Telkom ADSL install wait time

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BrokenLink

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Hey

I need to have a ADSL line installed to be operational from january, have any1 recently had one installed and know what the wait time is like? Its in pretoria.

Would rather have actual feedback than telkoms predictions :) Dont want to have it working to soon and then need to pay for an extra months rental while line is not used...

Thx!
 
i had telkom line ages, dsl activation at exchange was 2 weeks.

got my dsl for 3 weeks now
 
They were with me within 3 days to check out the premisis. But in the pole the next week friday and the monday they installed the line and everything work. Two weeks. But the installer said that I am lucky because people normally wait longer than I did.
 
Getting the voice line for me was fast, telkom was there in the same week. Getting ADSL activated....they told me not before 11 Feb, apparently no ports on my exchange and there is apparently a network freeze...
 
Just applied for voice line they confirmed yesterday tech guy coming next Thursday to install....then it's to activate adsl....so I'm expecting end December......this is in mouille point btw
 
Got both my line & DSL activation in about a week.
Only the line activation do they need to come out. Just need to check what speed your line is capable of.
Once you setup your ISP, I would recommend not migrating your line from Telkom to the ISP.

Had my ADSL line for 1 1/2 months and very happy with it. Much better than 3G!
 
My experiences so far: 10 days and counting..

Hi all

I'm writing up exactly what Telkom spins me day to day, while I wait for them to install the adsl line:

Today's post follows - read the whole story at my blog: http://wolfen351.blogspot.com

Telkom aDSL Installation: Day 10
Called Telkom, spoke to Michelle. The call wait time was about 5 seconds, love the quick answer! She struggled to find the record, but eventually found it after I gave my ID. Reason for taking long: escalated for cabling. (Again!!!???) Technical Code 31 on the line - Material Unavailable. She says that the 19th there were ports available. 21st my port was confirmed and marked. 24th a technician marked the thing with Code 31. Friendly consultant! Telkom will contact me when they get the material. The consultant thinks that it is an aDSL data card. She says that the last movement was on the 27th of November 21:53 - Data staff. She says that she will escalate the call. She gave me a better order number: 1877220-44 so the call agents can find my call easier.
 
To answer your question it can be 2 weeks to 6 months. Use all the escalation procedures and maybe you will get lucky. If not cancel and go the route of Cell C their offering is competitive.
 
There are many factors that could affect how long you can wait for ADSL to be activated:

  • Does a new line need to be installed on the premises?
  • Does the exchange support ADSL?
  • Then there is the hurdle of port availability on the exchange in some cases.
  • Also, consider the time of year as many Telkom employees take leave and orders might take longer to process.

In short, there is no real ETA as it differs from order to order.
However, the average waiting period is anywhere between 2 and 6 weeks. ;)
 
Telkom aDSL Installation: Day 11

This is the 11th day and about the 6th phone call to find out progress.. please see my blog for the rest.. http://wolfen351.blogspot.com/

Called Telkom - The menu is starting to irritate me today. Wait time is about 16 seconds. Spoke to Nazli. She is quite friendly. Took about a minute to read all the logs on the call.. :) Says her computer system is slow. Summary of our conversation is: Problem was cleared yesterday. Telkom will re-book the appointment.. She confirmed the call was escalated yesterday. She will book Friday for the installation - she will send to scheduling department herself. She made it sound like that is not the norm.. She said that she would ask them if they have anything sooner.. On Friday 7-8 am the technician will call me to give me the exact time for the installation, asked me to be flexible the whole day.
 
Telkom Installation Day 500-800

Still no phone lines installed, said my phone lines have been stolen 55 times.. strange.. 1st time in the 30 + years of living there never had a problem till 2 years ago.. they dont want to install because fear of getting stolen again.. solution.. put them underground.. they say they will install when they feel the need i suppose...
 
