LLU Headaches

Forums › Vocus (including Slingshot, Orcon, Flip, Stuff Fibre and CallPlus) › LLU Headaches

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#20866 8-Apr-2008 11:21

So as a tech head and a web developer who works from home, I jumped at the chance to get on the new LLU plans, especially since I live about 500 metres from the Ponsonby exchange. After a bit of a wait time, I finally got my provisioning date and was looking forward to my shiny new ADSL2+.

The date came, and the next morning, I received an email from provisioning congratulating me on my connection to Orcon Home+. However despite having an ADSL2+ signal on my line, I was not authenticating.

After many calls to Orcon support, and speaking to some support techs who were helpful and friendly and some not so much, we finally determined that Chorus had not actually switched me over to Orcon's gear at the exchange.

Now another wait (albeit a shorter one) ensued as I went back through the provisioning queue.

Finally got a connection up and running on Friday afternoon of the the 28th, and I had shiny new 12Mbps down and 800Kbps up! But just to sour the relief that I finally had my connection up and running, my line was no down with no dialtone.

Several days, many more calls to Orcon support, and another exchange visit from a Chorus technician finally saw my phone AND my internet up and running.

I didn't however have my previous number moved and while I'm sure I requested this, Orcon seemed to think I hadn't. But, since we'd just moved in, I decided to live with the new number in the hope of just having some great uninterrupted service.

Now at this point I still did not (and still don't) have call waiting or voicemail on my line, despite being on the Gold+ plan. After speaking with support again they informed me that voicemail was having some teething problems and would be load soon. I'm not too worried about this, but I hope to have these all sorted if I'm paying for them.

All ran well for the first 4-5 days, before my router dropped my connection and would not come back up. Waited a while and did several router reboots and still nothing, so back onto support (oh man I hate that hold music). About 2 hours later I got reconnected.

The next week ran pretty smoothly, until last night when my connection dropped again, and would not come back up, this time at about 4.45pm. I jumped back on the phone to support and was assured that my problem had been passed through to tier 2 support and they are onto it, but as it's after 5pm I may not expect anything until tommorow.

Now I certainly don't expect Orcon to have a full team 24/7, but considering they're offering this new service, which based on my experience is not without it's issues, I would have thought that they might have a bit of overtime happening from support to ensure things are running smoothly.

I was a bit stressed by this non-committal promise of maybe tonight and maybe tomorrow, as I had clients waiting for site changes to be uploaded, and my backup connection through my cellphone was also playing up. However I figured there was nothing I could do and simply hoped that when I woke up in the morning, all would be back to normal.

So I get up this morning and I'm still not back up and running, so I'm back on the phone to support and all they tell me that my ticket from last week has been reopened, and I'm in the queue. I enquire as to an ETA on a fix, but all that I'm told is that since I phoned last night around 5pm, it could still be until tomorrow at midday before anything is resolved!

At this point I'm pretty frustrated, and I asked the guy I'm speaking to if there have been lots of other people having trouble with LLU connections and he implied that there had been.

Now as I said above, I don't expect miracles and 24/7 support here, and I understand that teething problems do occur with new products, and as an early adopter this is sometimes the price you pay. But I am getting frustrated, especially with little explanation as to why problems are occurring.

While I'm not a network engineer, a bit of explanation as to what is or might be wrong is much more calming than "your in the queue, and it will be looked at in 24-48 hours".

Has anyone else out there had troubles with their new LLU connection like I have? If you have, I'm sure you would agree that frustration levels could be kept at bay with a bit better communication from Orcon.

PS. Sorry if this all comes across as a bit of a rant, but I've just tried to brain dump what has happen over the past few weeks.

Scott

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22 posts

Geek

#122062 8-Apr-2008 11:49

Hey there, on the Ponsonby exchange here also. Have had exactly the same issues as you, was without Broadband all day yesterday
from 6am through 6am this morning. Have been chasing this with Orcon all week, with the same issues.

I couldnt receive calls in yesterday, people would either get the no such number tone or go straight to voicemail.

