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We moved house a couple of weeks ago, which meant moving phone, internet, etc. Due to not having broadband with Telecom, the move would take about a week.. same old story - can't have more than one Job request per account in the system at a time, so 1 for phone move, then 1 for DSL move from my ISP after the phone move has been completed. Screw that, time to dump Telecom. Voice line is too expensive anyway, and we don't make that many phone calls. Lets move to:
1) Naked DSL with Snap (awesome, works well, speedy connection, pretty good service from the call centre, etc etc)
2) VOIP with a SIP provider. I decided to go with iTalk from slingshot on recommendation of a friend.
I'm looking forward to when it's working completely and I never have to call the slingshot call centre again....
*) Entered the account application online on the 13th. A friday. probably a stupid idea. This application included the porting of our old number from the telecom line.
*) Account was not actually activated until the 24th, and porting wasn't completed until the 25th. That's appalling. The website for iTalk says a lead time of 2 business days. Should have been the 17th or so. Granted, this is probably Telecom, but come on.
*) The Linksys ATA device I purchased from slingshot was not actually sent to me until account activation. It's mine, I wanted it when it's purchased. Turns out that this is because they don't activate the account until the number is ready from porting, and they pre-configure the device with provisioning data.
*) I could access all of the configuration on the ATA device when it arrived, and I noticed some URLs in the advanced section - a tftp, and https - both referring to slingshot servers. As soon as I'd configured it so it could access the net, it apparently fetched these details and subsequently locked me out of the admin area by applying a password.
*) Calling the slingshot call centre is awesome... "There should be no password".. "What about 'password'?" "'admin'?" etc etc etc.. "I've never seen this before, you shouldn't have to enter a password.." ad infinitum.
*) I repeatedly ask for a copy of the cfg file that the device is fetching. "No, that's privvy to Callplus, sorry you can't have it". Dammit, it's my device, and the config file is specific to my device - it has the MAC address of the unit in the filename. (Yes, I could just fetch the file myself with wget or a browser - but it's https and requires a client cert..)
And finally, the ATA device itself registers with the SIP trunk fine, but will periodically drop off and give a registration status of 'Failed'. Seemingly randomly. With no other SIP clients connecting.
On the positive side, the couple of phonecalls that I *have* made with the VOIP line have been great - clear audio, and featureful - voicemail, caller ID, etc etc..
So in summary, not terribly impressed with the provisioning and service from the slingshot call centre, and somewhat bemused by the fact I cannot get the config that they're provisioning my device with. Unless I'm mistaken, it's my device, not rented (I've specifically asked that on the phone, and both times they've said, "yes, it's yours, you paid for it"). I'd love to get a copy of that config file so that I can actually use it myself, on my own webserver.
Biddle Corp
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