Telkom aDSL Installation: Day 15 (Big disappointment)

Today is telkom's 15th day after I have requested the aDSL line..

see the full story at my blog: http://wolfen351.blogspot.com

The positive (The technician & MWEB):

Yesterday (Friday - Day 14) the technician came out and installed the line. I especially arranged to work from home the whole day. He came out nice and early, around 8AM hooked up a tone generator/tester and disappeared.

He came back around 11AM and told me all was well. He specifically confirmed that the line was 4mbps. He gave me one of telkom's closer aDSL modems, and hooked it up for me nicely.

I gave mweb a ring (brilliant service by the way!) and they hooked me up with a username and password. They even configured the router, all in 15 min. Lets see Telkom 15 days and Mweb 15 Mins!! :)

So now i'm all excited - the line works, the modem is plugged in, and my username allows me to connect. Great so far! Open a browser, point it at Google. Nice, works 100%. :)


The negative (The speed of the line):

So I decide to just check that everything is ok. Point my browser at www.speedtest.net and press "test". Now, i'm expecting a nice 3.75mbps or something similar - it is a 4mbps line after all! Imagine my surprise when the result comes back with 0.88mbps!!!!! I'm like - that's not even quarter of the speed i'm paying for! I couldn't believe my eyes, so I ran the test SEVERAL more times, over the next few hours. Eventually it stabilized at around 1.4mbps connection speed.


The terrible (The call centre):

Today - Saturday (Day 15)

Time to try to sort this out. The only option I have is to call the call centre:

Call 1: Call the sales department, am told that i'm now an "existing" customer and that I would be put through to technical support. The line goes dead.. I wait a minute or two and hang up. Nice introduction to being an "existing customer".

Call 2: Call the existing customer option. The phone system forces me to enter a phone number, when I give it 1234567890 it does not recognise it. I give up - Where the heck am I supposed to get my phone number..

Call 3: Back to the sales department, speak to a more helpful consultant who gives me my phone number and puts me though to a tech support person. Spoke with Nicky who explained to me that my line syncs at 1mbps even though it is set to be a 10mbps line. She says that she will escalate the call for me and gave me a reference number: ESC000116245. Does that mean escalation number hundred-thousand? wow! It is starting to show me that Telkom's bad reputation is well deserved! Anyway I let her know that I'm thinking of getting out of the contract using the "cooling-off" period. Especially since I am paying for 4mbps and getting 1mbps BY TELKOM's own admission!!

Call 4: Decided to brave the damn menu one more time. Called the sales department, just to check what the cooling off period is. Spoke to a very rude and unmannered consultant called Florence, who refused to give me a reference number. She had no idea what the cooling off period was, and advised me that cancelling the line would involve cancellation fees!!! Can you believe that? They actually did not deliver the product I bought, and now they want to change me for cancelling! Wow! Telkom's reputation for being stupid is starting to come into focus. Really regretting trying to do business with them.

Anyway, now I have 2 options, cancel the contract or live with the slow speed. In the time while I am making my mind up, the mythical cooling-off period is ticking away....
 
If you have a uncapped account it could be the cause of the problem, you can purchase a 1Gb axxess prepaid voucher from PnP tillpoints @ R70 and test with that to confirm it's a Telkom problem.
 
Here is the latest installment of my attempt at getting aDSL installed and working... http://wolfen351.blogspot.com/2010/12/telkom-adsl-installation-day-19-fight.html

I'm on Day 19 now!!!

Called Telkom - Fought through the damn menu - (Man if you hear that "Welkom to telkom online by the sleepy computer voice again!!! grr!) - eventually got to the accounts section. Spoke to a polite consultant who explained that the Billing issue would only be able to be solved at the end of the month when they work out the account. I explained that this would cause me great unhappiness to be billed for something I did not order. He promptly put me through to ?Sales? without giving me a reference number or his name :(. I waited about 2 minutes and hung up.

Lets try this again...

Menu grrr. I mean if you tell me that your menu options change every time I call... * sigh * Lets try the fault enquiries line... They threaten all their fault reporting customers with an "unnessesary call out fee". Nice! The call centre system says it will take 15 minutes to answer the call!!!!!! Took about 5 min - Mali at fault reporting. He says I should call aDSL technical support.. 10219 Option 1 Option 2 Option 3. Telling you that I'm being shunted around and I don't like it..

