Line/ADSL dead for 17 days - Afrihost reply?

[koosbeer]

My line has been dead for 17 days now. Afrihost manages my line so I am dealing with them directly. They have not gotten back to me in a while and I am not receiving any updates. Is the line being fixed? Are they currently working on it? I have heard "technician was assigned" since the fault was 5 days old. Afrihost has escalated but still no real feedback or progress. Im posting here as I am also not getting replies on my PMs.

Fault 180BTK060317. Please assist

 

[AfriFella]

My line has been dead for 17 days now. Afrihost manages my line so I am dealing with them directly. They have not gotten back to me in a while and I am not receiving any updates. Is the line being fixed? Are they currently working on it? I have heard "technician was assigned" since the fault was 5 days old. Afrihost has escalated but still no real feedback or progress. Im posting here as I am also not getting replies on my PMs.

Fault 180BTK060317. Please assist

I'm so sorry to hear about the long delay here, koosbeer. I can see that your fault has been open for a very long time and that we have sent through multiple escalations. Openserve responded to an escalation this morning stating that a tree has fallen on your aeriel route cable and damaged it. The unit has to be replaced which is the reason for the delay.

I'm sorry that this information was only relayed today, but I can assure you that we're doing our best to work with Openserve and resolve the issue for you as soon as possible.

 

[koosbeer]

I'm so sorry to hear about the long delay here, koosbeer. I can see that your fault has been open for a very long time and that we have sent through multiple escalations. Openserve responded to an escalation this morning stating that a tree has fallen on your aeriel route cable and damaged it. The unit has to be replaced which is the reason for the delay.

I'm sorry that this information was only relayed today, but I can assure you that we're doing our best to work with Openserve and resolve the issue for you as soon as possible.

Thank you for the reply. Here is my problem. This fault was reported 17 days ago. 5 days in, a technician rocket up, did his little machine thing, picked it up and then said he will come back. He never did. Now, today, AFTER you gave me the above information another technician rocks up. little machine, back and forth. "Sorry sir, we cannot gain access to the property but I can see from the street that the line is broken. We cant fix it Telkom has to."

Here is the problem: You gave me the report that the line is broken before the tech was at my house. Now this tech is reporting something that was reported a long time ago? Also, what can we really do? Is there anything we can do to make sure that the line gets fixed within a reasonable time? I dont understand why it is taking this long. I dont understand why Afrihost cannot apply more pressure to Telkom to get this done?

What is your purpose in the payment line? I pay you, not Telkom for the line rental. That should surely mean that you have some leverage or agreements in place to ensure atleast a basic level of service. Is this fault not at the point where they are truly obligated NOW to fix this thing ASAP instead start a whole new 10 work day BS over again?

I am really at the end of it all now. There is truly nothing I can do. But is there truly nothing Afrihost can do for me, your customer?

 

[WickedP3NGU1N]

Afrihost can put as much pressure as they want, but Telkom will get to it when they get to it, its just that sad unfortunately. My line was down on the 7th of March due to "Wind" that shifted the box and slightly moved the cable. That was fixed quite quickly but only because I have a connection at one of the contractors Telkom use so I was lucky he could shift the Fault Number to his workload. Then last week Thursday the line goes down again. Logged it with Afrihost and then had 3 separate SMS's from Telkom with 3 different faults. 1 is a area failure with the main ISAN/MSAN/Exchange in the area, the other is a faulty DSLAM and the 3rd was area maintenance so I was really NOT sure what was going on. My connection called a friend of his who rocked up and did all his checking, and it turns out that they did maintenance on the mini exchange around the corner and "Forgot" to plug all the connections back in, some 30 odd of them.

So with techs like this running around for Telkom that forget to plug stuff in again, I really hope they fix your issue soon! Afrihost did what they could but there is nothing they can do about Laziness/Buck passing/Lack of care from our incumbent

 

[Toxxyc]

Doesn't matter, his contract is with Afrihost, not Telkom.

I would refuse to pay for the downtime. Telkom does that, Afrihost should too.

 

[AfriFella]

Thank you for the reply. Here is my problem. This fault was reported 17 days ago. 5 days in, a technician rocket up, did his little machine thing, picked it up and then said he will come back. He never did. Now, today, AFTER you gave me the above information another technician rocks up. little machine, back and forth. "Sorry sir, we cannot gain access to the property but I can see from the street that the line is broken. We cant fix it Telkom has to."

Here is the problem: You gave me the report that the line is broken before the tech was at my house. Now this tech is reporting something that was reported a long time ago? Also, what can we really do? Is there anything we can do to make sure that the line gets fixed within a reasonable time? I dont understand why it is taking this long. I dont understand why Afrihost cannot apply more pressure to Telkom to get this done?

What is your purpose in the payment line? I pay you, not Telkom for the line rental. That should surely mean that you have some leverage or agreements in place to ensure atleast a basic level of service. Is this fault not at the point where they are truly obligated NOW to fix this thing ASAP instead start a whole new 10 work day BS over again?

