Broken Roadside DSLAM still broken after 2 months but who to talk too...Telecom CS not helpfull

Forums › New Zealand Broadband › Broken Roadside DSLAM still broken after 2 months but who to talk too...Telecom CS not helpfull

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#760295 12-Feb-2013 17:28

Wow this just gets better and better...or is that tragic. Thought I would try the poster idea and and ring Auckland Council. Auckland Council have NO WAY of contacting either Chorus or Telecom to report anything dangerous. Great huh. Will come in really handy if we have a major civil emergency.

So I rang Telecom and after 10min on hold gave up.

So rang Chorus graffiti line as it is the phone number on the cabinet to report faults and graffiti Helpfully but referenced me to Telecom faults. Something familiar about this.

After much resistance I had to press the point hard that someone was going to die unless I was put through to a supervisor (yes dramatic but possible with the open power distribution, the things you have to do to get a point across). So I was put through to someone else at Chorus.

Imagine a real emergency in Auckland. I shudder to think what would happen if you can't report a danger except to Manilla who appear to be attached to the delete key.

Talked to the next person who then put me on hold and after 10min lost phone lines as the whole Xnet VFX service has gone down down so lost phone lines for half an hour or so.

Just got through again and the person I was talking too has gone home. I give up today.

Oh well if someone dies at least I tried. Not sure it will reflect so well on Chorcom :(

Hope I don't have to rely on anyone I spoke to to save my life.

RunningMan

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#760314 12-Feb-2013 18:22

andynz: the whole Xnet VFX service has gone down down so lost phone lines for half an hour or so.

Clearly not the whole service, as mine is still going. Perhaps it's the damaged cabinet ;-)

Bung

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#760344 12-Feb-2013 20:06

andynz: After much resistance I had to press the point hard that someone was going to die unless I was put through to a supervisor (yes dramatic but possible with the open power distribution, the things you have to do to get a point across). So I was put through to someone else at Chorus.

You've already had Peter Lambrechtsen say that he'd forward this to someone that could deal with it. Isn't this a case of beating a dead horse?

plambrechtsen

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#760348 12-Feb-2013 20:14

Bung:
andynz: After much resistance I had to press the point hard that someone was going to die unless I was put through to a supervisor (yes dramatic but possible with the open power distribution, the things you have to do to get a point across). So I was put through to someone else at Chorus.

You've already had Peter Lambrechtsen say that he'd forward this to someone that could deal with it. Isn't this a case of beating a dead horse?

Yep..

And I've had a respond back from my contact, who has forwarded it onto the right person.

Done.

nedkelly

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#760408 12-Feb-2013 21:19

This is why I love Geekzone, stuff happens and you get a good laugh at other things that are said here and the irc channel.

freitasm

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#760416 12-Feb-2013 21:35

Even though it's done and something may happen, it makes you think... Chorus OWNS the network/infrastructure. That cabinet is theirs. If you call to report the cabinet is damaged they can't just send you to [put your ISP name here] as that's nothing to do with them.

Really strange. Also, moving this to the appropriate forum as this is not a Telecom New Zealand topic.

allan

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#760464 12-Feb-2013 23:47

Had a similar experience a couple of years ago when a young guy being chased (am I allowed to say that?) by a Police car lost control on our street at 4am and took out a power junction box, and both (then) Telecom and TelstraClear connection pillars in front of our property. The Police called the power company immediately, but weren't interested in the other two.

Being the good citizen that I am, in he morning I attempted to report the issue to both Telecom and TelstraClear. With some perseverance, I did mange to get someone in Telecom faults who was able to take the details and it was repaired later that day. However, I discovered that I could not get past the "plese enter your customer number" prompt on the TelstraClear number and I wasn't a customer. Discovered later that day that our neighbour was and so got him to report it, however why is it so hard to contact organisations these days. They hide behind obscurity and automated phone gateways that sometimes just make it impossible to get to the right place.

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mattwnz

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#760467 12-Feb-2013 23:54

Isn't it a bit strange that you call the chorus vandal helpline, and it gets redirected to telecom. I thought they were supposed to be separated, and telecom is no different to any other ISP using the network. Sounds like some systems are still broken.
I would suggest to use twitter, as I get good results tweeting companies when their normal customer support sucks.

Zeon

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#760480 13-Feb-2013 02:49

If you hadn't got assistance on here my suggestion probably would be to log it as a fault and the Chorus tech will come and see the cabinet report to his boss etc.

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Wheelbarrow01

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#760490 13-Feb-2013 07:23

johnr:
plambrechtsen: I've also forwarded this link onto someone in Chorus who can deal with it.

You are meant to ask have you got a Master Filter installed

I laughed till I stopped when I read this.

andynz

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#761561 13-Feb-2013 09:36

Thanks guys for your comments and suggestions. What an eye opener it was yesterday. In the end I called the Chorus Cabinet and Graffiti line again later on. I asked to speak to a supervisor but I was told I had to ring Telecom Faults again. Utter frustration set in. I asked the women's name so I could give it to the press if someone is killed. Ok not proud of that one, it obviously upset her, but it had the result of me being passed onto her supervisor who on hearing the whole story agreed it was a health and safety issue, sympathised with the 2 months of frustration I had had and promised she would ring her bosses at home and ring me back. 10 min later she rang back with confirmation of action being taken today and I would be rung with a progress report. This morning a contractor rang first thing to confirm the DSLAM location and that they were doing some sort of repair today.

I guess my point is that I had to be a real squeaky wheel and upset people, including myself, to reach someone who could take some action on a potentially fatal situation. Anyone remember the little girl who drowned in a Waitakere Council drain having fallen down a misplaced manhole cover after it had been reported to the council over a number of months by multiple people. No responsibility was taken for her death.