Call number 3...

Damn menu is irritating me BIGTIME now! Calling Option 1, Option 2, Option 3.. Wait time was about 5 seconds.. Nomali. Efficient.. Told me it is a "between a 1 and 4 Mb line". I mean what the hell? She can't find the escalation number.. Does not want the Escalation number from me. She says the line has been put into service and that no escalations are logged against it. She wanted to palm me off to the "technical support" department. At this point I got grumpy and I demanded that she either sort out the problem or that her manager would. She put me on hold for 6 minutes. At which point the line started ringing... ?? Weird! "0113621144 is not available right now". Please leave a detailled message after the tone. That does it - Escalation here we go. She obviously was not looking for a difficult client..

Call number 4....

Called again, got to speak to Cynthia. Asked to speak to his manager immediately. 5 min hold time, when he told me that his manager is still busy with another customer and that the manager would call me back. Told him that I did not trust that the manager would call me back and would rather continue to hold. After about anouth 2 mins the line just cut out.

Call number 5...

"Welcome to Telkom Online" - Feel like chewing my pulses off! Got lost in the menu..

Call number 6 ...

20 mins and counting... Man I love waiting - I have spent an hour on the phone already, just to find out how far my query is. Interesting that the line is so "busy" just before 5pm.... Just how much patience do they think their "happy customers" have?

Thomas - spoke to me, tld me his manager is "unavailable". Took my ID and the reference number. Seems friendly enough. Need to log it as a fault. Cannot give me assurance that the problem will be fixed. Tells me that the terms and conditions mean that the service is not guaranteed. I explained to him that 25% of the advertised speed is unethical. He put me on hold.. 5 mins ... Total Call Time today: 1h30m. Told me he has requested feedback by email. He will call someone to get more immediate feedback... Still on hold, 15 min so far... He came back to me letting me know he is still on the problem and put me back on hold... 20 min total now...

They have the problem with my analoge port which could be affecting my speed. There is a port reference number logged (504CRK071210). Will be resolved in 3 days as per the Technicaln's SLA. Please call the 0800 375 375 Technical support.

On the ESC number they have not attended to. Thomas does not know how long the fault's department escalation SLA is. He says that [email protected] i should send him an email to resolve the issue. He seems to really be going above and beyond to help me.
 
I only waited a week for my line to be installed and had my connection in no time
 
Telkom aDSL Installation: Day 29 - Shaking my head

Hi all

Today is a sad day for me, I've officially given up on Telkom. From now on I will continue to fight the good fight, but I don't expect any resolution. These guys do not keep to their OWN SLA's never mind that the escalation process is a joke.

Read the full story at my blog http://wolfen351.blogspot.com

Summary of the latest below:

Developments since my last post:
* On SaturdayTelkom came to my house, but they were troubleshooting a neighbour's down phone line issue. Told me that my issue can be resolved with a phone call.
* On Sunday the Technician troubleshooting my line called me, upset because I don't have a telephone plugged into the line. He tells me that the line cannot sync above 1mbps because of the distance to the exchange. I tell him that I want that in writing, he refuses, but says he will discuss it with his manager. After a while he calls me back and says that his manager agrees that he cannot give the results to me in writing. He tells me that he cannot fix the line to 4mbps. I tell him that until he gives me an excuse in writing or fixes the line I will keep escalating the call. Just after that he closes the call and I receive the following SMS from Telkom:
"From 0214257454 - Telkom ADSL 011xxxxxxx(ref 504CRK071210) restored. Reply to this sms within 24 hrs if still faulty." I replied, but as I expected - No response!
* Yesterday evening a Research consultant phones me to hear about my aDSL experience! That was fun, told him all about this blog and how crap telkom is. I rated the technician ok, but the call centre and the admin and the process as low as I possibly could.
 
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