Relocation woes, what redress do I have, or how can I escalate?

Forums › One New Zealand (including Vodafone, WxC, Farmside) › Relocation woes, what redress do I have, or how can I escalate?

aquatarkus

59 posts

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#251708 8-Jul-2019 00:05

Background: we rebuilt our home to incorporate a granny flat so that my mother-in-law could move there and get an increased level of domestic support. She's been a Vodafone landline/mobile/fibre/TV subscriber for years (we're on Spark ourselves). So some time ago we told Vodafone that she would be relocating from number x in ABC street to number xA in DEF street. We were told that's fine, straightforward, just let us know the date and it will all happen.

This was just before Vodafone was sold.

Her relocation took place in the week that Vodafone was sold and Vodafone's phone support went caput for several days. Oops.

When we finally got through to relocations several days after she had moved in to find out where things were at it was apparent that nothing had actually been done in advance. We were given a date for Chorus to come and install fibre and get her landline, internet and TV going.

On that date the Chorus technician turned up and went away again. When I rang Vodafone relocations I learned that there were not enough nodes in the street and we had to wait for Chorus to install a new node.

Oops.

You'd think this - at the very least - could have been anticipated by some research after our initial request. Evidently that doesn't happen.

We were given another date when the install would happen. It didn't.

Chorus refuses to speak with customers and insisted that we go through our ISP but after a lot of pleading I found out that they been asked once by Vodafone to do the connection with no indication of any urgency and no follow ups.

By now my mother-in-law has been in occupation for 4 weeks with no phone, no internet, and no TV. She is 89 years old and had medical alarm services attached through her landline at her previous address. None of those are able to be active at the moment because she has no landline.

I rigged up her Vodafone TV box with a connection to our network but Vodafone TV refuses to work unless the ISP is Vodafone, so that's a no go too.

Where are we now? As far as I can tell Chorus still hasn't got past step 1: connection requested. Vodafone hasn't got past "there's nothing we can do".

She does have a mobile phone, and she is able to watch some free TV channels so she isn't Totally Cut Off but this situation is really poor, and if I was involved with Vodafone support I would be seriously embarrassed by this level of support.

Vodafone used to be better than this.

Are there any magical incantations I need to mouth down the phone, or escalated contact numbers I can ring, or arms I can break* to speed this process up?

*not literally

Cheers

Trevor

jonathan18

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#2271567 8-Jul-2019 05:51

The best cut-through that seems to work here on GZ is DMing the big kahuna, @jasonparis, who seems to be fairly active at engaging with his company's (many, many) problems.

Given the age of your MIL and the need for a medical alarm, I can understand why these delays are particularly frustrating. Good luck resolving this.

timmmay

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#2271572 8-Jul-2019 07:11

Can you piggyback off the main house's internet connection? Run out ethernet or use WiFi? That can give her most things, phone, internet, tv, and you can probably get a medical alarm that works through that or cellular.

I wouldn't expect any ISP to consider this as important as you do, or do anything in a hurry, least of all Vodafone.

sbiddle

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#2271584 8-Jul-2019 08:29

It's a difficult situation which is kinda your issue, even though it's also not really.

Does the granny flat have a unique lot/DP number or is it just part of the other property? It's not uncommon for many granny flats to not be unique.

When Chorus (or any of the LFC's) build out the network they're allocating capacity or tubes for each legally designated property in the street so that everybody can get a connection. If your property was split with it's own legal lot/DP number after the network build was complete, or if it does not have it's own legal lot/DP number then there will be no capacity on the network for the property.

Fixing this means a redesign of the network which depending on how the network is run can be easy or difficult and may require civil works. This can take from weeks to months depending on the scale of the build required.

aquatarkus

59 posts

Master Geek

#2271867 8-Jul-2019 14:27

The house is a separate dwelling on the same lot/DP. I understand this is common. I also understand that the initial fibre network put in the street may have underestimated the eventual demands - I don't think we're the only property in the street with multiple premises. Although it's a very short street :-)

I do think that this problem could have been identified shortly after we approached Vodafone with her relocation plans; had we known in advance that she would not be able to get connected for "months" we would have unbundled the phone, internet and TV services and be in a much better place than we are now.

I have temporarily connected her to our network but (a) that's still not providing a phone (b) the vodafone set-top box says sorry you're not a vodafone network and drops the service. (Actually the message it gives is "phone X to subscribe to vodafone" but the reason is the internet connection is Spark not vodafone.)

Wheelbarrow01

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#2271903 8-Jul-2019 15:31

aquatarkus:

The house is a separate dwelling on the same lot/DP. I understand this is common. I also understand that the initial fibre network put in the street may have underestimated the eventual demands - I don't think we're the only property in the street with multiple premises. Although it's a very short street :-)

I do think that this problem could have been identified shortly after we approached Vodafone with her relocation plans; had we known in advance that she would not be able to get connected for "months" we would have unbundled the phone, internet and TV services and be in a much better place than we are now.

I have temporarily connected her to our network but (a) that's still not providing a phone (b) the vodafone set-top box says sorry you're not a vodafone network and drops the service. (Actually the message it gives is "phone X to subscribe to vodafone" but the reason is the internet connection is Spark not vodafone.)

Can you please send me a private message with the address of the property. I just want to see if there is any opportunity for Chorus to assist here.

The views expressed by me are not necessarily those of my employer Chorus NZ Ltd