orcon outage

Forums › 2degrees (including Slingshot, Orcon, Flip, Stuff Fibre, MyRepublic, 2talk and Vocus) › orcon outage

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57 posts

Master Geek

#1028514 21-Apr-2014 11:01

@FireEngine this is the sort of information Orcon should have posted on their network status page. People just wnat to know what is going on and are normally sympathetic and understanding when given an explanation. Personally I think Orcon handled the event very poorly and did themselves no favors in my book. Once fiber comes my way in June I will be looking at my other ISP options for sure.

FireEngine

1223 posts

Uber Geek

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#1028518 21-Apr-2014 11:20

RJKIng: @FireEngine this is the sort of information Orcon should have posted on their network status page. People just wnat to know what is going on and are normally sympathetic and understanding when given an explanation. Personally I think Orcon handled the event very poorly and did themselves no favors in my book. Once fiber comes my way in June I will be looking at my other ISP options for sure.

It was on the network status page, as up to date as here.

What would you have had us do better? (Genuine question)

Regards FireEngine

RJKIng

57 posts

Master Geek

#1028532 21-Apr-2014 11:48

@FireEngine, In my and a colleagues opinion the amount of information provided on the outage page was limited in describing the extent of the outage. Words along the lines of major or multiple events (Hamilton and CH-CH Dunedin), health and safety restrictions for technical staff to access the area and the details of a location / cause of the fault. Details like landslip just North of Kaikoura, multiple cuts rail bridge wash out etc. While some customers may not appreciate what this detail means the more technical minded people, like those that visit this site, would appreciate the information and give them some understanding of the significance of the repair required. Also that technical staff were working on rerouting services would also have been good info, obviously this was a contingency but would give users some assurance all efforts were being expended.I should not have had to come to this site to get a full picture of the problem. The information you gave here was extensive and informative. All things the official support page we not.

FYI I have no problem with the Orcon product I subscribe to.

Thank you for taking the time to provide the extensive information here.

Bartanda

23 posts

Geek

#1028564 21-Apr-2014 12:48

And don't forget I was originally given a fairy tale by the helpdesk that an upgrade was in progress while the network status showed "Due to vendor backhaul issue... may experience packet loss and some voice impact Wellington Christchurch Dunedin Timaru Queenstown. No ETR from vendor as yet." At this point the network had been down for about an hour.

Don't get me wrong though, I appreciate the information @FireEngine has been providing, but I agree with RJKIng that the information should be were most people will look for it. Additionally the info should be accurate and not try to make the situation appear less severe than it really is. Orcon should now provide affected customers compensation for such a lengthy outage.

RJKIng

57 posts

Master Geek

#1028586 21-Apr-2014 13:45

@Bartanda don't even bother asking for compensation. They will throw the T and C's at you.

"From your email I understand that you’d like to request for a credit.

My apologies for the delay in responding to your email, we do appreciate your patience during this time also however, we were told by our upper management that we are unable to provide a credit for the outage because as per our terms and condition:

8. LIABILITY

8.1. Orcon will not be liable to you if it is prevented from providing the services by reason of any act of God, act of state, riot, insurrection, civil commotion, strike, sanctions, boycott, embargo, adverse weather conditions or any other circumstance (including a network failure) beyond our reasonable control. If such an event occurs, Orcon will endeavour to advise you of the existence of the event and the effect of such event on the provision of the services.

Our technicians was able to fix the issue today so all you need to do is turn off the modem for 5 minutes then turn it back on again.

I hope this information was helpful and if you have any other queries please do not hesitate to email me back or call me on the number below.

Thanks for contacting us."

Edit Clarification: Was not me that asked for compo but just thought I'd share other users experience here.

wolfshead

2 posts

Wannabe Geek

#1028591 21-Apr-2014 14:21

RJKIng: @Bartanda don't even bother asking for compensation. They will throw the T and C's at you.

"From your email I understand that you’d like to request for a credit.

My apologies for the delay in responding to your email, we do appreciate your patience during this time also however, we were told by our upper management that we are unable to provide a credit for the outage because as per our terms and condition:

8. LIABILITY

8.1. Orcon will not be liable to you if it is prevented from providing the services by reason of any act of God, act of state, riot, insurrection, civil commotion, strike, sanctions, boycott, embargo, adverse weather conditions or any other circumstance (including a network failure) beyond our reasonable control. If such an event occurs, Orcon will endeavour to advise you of the existence of the event and the effect of such event on the provision of the services.

Our technicians was able to fix the issue today so all you need to do is turn off the modem for 5 minutes then turn it back on again.

I hope this information was helpful and if you have any other queries please do not hesitate to email me back or call me on the number below.

Thanks for contacting us."

Edit Clarification: Was not me that asked for compo but just thought I'd share other users experience here.

@RJ King - The true Irony is I didn't ask for compensation, I just complained at the lack of honesty and poor communication from Customer services - The response - to not read my email and then tell me provide a generic response the wasn't even relevant - End game - I am going shopping

FireEngine

1223 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1028652 21-Apr-2014 18:17

RJKIng: @FireEngine, In my and a colleagues opinion the amount of information provided on the outage page was limited in describing the extent of the outage. Words along the lines of major or multiple events (Hamilton and CH-CH Dunedin), health and safety restrictions for technical staff to access the area and the details of a location / cause of the fault. Details like landslip just North of Kaikoura, multiple cuts rail bridge wash out etc. While some customers may not appreciate what this detail means the more technical minded people, like those that visit this site, would appreciate the information and give them some understanding of the significance of the repair required. Also that technical staff were working on rerouting services would also have been good info, obviously this was a contingency but would give users some assurance all efforts were being expended.I should not have had to come to this site to get a full picture of the problem. The information you gave here was extensive and informative. All things the official support page we not.

