42Mbps Coming - Fix Existing Network First!

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kingdong

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Dear RON (Ron Reddick),

Thanks for the official announcement regarding the upping of speeds on your network to 42Mps HSPA in April, starting in PE.

See: http://mybroadband.co.za/news/broadband/18963-Cell-42Mbps-HSPA-arrives-April-2011.html

Having said this, I still can't fathom why you are rolling out this new network, when many of your existing customers are not even experiencing the woooooosh you currently advertise. On this forum, there are hundreds of unhappy customers who paid for a fast, reliable product, yet still have daily connectivity problems, slow uploads (W/Cape) and slow download speeds nowhere near what is acceptable. Many are reporting the system is slowing down dramatically this year, possibly because of over subscription on your towers.

How about you fix the existing infrastructure and look after your existing client base first. I surely hope that this isn't just lot of hot air wooooooshing past, after-all it's election time. Perhaps your existing customers will consider buying the new modem you are offering when their contracts expire. Unhappy customers don't make repeat / long term customers.

Regards
Ant
 
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I totally agree, Ron said he would get his tech team to look into the Brackenfell disaster area... but to date... 1 month later... no improvement!

Maybe this is their fix??
 
wont happen, think of it from a business sense point of view. U need to keep up with the competition and right now in the 3g market thats the perception of speed. So every1 is currently fighting for the title of fastest mobile broadband to use as their main selling point.

I guess most people still like the perception of driving a ferrari over the riability of a volvo, if u catch my drift ;-)

Me, bring that volvo any day!!!
 
according to the article ... this is part of them upgrading their capacity(with a better speed to boot) .... so is that not what you want??
 
lucifir said:
according to the article ... this is part of them upgrading their capacity(with a better speed to boot) .... so is that not what you want??
Click to expand...

Quite right - it's the same network that they're improving, not another one for faster future subscribers. It can only be to your advantage.
 
Some of you have missed my central point. Certain areas are still a major problem. Why can't they merely fix that which exists, considering people have paid for the service; many of whom have forked out cash in advance. If you read the article carefully, you will have to buy a new modem (42Mbps HSPA+ ZTE model) to get full advantage of the new upgraded network. It appears to me that the prevailing attitude at Cell C is : "if you do not like the service you have, there is a fix, and that is forking out more cash for new equipment".

So many have already got the 21mbps modems, but very few even reach 2mbps, according to all the speed test results on this forum.

People have paid over their cash, and a service advertised should be delivered, but it ISN'T.
 
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FFS, it's the same network.
The article clearly mentions, that along with these upgrades, comes increased capacity = a better overall experience for all, including the "disaster areas".
The holistic approach, combined with their individual attention given to towers, will make it better for all.

Who cares about the new speeds?
Overall it's going to result in a national improvement for all clients.
This is not like Vodacom or MTN whom only have a limited amount of towers which are 42Mbps ready - this is a national roll out.

So keep on contacting the call centre, email support or PM Ron or Lars (whom we are lucky to have here) and you'll be sorted.

Bashing on the advancement of technology and the network is ridonkulous in this instance.
 
It's matter of principle Shake&Bake. Why are large problem areas still being ignored after months of complaining, when the customers have paid already, and continue to pay?
Perhaps you need an analogy.

Let's say you have paid for entrance to a buffet restaurant.
You step into the queue and see the people ahead of you filling up their plates and then go and sit down and begin eating their meal.
While this is going on, you wait patiently for your turn while others eat.
Then the people who have already been served and have eaten their first plate stand up and the server tells you that you must go to the back of the queue so they can be served.
You protest, but nobody listens.
The people now at the front of the queue fill up their plates with even more food than their first helping, while you stand bye watching helplessly.
Imagine if this happened every day to you for months.
Wouldn't you also feel cheated, get grumpy from hunger or want to walk right out of there?
 
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Keep on calling on management.
If they're not going to listen to you, then see what CPA can do for you.

But the whole analogy you gave in the OP; of elections and a new network is a farce.

I'm a happy bugger and not trying to be blasé about your predicament, but you have to see that the 42Mbps upgrading of the network is and will be better for all.
Your "attack" on the 42Mbps upgrade would have people thinking it's not a good thing.

Drop Lars or Ron another another PM - I think I've read here where techies have been sent out to people's homes to get issues resolved.

Good luck.
 
Hey Kingdong! Your conclusion is totally wrong!
I can repeat one more time – this forum is the place of most unhappy people and techies.
99% of the CellC customers are happy and have no idea of existing of this forum.
I have at least 20 ppl around who got black and white sticks and running @ full speed (>5M).
They do NOT posting they speedtest result here. They running they sticks weeks by weeks without disconnections . . .

BTW - from january i can see 5 towers around and my speed is between 8 and 13M/ No disconnections . . .
 
