Why does Vector inform you of planned outages yet Chorus does not?

Forums › New Zealand Broadband › Why does Vector inform you of planned outages yet Chorus does not?

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383 posts

Ultimate Geek

#933307 13-Nov-2013 16:46

From the point of view of somebody who reads the Chorus notifications at an ISP I can think of a few straight forward reasons. I'm not an expert in this area so this is educated speculation at best and could well be wrong. It should at least give you an idea of some of the likely limitations.

A lot of it has to do with who has what information.

A typical notice to an ISP might provide information something like 100 pair connected to exchange X.

Now this tells the ISP a lot and very little. It is theoretically possible but probably not practical for an ISP to have a database that matches customers to their exchange. We do have access to that sort of information.

Now 100 pair would mean only 100 connections possibly less as it may be some of those pairs are not in use. Additionally I believe but could be wrong that the report 100 pair I hear about is not 100 pair belonging to my ISP but all potential ISP's. To add another level of confusion if it is only 100 pair down and an ISP has 200 pair in use by its customers there is no way to know which ones are affected.

I can think of more examples and scenarios but the above should give you an idea of the barriers to providing customers with good communications about outages, planned or otherwise.

Please note: I have a professional bias towards Vodafone.

Talkiet

4793 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#933311 13-Nov-2013 16:51

I don't know the reasons they'll give you, but I'll have a stab...

- Electricity is a genuine monopoly unless you want to generate your own - and some people rely on electricity for life critical purposes. If broadband is important to you, it's incredibly unlikely you are actually limited to one provider anymore.

- Electricity could be used for cooking, heating, keeping stuff cool, security systems (yes I know SOME people MIGHT think that Internet is important for this too - see above point - get a backup). Internet is used for playing, unless you're a business, in which case, get a connection with an SLA, or at least a backup connection.

- Chorus don't have end user contact details, and they DO provide outage details to RSPs. You SHOULD have an issue with the RSPs before you have an issue with the infrastructure provider that doesn't even have your contact details.

- Not all infrastructure providers are as important as each other. Would I rather lose electricity or Broadband? Well, I have been in the position where I did lose electricity for nearly 3 weeks after the Feb 22 quake in Chch. It was significantly more impacting than losing broadband, believe me! As it happened, I had a backup 3G solution so I actually had no power but still had connectivity.

- As has already been pointed out, it's likely that the service interruption was due to a fix being done rather than planned work. Sometimes this happens. Deal with it.

Cheers -N

Please note all comments are from my own brain and don't necessarily represent the position or opinions of my employer, previous employers, colleagues, friends or pets.

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933326 13-Nov-2013 17:09

Talkiet. Your comment about "deal with it" was rude. I am dealing with it in the only avenue of communication I have. Chorus will not respond directly to any communication on service and as past experience has shown in trying to get issues sorted for our community, they only listen when you scream at the top of your voice. Ask Chorusvan, he knows!

The response of Chorus when a Tornado ripped through our community this time last year was abysmal. I know that faults messages left through various ISP's where not passed on to the engineers in the field. Vector had the area up and running in 12 hours. Chorus took approx 7 months. Not comparable? You had to be here to see the two teams and the way they worked. Chalk and cheese.

This post is about the potential for Chorus to improve their service by listening. What I find is an attitude of tough, you get what your given. It is quite sad.

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933327 13-Nov-2013 17:12

KiwiNZ:
andynz: My ISP received no notification of an outage on our street.

It leaves the un-answered question as to why Vector who, I don't buy from, do notify me.

It is a different standard of service yet they are both infrastructure providers.

Is it an opportunity for Chorus to look at the service they offer. Yes. Will they. It seems unlikely.

Ring Vector and ask them why

Not sure why I need to ring Vector, I don't have a problem with their great service. No I don't work for Vector, hold shares or have any other reason to praise them.

michaelmurfy

meow
13260 posts

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Lifetime subscriber

#933365 13-Nov-2013 17:33

andynz: So a database of email to physical address with auto content sent by the tech would be a good idea?

Nope, it will annoy more customers, ISP get's the blame and things get pretty messy. Customers don't normally know about Chorus and blame the ISP for everything. xDSL is a best effort service so if your business relies on it you should be looking into a dedicated option complete with a SLA - this way if an outage was going to potentially occur you'll get a notification explaining this and how long it's going to be out for.

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
Referral Links: Quic Broadband (use R122101E7CV7Q for free setup)

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Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

Kirdog

202 posts

Master Geek

#933386 13-Nov-2013 18:09

If your business so important, then you can have this solutions:

Power: UPS, + small petrol power generator 1-2 Kwh (or more, depends on size of your business).

Internet: 3g/LTE Backups.

Easy :).

Sorry about my English guys :>

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933430 13-Nov-2013 18:44

Hey guys, its not about me its about the state f service from Chorus. DSL gone again so on 3g. just went for a drive. sure enough guy by the side of road but didn't know he had disconnected us. "What phone number are you" he asked. its naked DSL I said. "Oh" hr said. then started looking through the local network database. it is red school work book with lots of side notes and scribbles but nothing about our existing baked DSL.

Is this really the state of the art network database, a hand written work book with missing active circuits?

Quic Broadband

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canoe

15 posts

Geek

#933506 13-Nov-2013 20:58

andynz: Hey guys, its not about me its about the state f service from Chorus.

