Openserve + Telkom locking complexes/gated communities in to contracts??

[RelativeIT]

Hi Guys,

First off, since this is my first post, let me introduce myself. I run my own IT consulting company in Somerset West since 2009 - I was an IT technician for a retail company before that for 5 years. I've lurked the forums over the years and am somewhat familliar with the forum. I've gained invaluable info in these forums before regarding internet provision which finds its way into my daily operations.

Bringing me back to my point:

I've built up some clients over the years. I resell Axxess internet to most of my clients which is 99% ADSL. Most of my clients aren't in Fibre covered areas yet. The ones that are, are in gated communities like Helderberg Village and Greenways Estate - both of which recently got fibre.

What I know so far is that in these complexes fibre was installed by Openserve, but Telkom was the customer interface that sold the solution to the body corporate / homowners association of these estates.

I was providing a bunch of clients in these areas with ADSL, and after getting Fibre, these clients wanted to transfer thier lines to me, because they like the way I do business and didn't want to deal with Telkom.

I proceeded to put in requests for transfers to Axxess of the lines, but Axxess cannot transfer the lines because they are locked in by an agreement with Telkom. I contacted Openserve about it, and they told me it was a "CSS" or "customer specific solution" offered to Telkom.

One of my clients is a member of the body corporate of one of the estates, but wasn't personally involved with the agreement, but tells me the contract spans for something like 10 years.

I have some concerns about this because Telkom has effectively just taken some business away from me. I was completely blindsided by this as were my cutomers. For the regular residents in these complexes, occured without my, or customer's direct conscent, because the decision was made by management of the complex on thier behalf.

Has anyone else encountered this yet? I was so hoping that Fibre was a means of getting Telkom out of my daily life, and now I'm stuck against another monopoly.

Please keep in mind that the above is the picture as I see it. I may not have all the information because my clients don't know everything, and Telkom and Openserve are somewhat guarded as to the info they give out, so please, take it as such.

My questions are:

• Do I have it wrong?
• Is there any way around it?

Any insight/discussion about this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Stünky]

Hi there,
The issue is regarding the cost for the layout of the fibre. I am in a complex that has the same 10 year deal for the fibre installation cost recovery. The fibre in my complex doubles as the intercom and in the future, it will also handle the CCTV installation.

So that is the reason for the 10 year lock down of fibre with OpenServe/Telkom. The setup is appealing to residents and tenants as it is more convenient to have an all inclusive package that provides a landline number, fibre and data. This setup is most likely offered at a slight discount to what you would pay in a un-gated residential area.

However, not all residents and tenants opt for landline and internet data from Telkom. I have to take the fibre from Telkom but I have my data from Afrihost.

So you could sell Axxess data to your clients in these complexes. The switch is as simple as changing the username and password on the router.

Lastly, you might find that certain offerings from Telkom are really competitive in terms of price.

I would suggest you contact the Telkom Gated / Lifestyle communities and compare the prices. Another selling point could be offering month-to-month data as some Telkom offerings are for 24 months.