does not have a Global Mode - you would have to use third party services such as DNS or VPN to access content from overseas.

Overall performance is good, even better if on cable. Online customer service (as in Twitter, Geekzone) is great, but phone support is slow and always busy. Sometimes slow to respond to market demand (as in to bring new products/services, fix things that shouldn't be broken in first place).

YMMV.

Nicely summed up.

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Inphinity

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#1065162 13-Jun-2014 19:49

As above, they do not have a 'global mode' (few ISPs do). I do not have any experience with their UFB connections, but do with their ADSL, VDSL, and business fibre. We have very few total outages, but do encounter performance issues more regularly thank I would like (though haven't had any probs with their transparent proxy lately.. touch wood). Phone and email based support is slow, and it can be annoying to get hold of someone who can actually help, but once you do (online resources like GZ are great for this) the resolution is usually swift and positive. Would I recommend them? If the deal represents good value for your needs, yes, I suppose I would.

shelford

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#1065186 13-Jun-2014 20:26

Inphinity: As above, they do not have a 'global mode' (few ISPs do). I do not have any experience with their UFB connections, but do with their ADSL, VDSL, and business fibre. We have very few total outages, but do encounter performance issues more regularly thank I would like (though haven't had any probs with their transparent proxy lately.. touch wood). Phone and email based support is slow, and it can be annoying to get hold of someone who can actually help, but once you do (online resources like GZ are great for this) the resolution is usually swift and positive. Would I recommend them? If the deal represents good value for your needs, yes, I suppose I would.

Thanks for all the advice/info. The deal is a lot better than what we are on and they are paying for the fibre to be installed down our long driveway to the house, a price which I've been told is quite high.

If I have to pay for a unblock US or something similar it still will work out cheaper for us anyway. I also called slingshot to ask how much for us to terminate the contract and kinda hoped they'd offer us a similar deal but they didn't. Not sure if that's something they'd do anyway.

NonprayingMantis

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#1065191 13-Jun-2014 20:45

shelford:
Inphinity: As above, they do not have a 'global mode' (few ISPs do). I do not have any experience with their UFB connections, but do with their ADSL, VDSL, and business fibre. We have very few total outages, but do encounter performance issues more regularly thank I would like (though haven't had any probs with their transparent proxy lately.. touch wood). Phone and email based support is slow, and it can be annoying to get hold of someone who can actually help, but once you do (online resources like GZ are great for this) the resolution is usually swift and positive. Would I recommend them? If the deal represents good value for your needs, yes, I suppose I would.

Thanks for all the advice/info. The deal is a lot better than what we are on and they are paying for the fibre to be installed down our long driveway to the house, a price which I've been told is quite high.

If I have to pay for a unblock US or something similar it still will work out cheaper for us anyway. I also called slingshot to ask how much for us to terminate the contract and kinda hoped they'd offer us a similar deal but they didn't. Not sure if that's something they'd do anyway.

vodafone don't pay for the installation, Chorus do (and the same wouldbe for any ISP you chose to get Fibre through)

surprised slingshot didn't offer you fibre. they have largely the same deals, but maybe they don't have an agreement with your LFC, whoever they are.

ETA: whilst VF as an ISP are ok, I would personally never, ever, ever trust a single thing a door to door salesman claims. Make sure you get every single thing he claims in writing, on official VF letterhead.

Handle9

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#1065193 13-Jun-2014 20:51

I've been with Vodafone a couple of times, always found them good, pretty much on a par with Telecom. Those two have the most consistent service, at least in my experience.

kiwikiwi

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#1065205 13-Jun-2014 21:10

I've been with vodafone in the past.
As an ISP they're ok but things you do need to note.
Transparent proxy that sometimes needs a good slap to get going sometimes although it's been almost a year so I have no idea what it's like now.
Price wise it's comparable and ok.

In my experiences I've had DNS fails and random cut offs every 2 days during the night randomly.
Calling up the call center is ok there is sometimes a wait but it isn't long.

I'd search for alternatives but they aren't bad.

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Coil

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#1065230 13-Jun-2014 21:54

I would go for your deal that you got there.
Vodafone ufb performance is great. This is coming from personal experience and other users.

dejadeadnz

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#1065253 13-Jun-2014 22:41

Long term Vodafone ADSL (then) VDSL user here and quite a few of my less technically-oriented family and friends are also on VF, often due to my own referral.

Pluses:

1. Generally quite stable connection and good performance. Doing things like (legal) torrents and large downloads, I can get close to line speed even off international downloads in peak times. Youtube performance is very good. In fact, internet connection-wise, bar Netflix (see below), I consider it to be 9.5/10.

2. Very minimal outages.

3. Unlimited plans (if you eventually go there) that appear to truly work -- fingers crossed -- without crippling performance degradation.

4. Excellent social media-based support. If you have a problem with VF, you'd be far better off posting a polite but firm message on their FB page and PMing your details.

Minuses:

1. Truly terrible phone/e-mail based support. Expect huge ring times if you have to ring them. IME things are rarely resolved with one phone call and promises to ring back etc are rarely kept.

2. These days VF is clearly a follower, rather than a maker, of trends. You rarely will see cutting-edge deals coming from them first.

3. Netflix performance is often patchy, with much more re-bufferings than usual lately.

NZCrusader

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#1065290 13-Jun-2014 23:22

michaelmurfy: Anything is better than Slingshot.

This is a very poor comment.

In actual fact, I am with Slingshot and aside from the VB104W which is not a flash router... the actual service is really good.

Wait times on the phone are minimal compared to other ISPs.
There are several other ways to contact SS support other than phone.

In terms of latency, I get lower latency than people in my area on Telecom, Snap and Vodafone (cable).
In terms of throughput I can near max my VDSL (around 45 Mbps) on p2p, you tube is flawless and I really cant fault it.

Slingshot may have let themselves down in the past through bad performance / support / PR, but in this day and age currently they do remarkably well and appear to be maintaining this which is really good to see.

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r2b2

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#1065296 13-Jun-2014 23:48

kiwikiwi: I've been with vodafone in the past.
As an ISP they're ok but things you do need to note.
Transparent proxy that sometimes needs a good slap to get going sometimes although it's been almost a year so I have no idea what it's like now.

Is this true for Fibre customers? My impression was the transparent proxy was only an issue for Cable customers and not ADSL/VDSL customers but not sure about Fibre?

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