After reading jmosen's recent post about Telecom and Orcon, I also want to raise a very similar story.

Some time ago my partner and I purchased a property (not a new house, previous owners did have a telcom line), and planned to move house on the weekend of 25/26 August.
Now as I use the internet a lot from home for work (home office), I did lots of planning.

We had been a customer of Orcon's for over 10 months, and we very happy with the service (we had 15gb max/max internet, and the homeline service), so we haven't had a Telecom bill for a while.

3 weeks out from moving I contacted Orcon to organise the change of address, and to move our homeline, broadband, and tolls. I explicity asked if there would be any issues with the new address, and if they could check the line there first, just so we know its all ok. Orcon said this was fine, and the change-over would be instant, with no downtime (or very little).

Reasonably happy with this, we ordered the change over. Was scheduled for the monday (27th)
Now 1 week before the move, Orcon suddently came out with their new "Talker Surfer" plans, with 12 months free home phone line.
We decided to go ahead with this, even though it took about 4-5 email requests back and forth from Orcon, to get it sorted (each Support rep that emailed us didn't know there was already a service order to change address).

Anyway that was sorted, we were switched to the new plan ($92 / mth), for homeline, unlimited tolls, 20gb internet, etc.

Now came the weekend of the house move, which went well! (no rain!)

And on Monday, at 12 noon, the phone and internet was disconnected at the old house. Which was fine, as I thought all was going to plan.

As I wanted to be "safe", we specifically setup the sale and purchase agreement on the old house to give us "one" week extra after the move, in case we still needed the phone line there. (also for cleaning)
I also organised another set of PC gear, including computer, modem, etc, in case I needed to use the internet at the old house (while it was empty) in the week after the move.
I also had my normal office setup in the new house.

It came to Monday afternoon, and a few hours after being disconnected at the old house, there was still no phone line (no dial tone) and no internet at the new property.
So this is when the many calls to Orcon started.

After lots of calls, I was told to wait, and that it was being looked into.
I was also told by the Orcon staff (who were mostly very good) to check every phone jack, etc. But still no luck.
Got to 5pm Monday, and we were told to give up, as it was end of business hours.

Tuesday came round, still no luck. Rang Orcon again, they said there was an issue with Telecom, and it would be sorted soon.

Tuesday afternoon, still no internet or phone.
Now this was starting to really get on my nerves, as I *needed* it for work purposes. I tried to ask Orcon to switch it back on at our old address (so I could use the 2nd office I setup), but couldn't be done.

So I had an office and PC's setup at both houses, with no phone, no internet, stuck without being able to do any work.

Finally managed to get hold of the helpdesk manager at Orcon, who was going to look into the problem herself.
So it looked like I was finally getting somewhere.

After more calls that I can imagine, 5pm Tuesday rolled round, still nothing, everytime I spoke to Orcon, they said "Telecom" were looking into it. And they also kept saying "I had done everything right, lodged the correct orders, etc, and it wasn't my fault!". They also said they had followed the right procedure (contacted Telecom), so there was nothing they had done wrong.

I just couldn't understand why they couldn't just organise a tech to go and check the exchange.

Anyway, I was told by the Orcon helpdesk manager, that it should be going in the morning (Weds).

Wednesday morning comes, and guess what, no phone or internet.

After more phone calls, and getting hold of the direct line number of the helpdesk manager (who was most part helpful), I managed to make some progress, and push the issue "higher up" the chain.

Finally the manager at Orcon was getting somewhere, and had finally got hold of Telecom.
Telecom were now saying there was a "service request" open on our new address, and they wouldn't do anything to the line until this "service request" was closed!!!! ??????
So Orcon told them to close it.

After lots more calls during Wednesday, to the Orcon manager, and Orcon staff, finally they had some good news!
Telecom had agreed to send a technician around to investigate the problem.

The Orcon manager rang me personally back, to say a Downer tech would be coming around after 5pm to check the line, and the exchange.

Sure enough, before 5pm a Downer Tech rang my  cell, and said "ITS WORKING"!.
Checked the ASDL, all go, and phone line, all go!
The Downer tech even gave me his cell number, and said to check it, and call back if any problems. Very nice guy to deal with.


So finally after 2 and half days without phone or internet, it was finally sorted.
And all it took was Telecom to close a "service request / order", that was supposedly open, and send a tech around, who spent all of 5 minutes switching it over.

WHY COULDN'T TELECOM HAVE SENT THE TECH TO FIX THE PROBLEM & DO THE CHANGE OVER AT 12pm ON MONDAY!!!
They wasted 2.5 days, trying to say there was no problem, and they wont do anything, as there was already a service order open!!!!

Do you know what the service order/request was??? It was the one that Orcon placed for my change-over! DOH!!!!
Someone between Orcon and Telecom just had no idea....


Anyway, I spoke again to the Orcon manager, thanked them, and they explained the situation better:

(not in their exact words): "Telecom are usually pretty good in switching customers, and whever we (Orcon) put requests through to them, they get done quickly. However, since we have released these new free homeline plans, Orcon has been swamped with new customers, all switching from Telecom. As a result, Telecom are starting to slow things down, and not playing nicely, causing delay's just because they can".

And in my case, all it really took was a couple of managers to escalate the problem further up, then Telecom finally decided to pull finger and get it fixed.

Its basically the same as the story from jmosen. I was stuck in the middle between Orcon and Telecom.
Telecom didn't want to budge, and Orcon couldn't do much either.
And I can't ring Telecom and ask for help, as I'm not "their" customer anymore.

Overall I still rate Orcon's products & pricing a 9/10, as my ADSL speeds are very good, and never drops, plus pricing excellent.

However, their customer service may have slipped slightly since I first signed up over 10 months ago.
Call wait times to their helpdesk were approx 15-25 minutes on average (over the 10-15 calls I made during my downtime)
Back when I signed up it was quicker (5mins max).
This can be related to the "free" homeline deal Orcon recently released, lots more customers!

And I rate Telecom a big 1/10. As they are plainly abusing the situation they are in, and not playing nicely when customers are switching.

But thats not new, and will probably be the case from now on, as more customers switch to other ISP's.

Anyway, thanks once again the Orcon helpdesk staff, and the manager, for persisting with my problem, and putting up with my constant calls.