Just a thought - it is possible to get one's internet from an ISP selling Vector instead of Chorus but it depends where you are. it doesn't sound like you are in a suitable location but something to bear in mind for the future.

good luck with it.

pjamieson

441 posts

Ultimate Geek

Trusted

Chorus

#933619 14-Nov-2013 02:27

I'm sorry AndyNZ, but could you please just deal with your Retail Service Provider. That is the regulated framework instigated by David Cunliffe in 2006.

Chorus cannot deal with you. If there is a planned outage it will be communicated to your RSP, if they don't pass it on, it is their lack of systems at fault. If it is an unplanned outage you have a regulated 4 hour timeframe to be advised of a resolution time and for that resolution time to be adhered to.

Blaming a Tech for not responding to some random walk-up is not acceptable, nor is comparing the Electricity Network to the Telecommunications network without doing some basic investigation (which once again could involve talking to your RSP about your contract with them for UBA Services).

And in my opinion also look forward to these targets going from an exceeding to a nearly met result if the UBA Price reduction goes through.

Once again, log a fault with your RSP, if it is a repeat fault or outside the committed times, ask for it to be escalated.

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933642 14-Nov-2013 07:58

canoe:
andynz: Hey guys, its not about me its about the state f service from Chorus.

Just a thought - it is possible to get one's internet from an ISP selling Vector instead of Chorus but it depends where you are. it doesn't sound like you are in a suitable location but something to bear in mind for the future.

good luck with it.

Thanks for the suggestion but we only have the option of Chorus copper in Whenuapai. It's kind of ironic as we are on the fence line of Aucklands main military and civil support area and a couple of k's from the Southern Cross termination facility.

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933650 14-Nov-2013 08:20

pjamieson: I'm sorry AndyNZ, but could you please just deal with your Retail Service Provider. That is the regulated framework instigated by David Cunliffe in 2006.

Chorus cannot deal with you. If there is a planned outage it will be communicated to your RSP, if they don't pass it on, it is their lack of systems at fault. If it is an unplanned outage you have a regulated 4 hour timeframe to be advised of a resolution time and for that resolution time to be adhered to.

Blaming a Tech for not responding to some random walk-up is not acceptable, nor is comparing the Electricity Network to the Telecommunications network without doing some basic investigation (which once again could involve talking to your RSP about your contract with them for UBA Services).

And in my opinion also look forward to these targets going from an exceeding to a nearly met result if the UBA Price reduction goes through.

Once again, log a fault with your RSP, if it is a repeat fault or outside the committed times, ask for it to be escalated.

Well that is certainly an interesting take on things.

Chorus knows the cables round Whenuapai are in a bad state of repair. Chorusvan knows it too and has talked with me on the phone about it and other issues you can find in previous posts. These are complaints with validity not just some winge on about nothing.

Chorus spend a large amount of time round here swapping pairs between neighbours till they get the least complaints. They promise a review of the state of the copper network then never report back (again previous post about reporting back but we never heard anything. Yesterdays outage was due to the tech "checking the state of the cables" who then disconnects our dsl because there is no record in the hand written red work book of the crossing over of pairs at various posts to get a working pair and you are suggesting I ring my RSP to report a fault. Sorry but that is just ludicrous. It does not mater who put what regulations in place. The guy was 4 doors down from here. The fix, once I explained to him which pairs were used for what, was a 5 minute job for him to reconnect what he had dropped off. Your suggesting I don't talk to him, lodge a fault then wait for 24-48 hours for another tech, who does not know what the first tech has done, to come and decide there is cable issue then wait a further 24-48 hours for another contractor to come and repair the cable. Have you seen the film Idiocracy?

We are obviously coming from differnet experiences hence our differing points of view but I do not accept the notion that because a system is in place it is the best system there is. You only have to read my many posts here about Whenuapai and Chorus to know this single post is not only about a specific fault but a much bigger issue of the way the copper infrastructure is run.

The proposed UBA price reduction is a different subject and not relevant to our local copper network. These copper pair problems have been going since I moved here 23 years ago. It is a issue with the way the hardware business (Telecom then and Chorus now) maintains the system. For the number of call outs over the years the cables could have been replaced 5 times over. It is nothing to do with current discussions on copper pricing.

1080p

1332 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#933658 14-Nov-2013 08:41

If living in an area with a problematic copper network is a great issue for you, perhaps it would be a better idea to look into shifting premises rather than bleating on for months on end.

Chorus obviously have a planned calendar for upgrades and the vast majority of that will be looking at rolling out the next generation fibre network. I suppose it is a harsh reality that you will need to put up or shut up because the community there is not large enough to (economically) justify an immediate intervention.

Additionally, I see that Whenuapai is on the Chorus map for eventual fibre deployment. Explain to me why they should spend bucket loads of cash completely overhauling something they will replace in a few years time anyway?

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933681 14-Nov-2013 09:25

so that justifies the red note book, no records kept and me having to tell the tech how to reconnect our DSL?

andynz

360 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#933683 14-Nov-2013 09:28

Chorus have not set date for fibre and long term fibre seems increasingly unlikely. so no fibre and no copper. Just dandy. Great Barrier Island has people moving it to it because of the ability to do business now yet 20min from cbd?

canoe

15 posts

Geek

#933704 14-Nov-2013 09:56

try calling ryan at stratanet and see if they can deliver wimax to you. we use them to get high speed internet to places like dairy flat, miranda where no land lines at all. they can deliver up to 400mb up/down if you really want.

http://stratanet.co.nz/

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