Hold back on the upgrade and make good on your (Cell C) promise to bring coverage to the balance of the country
 
GRES said:
Hey Kingdong! Your conclusion is totally wrong!
I can repeat one more time – this forum is the place of most unhappy people and techies.
99% of the CellC customers are happy and have no idea of existing of this forum.
I have at least 20 ppl around who got black and white sticks and running @ full speed (>5M).
They do NOT posting they speedtest result here. They running they sticks weeks by weeks without disconnections . . .

BTW - from january i can see 5 towers around and my speed is between 8 and 13M/ No disconnections . . .
Click to expand...

I got to agree with him, many people I know dont have a problem.

Also if one truly understands wireless: I think what cell c implies is that by upgrading to 42 mpbs they will actually increasing the bar for exisiting connection speeds.
 
So by both of your reasoning's (GRES & MightyMuffinMan), everything is hunky-dory with your purchases, so nobody has the right to complain if theirs isn't up to standard. I get the feeling both of you would prefer that negative customer experiences were just brushed under the carpet or conveniently deleted from this forum so you can praise Cell C in chorus. Just because you not experiencing any problems, does not mean everyone is in your fortunate position.
 
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kingdong .... I think everyone understands that u having problems with cellc ... but in terms of this OP .... seems like they are trying to address the problem ... although maybe not quite to your liking .... as someone else here said ... maybe get hold of the ASA, ICASA (doubt u will get much help here) ... or maybe even one of the other networks?? I am sure they would love to show that cellc is lying about speeds, thus making them look good in comparison!! .... but if I were u and I was truly not happy with the product ... i would just go back to the place I bought it and kick up a huge fuss and get my money,etc. back
 
kingdong said:
So by both of your reasoning's (GRES & MightyMuffinMan), everything is hunky-dory with your purchases, so nobody has the right to complain if theirs isn't up to standard. I get the feeling both of you would prefer that negative customer experiences were just brushed under the carpet or conveniently deleted from this forum so you can praise Cell C in chorus. Just because you not experiencing any problems, does not mean everyone is in your fortunate position.
Click to expand...

Everyone has the right to complain if they are not receiving the service they pay for. But Cell C is still a business, so they either need to keep up with the local trends, or face losing this nice subscriber base they have built up with their 21Mbps network. As mentioned here, mostly techies and complainers visit the forums, and people complain far quicker than they complement on public forums. I have also had my fair share of issues which you will find all over the forum, but these have been worked on and we are getting positive results. I can assure you that there is no cellphone company in the world that operates with a 100% customer satisfaction rate. Fortunately, there is competition/opposition for those that do not want to sort out issues with their current SP. The grass is always greener on the other side.
Yes, Cell C has issues, but as a few posters have pointed out here, the network will just be upgraded, and they will still be able to focus on the current issues, some of which might even be resolved after the upgrades.
 
dingaanone said:
Hold back on the upgrade and make good on your (Cell C) promise to bring coverage to the balance of the country
Click to expand...

And so say most of us. I don't see much growth in the dark-red areas on the (poor) coverage map
 
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kingdong said:
So by both of your reasoning's (GRES & MightyMuffinMan), everything is hunky-dory with your purchases, so nobody has the right to complain if theirs isn't up to standard. I get the feeling both of you would prefer that negative customer experiences were just brushed under the carpet or conveniently deleted from this forum so you can praise Cell C in chorus. Just because you not experiencing any problems, does not mean everyone is in your fortunate position.
Click to expand...

If you read my post it says... nothing about your right to complain. All I'm agreeing with and stating...is that most people dont have a problem (I have a problem with my dongle currently btw) and that improving the tower speed to 42 Mbps will enable the tower to dish out more bandwidth (speed) to its users across connections as the upgrade will enable more backhaul capacity to be enablerd.

eg Just because a fibre supports 1Gbps does not mean that the tower/device will actually enable those speeds.
 
The past 2 weeks my wooosh been quite stable. So seen some improvement.
If they feel upgrading network, good for them. But lets hope they learned from previous mistakes in this rollout.
 
@kingdong. This time Ron is not talking about WHOOSH and buying new modems, instead he makes clear by quoting his CEO that their intention is to "boost the average performance on their network rather than merely creating higher peak speeds". For those who do not understand it, he added that the existing modem users should benefit from network improvements.
I read some HSPA+ R8 QUALCOMM presentations and it looks like this annauncement is consistent with HSPA+ migration strategy. There are many improvements in the network other than merely doubling peak transfer rates (which benefit few). Network intelligence is moved from the network computer to base station decreasing latency even further, improved data and voice capacitty, handover reliability and faster transition time from idle to high speed (for Web browsing) will benefit all. Qualcomm claims that R8 will double data rates to all existing (average and cell-edge) users.
CellC had mentioned migration to R8 when introducing WHOOOSH. For me it is also a way to fix existing network. Instead of dealing with second-rate support, now they have access to the current development team and enjoy real-time experience with the best. Assuming CellC employ engineers based on their abilities, not a political agenda, these gyus will certainly learn a bit, getting ready to fix network in problematic areas.
 
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