Again thank for all your replies. A few follow up comments:

Runningman - Yes confirmed with Xnet help desk they had had a partial outage on some VFX service late yesterday afternoon.

Bung - "Isn't this a case of beating a dead horse?" No I don't think so. You have to be a real pain in the butt sometimes to get through the barriers of large corporate customer service firewalls. The bigger the corporation the more of a pain you have to be. Multiple routes via social media, forums and ultimately embarrassment via the press can sadly sometimes be the only solution.

Peter Lambrechtsen - Good that you had a response but by letting me know you had and by your contact communicating with me we could avoid escalating frustration with the "firewall".

freitasm - Interesting comments. "Chorus OWNS the network/infrastructure. That cabinet is theirs. If you call to report the cabinet is damaged they can't just send you to [put your ISP name here] as that's nothing to do with them." - Makes you wonder really how separated Chorus and Telecom really are. Smoke and mirrors?

allan - I sympathise with your similar experience. In the past I have had the same problems many times, it just wasn't a case of such a dangerous situation.

Zeon - "If you hadn't got assistance on here my suggestion probably would be to log it as a fault and the Chorus tech will come and see the cabinet report to his boss etc.: - This is not possible. Chorus refer you to Telecom faults 120. This is Telecom's call centre in Manilla or where ever. I did this 4 times and nothing ever happened. There is no link for such problems between Telecom and Chorus. It is broken. After we had the Tornado through Whenuapai we were without phone line for a week. I reported the fault to 120 3 times and they said it would be passed on and actioned. We were not contacted. So i drove down the road, spoke to a very helpful Telecom contractor who came round 15 min later and fixed the fault in 5 min. Off the record we were told that Telecom was not passing on individual faults in the area. They were just told to fix things as they arose. So we were lied to by Telecom CS. They were not passing the faults on. There seems to be a serious problem with communication between Telecom and Chorus.

Lets hope for a happy ending and lessons learned. I suspect the former is more likely than the later.

Bung

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#761575 13-Feb-2013 10:01

andynz: I asked the women's name so I could give it to the press if someone is killed. Ok not proud of that one, it obviously upset her, but it had the result of me being passed onto her supervisor who on hearing the whole story agreed it was a health and safety issue, sympathised with the 2 months of frustration I had had and promised she would ring her bosses at home and ring me back. 10 min later she rang back with confirmation of action being taken today and I would be rung with a progress report. This morning a contractor rang first thing to confirm the DSLAM location and that they were doing some sort of repair today.

I guess my point is that I had to be a real squeaky wheel and upset people, including myself, to reach someone who could take some action on a potentially fatal situation. Anyone remember the little girl who drowned in a Waitakere Council drain having fallen down a misplaced manhole cover after it had been reported to the council over a number of months by multiple people. No responsibility was taken for her death.

Maybe someone that is familiar with this type of cabinet could comment on whether your fears are real or not. Just because you can see wires doesn't mean that mains voltages (LV) are exposed. Most Chorus workers aren't licensed electrical workers so the power area wouldn't be exposed just by opening the doors.

cyril7

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#761576 13-Feb-2013 10:03

Hi, had a similar experience a couple of years back, and area I was working in, was driving down the road and noticed a cross connect cabinet (passive) had its door swinging in the wind and rain was threatening, further it was on the edge of a park with a skateboard bowl, the whole area regularly got spray bombed etc so the jumpers were in real danger of being pulled.

On investigation it seemed that lock was jammed, so I got some long cable ties from the truck, zipped them together and strapped the door closed, then put some insulation tape over that to ensure it stayed.

I rang faults, and as expected it took sometime to get to approximately the right area, strangely instead of getting a "thanks for reporting that we will get someone to checkin on it", I got a "we have logged your CLID if there is any damage to the cabinet we know where to find you".

Clearly I was not impressed and gave the CSR a good earfull on dealing with the public.

Cheers
Cyril

andynz

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#761578 13-Feb-2013 10:07

Bung:
Maybe someone that is familiar with this type of cabinet could comment on whether your fears are real or not. Just because you can see wires doesn't mean that mains voltages (LV) are exposed. Most Chorus workers aren't licensed electrical workers so the power area wouldn't be exposed just by opening the doors.

Thanks Bung. The fear is worst case scenario but the the side is partially open due to the damage and I would guess that pushing pine cones and other stuff into the cabinet, as has been done, is not going to make it terrible safe or reliable long term and after 2 months I think we can call this long term. Welcome any comments on DSLAM cabinet power distribution and placement though.

chevrolux

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#761584 13-Feb-2013 10:13

cyril7: Hi, had a similar experience a couple of years back, and area I was working in, was driving down the road and noticed a cross connect cabinet (passive) had its door swinging in the wind and rain was threatening, further it was on the edge of a park with a skateboard bowl, the whole area regularly got spray bombed etc so the jumpers were in real danger of being pulled.

On investigation it seemed that lock was jammed, so I got some long cable ties from the truck, zipped them together and strapped the door closed, then put some insulation tape over that to ensure it stayed.

I rang faults, and as expected it took sometime to get to approximately the right area, strangely instead of getting a "thanks for reporting that we will get someone to checkin on it", I got a "we have logged your CLID if there is any damage to the cabinet we know where to find you".

Clearly I was not impressed and gave the CSR a good earfull on dealing with the public.

Cheers
Cyril

HAHA what a noddy. I guess we shouldn't use initiative then and let the network get wrecked.

Interestingly enough I saw a new ISAM cabinet with a broken lock too. Obviously too big to cable tie so I put a bandit strap around it. We work directly with Chorus so wasn't a big deal to get it sorted.

Things like this do take them a lot of time to sort out. The upper reaches of Chorus make it really really hard for the regional branches to fix stuff. So much red tape for them to work through just to get paid for repairing the network.

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