dobroadband install service sloppy

I am doing a self install. Got modem on Tuesday after ordering a week ealier. ADSL line syncs at expected rates but can't get past the verification step where one has to log on using guest@telkomadsl and pull down a page or two to activate the service. The modem won't login onto the guest account.

I called the customer service line on Wednesday and a guy told me to reboot the modem while he followed the process remotely, then said all is fine and that I should contact SAIX to activate the ISP account. When calling SAIX, they refused to process my request saying that the line has to go through the verification step first and that it still has not been activated.

I called again just now (three days later) and the "customer service" guy tells me that their verification server is down and that an email went out to all subscribers today. But I am not a "customer yet"! He says this, seemingly trivial, service is down and it is being attended to. I wonder if it went down due to heavy use, too many new subscribers?!

Somehow that response doesn't reassure me. Anyone know what else I can try to get this thing sorted out?

-z

For all good there is bad, and vice versa ...

I upgraded my DSL384 to DO3 at one of the Telkom customer centres, and within an hour my router was sync'ing at 4096

So yeah, sometimes they CANT, other times they WONT, but this time they did

Forget about the verification, go to the easy set up. Teklom must give you a user name and password to enter, the guest account does not work.

I ordered plain DSL (not the dobundle). Verification didn't seem to work, but somehow did:

SecretCode said:

The line synched without a hassle, but the verification (www.telkom.co.za/verifyadsl) did not seem to work. But later on it said "Your ADSL Service request has already been processed." so I think it's more an issue of misleading messages than not working.

Click to expand...

I did not phone Telkom at any point.

the technicians are attending to it ...

After countless calls to the support staff. I decided to do more research and diagnose the problem myself. It turns out that my router is sending out packets but gets no response from the remote side.

On my next call, after hearing my diagnosis, the support guy says that the exchange in my neighbourhood is affected. He then logged a fault and gave me a reference no. He tells me that because it affects a lot of people in my area it will be fixed quickly. But why do I not believe him ...

It seems that before I have even started using their service, I have hit a snag. Will let you know if it ever gets sorted out or I eventually cancel the service. I bet though that they have already charged me for this month's "service".

-z

sorted

This thing got sorted out 8 hours after the support call. I am now pulling data from the tubes that make up the interweb via ADSL.

If you are doing a self install watch out for the "no response from remote side" error. You can either see it happening from the DSL stats page (where you will see that the router is transmitting but gets no response) or if you dial out in briging mode you will get the standard "678 remote site did not respond" error message. If you report this the techies might respond faster/better.