I have since changed my encapsulation to PPPOE this morning and authenticated. I think Ive raised close to 14 trouble tickets in the last week.

I too work out of home alot, so sticking with Orcon LLU is too risky for me, so I am having my number and BB ported out to another ISP.

My ADSL2+ speed was no better than standard ADSL, so I will not be losing any sleep over this.

Its been a complete headache, I undertsand the Orcon guys have assisted as best as possible, however the whole experience has been a disaster. Have also been in constant correspondence with Duncan Blair et al along the way.

So can honestly tell you that you are not alone with your experience. But for me, it was enough for me to move away.

Im just hoping my porting across to the new ISP wont take as long as it has to fix the current issues.

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#122065 8-Apr-2008 12:02

Ah, great to know I'm not the only one having problems here.

I'm not ready to give up and move away at this point since I'm getting such great speeds, but if I keep getting these dropped connections, with fairly non-committal ETA's, I'm going to get completely frustrated and have to do something.

As I said in my last post I totally understand that it's a new product and I'm used to early adopters syndrome, but I just really wish the communication from Orcon support staff was a bit better.

I've spoken to some people who have been quite helpful with info as to why there is or was a problem, but others just give me standardised wait times and say goodbye. This is where most of my frustration comes from.

Tom from corporate support, who I've dealt with a few times has been one good example, he was very helpful and didn't spare me any details when speaking to him.

I understand that not all staff can give me details, but a callback from a tier 2 tech wouldn't go astray in between getting told "could be up 24-48 hours", it's just nice to know that there are people aware of the issues looking into things.

Selfemployed

22 posts

Geek

#122070 8-Apr-2008 12:09

I have to agree with you, the team are being as helpful as they can. However most of the time I cannot even call through to the helpdesk in the first place, the phone drops connections or they cannot hear me at the other end, or most of the time the IVR cannot hear my push tone. So I just use my mobile instead.

Ive had dropped BB connections all week, If I look at my logs, I count 44 dropped BB sessions in 8 days. For about 2 of those days I did not have a connection at all.

Unfortunately its too hit and miss for me, so need something a bit more reliable and helpdesk support which provides me with pro-active updates, as oppossed to the other way around.

It was pretty frustrating having to manage a production deployment over the weekend without any broadband on Friday night to early Saturday morning. Had to find a 3G modem to get me online.

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#122072 8-Apr-2008 12:20

Yeah I found that yesterday too, the IVR didn't respond on my landline, so had to use my cellphone. Seems to be fixed this morning though with a new IVR message too.

i'm lucky I've not had any large deployments to deal with over the last few weeks, so have managed to survive on my 3g cell connection when I have to, but I fear the day that my Orcon connection goes down during something critical.

What I would really love to see is the ability to view support tickets on the Orcon site, I'm sure it would help alleviate the wait times on Orcon's lines if those of us who have backup connections can check on things without having to callback again and listen to that horrible looping hold music.

Just out of interest, who are you moving to?

Selfemployed

22 posts

Geek

#122075 8-Apr-2008 12:25

Well Im just hoping that I dont get a bill after all the issues resulting in the move across to LLU. Initially when I was provisioned I couldnt even see any usage information until I pointed that out, the next day that issue was fixed.

Im actually moving across to Slingshot, will give them a go, speed is not much of a concern for me, given on ADSL2+ I had a pretty similar synch speed to standard ADSL.

Im hoping that I can return the Homehub in person too and got back to my Linksys.

duncanblair

248 posts

Master Geek

Trusted

#122086 8-Apr-2008 13:00

There are a small number of customers who are experiencing issues with their transfer to the Orcon+ network, and while I realise this is of little comfort to those of you who are among those few, I will try to give a bit of background:

There are a variety of different things causing these faults, and there are people here working to fix all of them. For example, we are finding that some copper lines have faults that have gone undiagnosed on Telecom's network, probably just manifesting themselves as substandard sync speeds. When these customers come over to our network the fault is causing major problems for that customer - in terms of performance and stability.

