Is Telkom its own worst enemy?

The only view I shall give about Telkom service, is the view of my backside. At an average of ~500 faults per 1000 lines (resid+bus), that's quite a lot. Taking car manufacturers, the good ones are at less than 10 per 100, or 100 per 1000. Huge difference. I think Telkom should give less money for bonuses and give more money for support training and better support service.
 
Exacerbating this problem is that the auditing system appears to lack the capacity to ensure that a single fault is not logged multiple times.
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For my last fault:
Logged at 8am
Fixed by 9am (very good!)
Got a call at 10am saying a technician was on his way to fix. Told them it was ALREADY fixed.
4pm - Technician arrives at my house to fix fault.
 
Novice

Most of my problems have been due to cable breaks caused by the contractors widening Buffelsfontein Rd at Builders Warehouse. Sometimes I could access the net and not the phone line, other times the whole line was down.
Telkom service here in PE is not too bad. The longest has been 3 days.;)
 
"Telkom’s understaffed technical department is under tremendous pressure to lower fault resolution times, but they lack the necessary resources to meet these targets"

With billions R's of net profit?:confused:
 
Telkom is suffering from the same problems as other major government organisations - politics, politics and politics; inefficiency, corruption etc etc. South Africa has a major crunch heading its way - we have lost so many good technical people over the last number of years, with English speaking countries like Aus, NZ and the UK snapping up our people. The military was in the news about this - lots of the last few white experienced techies buggering off to Aus to work in their defence force; lets not forget ESKOM; the SABC has major *** on the way; MNET has a shortage of television technicians; Municipalities don't have town engineers anymore - they have all left; And the list can continue. People can say that the power of the Aus Dollar, US Dollar or Pound attracts people - I say to a certain degree. I came back from UK after working as a tech there - I would'nt want to live there again...

Telscum is also responsible for their own predicament - rationalising staff at a crazy rate for the pure purpose of a better bottom line. Telscum's infrastructure has been upgraded, but not to the high standards needed in today's digital world. We are hamstrung but the tightfistedness of management - all to improve profits and thus to improve their bonus cheque.

I would also say that affirmative action has played a massive role in the failure of Telkom to rise above their profits - political appointees got top jobs without understanding the fundamentals of management. The idea that the government had, that they could replace the pale male with a "previously disadvantaged" was flawed. A lot of companies are discovering this.

I know a bit about what is going on at SABC - the broadcast has lost so many experienced white technicians, that there is a massive problem on the way - they are buying 4 new HDTV Outside Broadcast trucks and will have no experienced television technicians to run them. They do have some good black techs around, but their technical skills are not up to scratch at HDTV level. The situation is dire there. I can only imagine what is going on at Telkom where the situation is magnified.
 
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I finally got a call this morning from a telkom technician to come and install my new landline on Saturday. I made the application 3 months ago. I had all but given up on ever hearing from them.
 
Telkom seems to think that by going wireless/mobile they can avoid the problem of copper theft and keep/migrate their existing customers. That's an easy way out for them, but it won't work. It's a misconception on their part - here's why:
While I'd EASILY choose TelkomADSL over any wireless option, I wouldn't choose any wireless Telkom product over a competitor's wireless product. I can guarentee you that many of their residential and business customers only stick with them because they hold the monopoly in providing true POTS and ADSL services, which are still the most efficient and reliable.
The competition in the wireless/mobile arena is fierce - why Telkom's even trying to expand into (=BIG SPENDING) this area at this point in time is beyond me! They're spending money on the wrong areas, and should sort out their bloody failing/stolen copper infrastructure before anything else. Put someone into management that understands what to do to meet the damn market requirements and keep customers happy with efficient service and support!
 
A lot is said about Telkom, but it isn't alone if you look at telkoms in general. What about the forum? If I write to the boss, how long before I get a reply I wonder.
 
If you were to compare Telscum to BT in the UK, you would find huge similarities - both are monopolies, one is partly state owned, the other was previously owned by the State. The attitudes are very much alike, but BT has the technical staff to get things done. It does not have great service levels though. BT has excellent techs that get things done, but due to BT, internet access lags that of some of Europe (don't mention Spain though - that is crazy service) and ADSL broadband remains costly due to BT.

One thing that the UK has right, is the regulator, OFCOM. Our idiotic regulators could learn something from OFCOM!

I found BT to be alright - when ordering our landline, it did not take long, nor did our ADSL line activation. The ISP I used resold BT bandwidth, but it was pretty effecient (I had no download caps at all - in one month downloaded 120GB). Now compare that to Telscum (who are my ISP - don't see the point of using MWEB or others) - we really live in the dark ages here....
 
YKW said:
A lot is said about Telkom, but it isn't alone if you look at telkoms in general. What about the forum? If I write to the boss, how long before I get a reply I wonder.
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Depends on how relevant the issue is :D I agree that similar issues exist within large companies, but Telkom can improve through better systems. They are particularly bad I think...3 hours waiting time on the phone is just not acceptable.
 
I think they should implement a sms system. So u sms ur contact details and wait the 3 hours (not holding on the phone) for them to call back. Might take the same time but less stressfull for us.
 
rpm said:
Depends on how relevant the issue is :D I agree that similar issues exist within large companies, but Telkom can improve through better systems. They are particularly bad I think...3 hours waiting time on the phone is just not acceptable.
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It's a cheap shot I think having a go at Telkom when this is a common problem in all SA business (including MyBroadband and their disorderly house:D). They may be the whipping boys of the moment, but they are in good company.
 
YKW said:
It's a cheap shot I think having a go at Telkom when this is a common problem in all SA business (including MyBroadband and their disorderly house:D). They may be the whipping boys of the moment, but they are in good company.
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But you do not have a choice with Telkom..if you get bad service from another company you generally can go somewhere else.
 
i will have to phone them in august to move my adsl part of the line to a new line but leave the old line and number behind.... i dread that call.
 
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