FYI I have no problem with the Orcon product I subscribe to.

Thank you for taking the time to provide the extensive information here.

I think you are forgetting that such a situation, and our understanding of it, evolves over time, in all honesty the Website Status page aims to give the following information:

The fact that there is a major outage.
Who is affected
When it will be fixed

Those aims are pretty common across most industries.

We aren't aiming to give a complete context there as we fully understand we don't have it, and in cases such as this can't get it in a timely fashion (e.g. the fact that there are multiple cuts to the same link didn't become apparent for some time, diagnostics can't tell you that, a tech, or a policeman has to get past the first landslip to see the second, report it back, tests run etc etc it just isn't clear from the get go how bad it is during weather events).

At least you get a descriptive text, many utilities think "Under Repair" or similar is sufficient statement. As always there is a balance between speed of information and detailed content, in our case we concentrate on getting the fundamental details there as quickly as we have them.

Note weather events are unlike any other damage, normally when an excavator cuts a fibre once he stops, he doesn't cut it again down the road, or 100km away so generally the fix time for the cut gives you a firm indication of when we can expect service restored.

Of course I can come on here later and give you a fuller story but I don't believe that was possible much earlier. Yes we were working on re-routing but with no guarantees (and it took some 12hrs to enact even then), and the team were pretty stretched just getting such service restored - if you followed our Network Status page on Friday we had 3 concurrent major impacting events, like it or not in such times we will rightly concentrate on restoring service and communicating as best we can.

BTW I personally was updating the Network Status page for much of Friday - any difference in information is intentional for the target audience.

Regards FireEngine

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

RJKIng

57 posts

Master Geek

#1028668 21-Apr-2014 19:08

FireEngine:
RJKIng: @FireEngine this is the sort of information Orcon should have posted on their network status page. People just wnat to know what is going on and are normally sympathetic and understanding when given an explanation. Personally I think Orcon handled the event very poorly and did themselves no favors in my book. Once fiber comes my way in June I will be looking at my other ISP options for sure.

It was on the network status page, as up to date as here.

What would you have had us do better? (Genuine question)

So after I answer your "Genuine Question" as to what I would have had you do better you you think the industry common practices are acceptable.

Way to go by being standard.

Thank you for the detailed information you gave here. It puts in context the significance of the outage and the effort required to restore service. A shame users accessing the standard network status page did not learn of it.

FireEngine

1223 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1028695 21-Apr-2014 20:30

RJKIng: Way to go by being standard.

Standard doesn't include Geekzone so we are clearly not just standard.

I think you misunderstand me, I'm saying that the information available at the time limits the breadth of the information we can put out, and I am saying our Network Status is better than just saying "this is broken and it is under repair".

I'm also saying that every utility presents the information in a similar way - after all that is what customers want to know:

Is my problem part of a bigger issue?
If it is when will it be fixed?

What you are asking for we are happy to provide, through this channel, it can also be posed through our social media channel on Facebook, but it isn't really appropriate for a bulk "Status" channel (an equal number of customers will view larger articles as unclear and confusing).

So at the moment I have some genuine feedback from my genuine question, I'll consider on that basis how we can improve things, it doesn't mean I have an instant answer. (although I did make 2 changes to our outage notification content and process as a direct result of these incidents during the outage).

I am not however going to enter increasingly sarcastic debate, this is MY time on here, not Orcon's. I would ask you to take on board that I and Orcon provided the best information we had available at the time, as quickly as we could. I cannot promise to have better information or faster next time - as I have explained that is not always in my power, particularly in events such as those.

Regards FireEngine

FireEngine

1223 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1028701 21-Apr-2014 20:37

Bartanda: the info should be accurate and not try to make the situation appear less severe than it really is.

At that time we did not understand the additional impact to Dunedin and area, at the time this was posted, that was our understanding. No dishonesty here, just a time lag in information.

The Dunedin impact was caused by a completely separate issue to the Wellington and South backhaul issue.

Regards FireEngine

RJKIng

57 posts

Master Geek

#1028702 21-Apr-2014 20:37

@FireEngine. Sorry for the sarcasm, a moment of weakness on my part.

insane

3239 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

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#1028713 21-Apr-2014 20:53

FireEngine:

...I'm also saying that every utility presents the information in a similar way - after all that is what customers want to know:

Is my problem part of a bigger issue?
If it is when will it be fixed?...

I'll back you up on this one, when we've provided in depth incident updated/reports to xDSL users you end up getting more questions about what's happened or going on, technologies used, even some 'free advise given' etc that you really don't want when you're already swamped.

As a user though I expect to be told everything, before, during and after an issue, pay bottom dollar and receive rockstar service, the ISP can never win :)

FireEngine

1223 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1028715 21-Apr-2014 20:58

RJKIng: @FireEngine. Sorry for the sarcasm, a moment of weakness on my part.

Apology accepted.

At the moment I'm pretty sure if you had seen the full set of updates on the website it would paint a reasonably comprehensive picture and not far off what I have put up here - it certainly referred to us putting a replacement link in etc.

I'll see how we can present/record that while still keeping the info clear when multiple incidents are ongoing.

Regards FireEngine

FireEngine

1223 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1028716 21-Apr-2014 20:59

insane: As a user though I expect to be told everything, before, during and after an issue, pay bottom dollar and receive rockstar service, the ISP can never win :)

LOL! :-)

Regards FireEngine

RJKIng

57 posts

Master Geek

#1028717 21-Apr-2014 21:02

FYI I have no problem with the Orcon product I subscribe to.

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