While I am not trying to excuse these problems, the whole LLU process is a new process - right from provisioning through to fault resolution. Our guys are all working overtime to do everything that we can to ensure that the problems are resolved. Unfortunatley in some cases we are reliant on third parties, and we are managing these relationships as actively as possible.

So apologies for your experiences, and I have definitely taken the better communication message on board.

Selfemployed

22 posts

Geek

#122091 8-Apr-2008 13:13

Thanks Duncan, appreciate its new process and some learning still to take place.

I would really appreciate the increase in Comms as you suggest, perhaps an update on your website to acknowledge issues on the Ponsonby exchange or similar RSS feed?

I can honestly say I have had zero issues with my line with my previous providers, Synch speeds were never an issue, only power profiling, but understand you cannot comment on individual customers.

As mentioned prior Im more than happy to assist where possible in resolution of any issues or any interactive testing that can be done.

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#122096 8-Apr-2008 13:21

Hi Duncan, thanks for the response. I realise things are new for you guys too and as I've said I fully aware of the early adopter syndrome. As I said some of the support staff I've spoken to have been great, but some have been less than so.

I guess the biggest frustration for me and probably other customers that are technically inclined is that while it may not necessarily help fix the problem, giving us a bit of detail as to what's going wrong could help lower our frustration levels.

Plus as Selfemployed says, if we can help with some testing when resolving these issues, I'm sure we'd be happy to help.

0o0

46 posts

Geek

#122230 9-Apr-2008 00:42

Well i guess i'll add my Orcon llu horror story :P
In short, signed up on the 18th of march, got disconnected,without any warning, from iHug on the 30th march and had the misfortune of no proper internet till the 8th of April. After many calls to both ihug and orcon, the good people at orcon said they couldn't connect any sooner and gave me free dialup in the meantime, joy.
After being connected midday today:

Sync speeds with homehub:

Downstream rate:	4319 kbps
Upstream rate:	1019 kbps

adsl line
Status:	Cable connected
Line mode:	ADSL2+
Maximum line rate:	4484 kbps (upstream)
Noise margin:	6.3 dB (upstream)
Line attenuation:	46.5 dB (upstream)
Output power:	18.3 dBm (upstream)

46.5db att puts me about 3.3km away from the ellerslie exchange, about 2.7km straight line distance, so i wasn't expecting 24mbps but it's still a major improvement over 2.5-3.2mbps sync speeds with ihug.

Actual speeds:
Orcon gold+ with Homehub (siemens gigaset sx 763)

Note these are at 12:30am nz time, so offpeak for usa and nz.

Overall, it was worth the wait but i would caution any other early adopters, its probably better to wait a few weeks until Orcon gets the whole process smooth and efficient. I've only been connected for a few hours and have already experienced a few random disconnects but nothing major.

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#122496 10-Apr-2008 11:18

Well...my saga continues....

Yesterday I went to head up the road and noticed several Chorus vans parked up and down my road, with one technician up the pole directly outside my house. Great I thought, this is either going to have no affect, or something's going to go wrong. Giving it a little faith I popped up the road and came back about 30 minutes later. Just as I arrived back the Chorus tech was finishing up and headed off down my street. I noticed that the pole now had two new metal brackets on it that my neighbors and my lines were now running to.

When I got back into the house, sure enough my phone was now dead with no dialtone.

I quickly ran outside to see if the Chorus guy was still there, but all the vans had gone.

So sure enough, all I could do was call Orcon support again. After lodging yet another support ticket I carried on, with my internet luckily still intact.

However after an hour or so I noticed my speed was kinda slow, so I checked my sync speeds and I'd dropped from about 14000/800 down to 2500/200.

So back to support I go to add this to my ticket.

Now I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but does it seem odd to anyone else that considering the troubles that Orcon seems to be having with the LLU plans that Chorus techs would just so happen to install these new brackets on my copper loop resulting in not a complete disconnection, but a degraded service???