I am really at the end of it all now. There is truly nothing I can do. But is there truly nothing Afrihost can do for me, your customer?

I completely understand your frustration here. The reply to our escalation came in at 09:32AM this morning. It's possible that the tech who came out on site did not receive have this info before printing out his work order. I'm truly sorry that this miscommunication happened.

As mentioned, this does seem like a general issue and requires the replacement of hardware in your street. Openserve have created the work order and a Telkom team should be out to replace these components very soon.

Doesn't matter, his contract is with Afrihost, not Telkom.

I would refuse to pay for the downtime. Telkom does that, Afrihost should too.

As far as a credit goes, we're always super happy to credit for downtime. You really don't deserve to pay for something that you can't use. Your credit can, however, only be determined once your fault has been restored so that we have a start and finish date to base a calculation off.

 

[koosbeer]

Doesn't matter, his contract is with Afrihost, not Telkom.

I would refuse to pay for the downtime. Telkom does that, Afrihost should too.

Im definitly not paying for the downtime. I will make sure that the money is not deducted or returned. I just get the feeling that everyone is utterly powerless to do anything while the person getting screwed is me? The support guys get paid by Afrihost to "handle" the customer (me). Afrihost gets paid by everyone else. One guy refusing to pay because his little 4mb ADSL line isnt working is probably not having any effect on Afrihost. Telkom gets paid by Afrihost. So everyone is getting their money and happy for it. The only one that gets BONED is me. The customer, paying (in a small way) for all these things.

So again, my question to Afrihost. Is there honestly nothing you can do with this fault in its current state but reply with "we are doing the best we can" where your best is obviously not solving my line? Are Afrihost really that powerless in their deal with Telkom to take over line management? If that is the case, then there is a lot of dishonesty going on and the real life business strategy "We just hope nothing breaks" is really the strategy?

I get that the customer should just take it. Lying down, over the barrel whatever but isnt Telkom screwing Afrihost? Or does Afrihost feel one unhappy customer (with a legitimate gripe) is worth all the other stuff they get from Telkom?

It boils down to this: Afrihost really needs to show that they have the customers back on this, otherwise there is no reason to be dealing with Afrihost. They need to show that they will go the extra mile to help out their customers in a really bad situation. If they dont do that,then they are condoning Telkom's behaviour and just sitting back and going "well, I did escalate it".

Pressure needs to be applied. I simply just dont know where?

 

[Rickster]

Doesn't matter, his contract is with Afrihost, not Telkom.

I would refuse to pay for the downtime. Telkom does that, Afrihost should too.

He will definitely get a credit note from AH and Telkom.

 

[Icemanbrfc]

Doesn't matter, his contract is with Afrihost, not Telkom.

I would refuse to pay for the downtime. Telkom does that, Afrihost should too.

Calm down lol You can only request a credit, once the issue has been resolved. So from the time of logging the incident, to the issue being resolved, the days taken will determine the credit. It will be super easy for koosbeer once AH passes credit, because his next invoice will just indicate the credit, so he wont pay full.

 

[AfriGenie]

Im definitly not paying for the downtime. I will make sure that the money is not deducted or returned. I just get the feeling that everyone is utterly powerless to do anything while the person getting screwed is me? The support guys get paid by Afrihost to "handle" the customer (me). Afrihost gets paid by everyone else. One guy refusing to pay because his little 4mb ADSL line isnt working is probably not having any effect on Afrihost. Telkom gets paid by Afrihost. So everyone is getting their money and happy for it. The only one that gets BONED is me. The customer, paying (in a small way) for all these things.

So again, my question to Afrihost. Is there honestly nothing you can do with this fault in its current state but reply with "we are doing the best we can" where your best is obviously not solving my line? Are Afrihost really that powerless in their deal with Telkom to take over line management? If that is the case, then there is a lot of dishonesty going on and the real life business strategy "We just hope nothing breaks" is really the strategy?

I get that the customer should just take it. Lying down, over the barrel whatever but isnt Telkom screwing Afrihost? Or does Afrihost feel one unhappy customer (with a legitimate gripe) is worth all the other stuff they get from Telkom?

It boils down to this: Afrihost really needs to show that they have the customers back on this, otherwise there is no reason to be dealing with Afrihost. They need to show that they will go the extra mile to help out their customers in a really bad situation. If they dont do that,then they are condoning Telkom's behaviour and just sitting back and going "well, I did escalate it".

Pressure needs to be applied. I simply just dont know where?

Network and hardware issues do usually take a bit longer for Openserve to repair, and where possible we do push hard for issues to be resolved as quickly as possible. But if hardware needs to be ordered and replaced on the Exchange or major cables need to be repaired the timeline can increase quite a bit.

Once the fault has been resolved you will definitely be credited for the period during which you had no connectivity.