Hi,
I'm sending the following piece to as many papers as I can. It probably needs some finetuning, and since we all have so much to say on this matter, I thought it best to post it here and get some feedback first.
Please send me any rational editorial changes or criticism which you think would improve the letter.
L.
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I signed up for an ADSL connection about 8 months ago, and enjoyed remarkable access speeds. I could play online games, browse the web, catch up on e-mail and chat to online friends. I didn't have to worry about call charges and I could connect at any time of the day.
Then Telkom decided that they weren't making enough money off ADSL; they changed their pricing structure with the net effect that everyone who had ADSL enjoyed substantially less data transfer for the same price.
SO I was forced to take a smaller package which cost the same amount of money.
Let me break down what being an ADSL user costs, so that your readers don't fall for the rubbish that Telkom puts into their marketing.
I have a 192kb/s connection, the cheapest connection speed that you can buy from Telkom. Just the connection costs me R240 a month. But having the connection is not enough, I also have to pay for Internet access.
Before their pricing change in November, I could transfer up to 10GB of data for +-R190. This is on top of the fee I pay for 'renting' the line from Telkom. After the change in November, I was forced to change the package to R210 for 3GB of data.
Since then, my experience (and that of many others) with this service has been laughable.
Since last Friday, my ADSL connection (which I pay R450/month for) has been worse than using a standard phone line with a modem. I currently experience transfer speeds of 1/4 of what I'm paying for, if I'm connected at all. I have been unable to browse international sites reliably since then.
I called their 'customer service' centre on Sunday to log a fault with them. After waiting 10 minutes to speak to someone (and being shunted from one department to another), the agent took down my details and said he would log a call. Aside from not being able to give me a reference number for the logging of my call, he also told me that no-one could help me right now and that someone would call me back.
No-one has called yet, and knowing their standard level of 'service', nobody will.
Their official response to the situation is that there was no situation. Despite the fact that numerous users posting on local online forums complained about terrible access problems, their response was that "their network management systems did not pick up anything". How sad that a company with the reins on our communications infrastructure cannot detect a connectivity issue that was and is still virtually nationwide.
I do not understand how the CEO of Telkom enjoys a R40/annum salary when the infrastructure of the company clearly cannot cope with the existing user base. And they are advertising flatout to get more customers! This will further saturate the already overloaded network and degrade the service even more for the existing users.
Telkom is undeniably the thorn in the side of progress in this country. In the trenches, the situation is getting worse and worse. Telkom is not listening to its customers, they're just taking the money.
The second network operator (SNO) promises to bring some small measure of change, but it won't have any effect on the end-user for a few years to come. The SNO will be obliged to utilize Telkom's network infrastructure until they have developed their own, and they will only support business use initially.
There is also the danger that they will collude behind the scenes with Telkom to fix prices, as happened with the 'competing' cellular brands (one of which Telkom enjoys a major share in).
ICASA was supposed to be the watchdog keeping Telkom in check. They have had no effect at all, it's even gotten worse. Prices are up, service is down and Telkom keeps making more and more money.
When is someone going to do something about this? We can't do anything, we're powerless. The only way we could possibly show our displeasure is to not use their service, but we don't have any alternative.
Telkom is aware of their users' displeasure. They read the same forums that we post to, and they do nothing. They don't have the courage to admit that there is a problem; and given their official position on this weekend's connectivity issues, it seems that they do not have the technical expertise either.
I will almost certainly cancel my ADSL connection now, since it is virtually useless to me. Telkom clearly is not able to manage its own network, and I am confident that most ADSL users would agree.
I'm sending the following piece to as many papers as I can. It probably needs some finetuning, and since we all have so much to say on this matter, I thought it best to post it here and get some feedback first.
Please send me any rational editorial changes or criticism which you think would improve the letter.
L.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I signed up for an ADSL connection about 8 months ago, and enjoyed remarkable access speeds. I could play online games, browse the web, catch up on e-mail and chat to online friends. I didn't have to worry about call charges and I could connect at any time of the day.
Then Telkom decided that they weren't making enough money off ADSL; they changed their pricing structure with the net effect that everyone who had ADSL enjoyed substantially less data transfer for the same price.
SO I was forced to take a smaller package which cost the same amount of money.
Let me break down what being an ADSL user costs, so that your readers don't fall for the rubbish that Telkom puts into their marketing.
I have a 192kb/s connection, the cheapest connection speed that you can buy from Telkom. Just the connection costs me R240 a month. But having the connection is not enough, I also have to pay for Internet access.
Before their pricing change in November, I could transfer up to 10GB of data for +-R190. This is on top of the fee I pay for 'renting' the line from Telkom. After the change in November, I was forced to change the package to R210 for 3GB of data.
Since then, my experience (and that of many others) with this service has been laughable.
Since last Friday, my ADSL connection (which I pay R450/month for) has been worse than using a standard phone line with a modem. I currently experience transfer speeds of 1/4 of what I'm paying for, if I'm connected at all. I have been unable to browse international sites reliably since then.
I called their 'customer service' centre on Sunday to log a fault with them. After waiting 10 minutes to speak to someone (and being shunted from one department to another), the agent took down my details and said he would log a call. Aside from not being able to give me a reference number for the logging of my call, he also told me that no-one could help me right now and that someone would call me back.
No-one has called yet, and knowing their standard level of 'service', nobody will.
Their official response to the situation is that there was no situation. Despite the fact that numerous users posting on local online forums complained about terrible access problems, their response was that "their network management systems did not pick up anything". How sad that a company with the reins on our communications infrastructure cannot detect a connectivity issue that was and is still virtually nationwide.
I do not understand how the CEO of Telkom enjoys a R40/annum salary when the infrastructure of the company clearly cannot cope with the existing user base. And they are advertising flatout to get more customers! This will further saturate the already overloaded network and degrade the service even more for the existing users.
Telkom is undeniably the thorn in the side of progress in this country. In the trenches, the situation is getting worse and worse. Telkom is not listening to its customers, they're just taking the money.
The second network operator (SNO) promises to bring some small measure of change, but it won't have any effect on the end-user for a few years to come. The SNO will be obliged to utilize Telkom's network infrastructure until they have developed their own, and they will only support business use initially.
There is also the danger that they will collude behind the scenes with Telkom to fix prices, as happened with the 'competing' cellular brands (one of which Telkom enjoys a major share in).
ICASA was supposed to be the watchdog keeping Telkom in check. They have had no effect at all, it's even gotten worse. Prices are up, service is down and Telkom keeps making more and more money.
When is someone going to do something about this? We can't do anything, we're powerless. The only way we could possibly show our displeasure is to not use their service, but we don't have any alternative.
Telkom is aware of their users' displeasure. They read the same forums that we post to, and they do nothing. They don't have the courage to admit that there is a problem; and given their official position on this weekend's connectivity issues, it seems that they do not have the technical expertise either.
I will almost certainly cancel my ADSL connection now, since it is virtually useless to me. Telkom clearly is not able to manage its own network, and I am confident that most ADSL users would agree.