Anyway, I'm not too stressed at this point as it least I still have a connection, and the Orcon support was very apologetic when I spoke to them yesterday. I can definitely feel the frustration in their voices as I'm sure they're getting just as stressed out by problems like this as I am.

Will keep you all posted with updates.

Selfemployed

22 posts

Geek

#122503 10-Apr-2008 12:10

Hey Scott, sorry to hear about your issues. Just a couple of questions, is your phone line back up and running again?

If so can you hear any hum or line noise that shouldnt be there? Static clipping or anything like that?

My connection has been pretty good now for the last two days and now using PPPOE encapsulation may have made a difference - not sure.

Let me know how you get on

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#122508 10-Apr-2008 12:26

Hi Jason, my phone's not back up and running yet, so all I hear is silence at this point.

Apart from my much lower sync speeds, my connection hasn't been too bad in the last 24 hours, not too many disconnections.

Are you using a Homehub? If you are, what settings did you use to switch over to pppoe? mine doesn't connect if I simply change the encapsulation.

Selfemployed

22 posts

Geek

#122513 10-Apr-2008 12:45

Hey Scott, yeah I have the homehub also, you will need to arrange with the Orcon tech team if you are going to use PPPOE, was just something they got me to try and now have locked my port to PPPOE. So could be worth a shot.

Do you mind posting up your connection info from your homehub? SNR etc? Can you see it detecting ADSL2+?

Selfemployed

22 posts

Geek

#122514 10-Apr-2008 12:48

Here are my stats from the homehub:

'); document.write(''); document.write(''); document.write(''); document.write(''); document.write(''); document.write(''); document.write('

ownstream rate:	7732 kbps
Upstream rate:	1085 kbps
PPPoE pass-through:	if (internet_pppoe_passthrough == '1') document.write('Enabled'); else document.write('Disabled'); document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); device_no_adsl = (connection_type == 'DSL' ? '0' : '1'); if (device_no_adsl != '1') { document.write('
ADSL Line<\/h2><\/td>'); document.write('	<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); document.write('
Status:<\/td>'); document.write('	'); switch (adsl_line_status) { case '1': document.write('Cable connected'); break; default: document.write('Cable unplugged'); } document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); if (adsl_line_status == '1') { document.write('
Line mode:<\/td>'); document.write('	'); document.write(adsl_line_mode); document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); document.write('
Maximum line rate:<\/td>'); document.write('	'); document.write(adsl_max_line_rate_down+' kbps (upstream)'); document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); document.write('
Noise margin:<\/td>'); document.write('	'); document.write(adsl_noise_margin_down+' dB (upstream)'); document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); document.write('
Line attenuation:<\/td>'); document.write('	'); document.write(adsl_line_attenuation_down+' dB (upstream)'); document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); document.write('
Output power:<\/td>'); document.write('	'); document.write(adsl_output_power_down+' dBm (upstream)'); document.write('<\/td>'); document.write('<\/tr>'); } } Enabled
ADSL Line
Status:	Cable connected
Line mode:	ADSL2+
Maximum line rate:	7888 kbps (upstream)
Noise margin:	6.4 dB (upstream)
Line attenuation:	37.4 dB (upstream)
Output power:	20.3 dBm (upstream)

scottatron

18 posts

Geek

#122518 10-Apr-2008 12:55

Ah I see, maybe I'll give them a call and see if it helps.

Here's my homehub connection info:

Downstream rate: 3215 kbps

Upstream rate: 251 kbps

PPPoE pass-through: Disabled

ADSL Line

Status: Cable connected

Line mode: ADSL2+

Maximum line rate: 3016 kbps (upstream)

Noise margin: 5.6 dB (upstream)

Line attenuation: 27.5 dB (upstream)

Output power: 20 dBm (upstream)

So I'm definitely still getting an ADSL2+ signal, but my rates have dropped significantly since yesterday. I know some people are only getting speeds around this level, but given that I live 500 metres from the exchange, I don't see why I shouldn't be getting the speeds I was previously getting.

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adsl line

ADSL Line<\/h2><\/td>'); document.write('

ADSL Line