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websquadza said:
Question to Vumatel users: Would an add-on (IE a small extra cost per month) SLA interest you?
  • Assuming it provided you with the following:
    • Quicker access to support and escalations (We're talking from the Vuma end here) and;
    • Guaranteed Mean Time to Repair (ie, your line is repaired within a certain time frame between Monday and Saturday)
This would be a pseudo SLA (with proposed numbers that aren't far off what the FTTB providers provide). Comment below whether you would be interested in this add on and what you would be willing to pay for a service like this.
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How much are we talking here? JMPD "lunch" , EMPD "Lunch" or delmas "lunch"
 
:laugh:
5-10% extra for a guaranteed SLA? add that promised wireless service that's coming as backup connection I would well consider it for permanent-work-from-home usecases
 
websquadza said:
Question to Vumatel users: Would an add-on (IE a small extra cost per month) SLA interest you?
  • Assuming it provided you with the following:
    • Quicker access to support and escalations (We're talking from the Vuma end here) and;
    • Guaranteed Mean Time to Repair (ie, your line is repaired within a certain time frame between Monday and Saturday)
This would be a pseudo SLA (with proposed numbers that aren't far off what the FTTB providers provide). Comment below whether you would be interested in this add on and what you would be willing to pay for a service like this.
Click to expand...
Hmm I'm interested.
I'm thinking R50-R100 extra per month but preferably closer to the R50 side.

The reason why I'm saying this price is because I've been on 3 fibre providers:
SADV: 3 years with nearly no unplanned downtime
Vuma aerial: 8 months with no unplanned downtime
Vuma trenched: 4 months with 3x unplanned downtime

So considering there's history of 40+months with negligible downtime, R50-R100 would be free money for you/them.

I recently had downtime from vuma trenched and they quoted 3 days to fix and took exactly 3 days to fix. Not sure what was wrong, I'm guessing they unplugged me and needed someone to patch me on again. But if I was sorted out the same day then the monthly extra cost would have been worth it.
 
websquadza said:
Question to Vumatel users: Would an add-on (IE a small extra cost per month) SLA interest you?
  • Assuming it provided you with the following:
    • Quicker access to support and escalations (We're talking from the Vuma end here) and;
    • Guaranteed Mean Time to Repair (ie, your line is repaired within a certain time frame between Monday and Saturday)
This would be a pseudo SLA (with proposed numbers that aren't far off what the FTTB providers provide). Comment below whether you would be interested in this add on and what you would be willing to pay for a service like this.
Click to expand...

@websquadza

honestly? you know my deal, right. so the idea that i should pay a further fee for VT to deliver what they already should have is hard to swallow.

edit: for context, my ticket with them and their failed delivery has been "open" since February 16th.

on your side, it was updated yesterday or today with a message from them saying that i ****ing somehow need to prove to them that it isn't a "limitation on the device". this, after you and i have comprehensively and painstakingly demonstrated to them over many, many weeks using multiple machines and an infinity of tests and configurations that it has nothing to do with the LAN. that little episode cost me 2 weeks of work at the time amongst everything else. and i'm still doing it.

for more context, here's a picture of the box they installed at my previous residence:

20200905_145924.jpg


and here's a picture of their technician running away when asked to fix it, because "it's not my job" and you should call "the installation guys"...

20200905_152849.jpg.


so. yeah. weirdly, i'm not blown away at the idea of a tack-on fee to help them cover their over-indebtedness, bad business decisions, and consequent unsustainable exposure. especially when they suggest that the fee is to pay them to honour their ****ing obligations in the first place.

what's next? two guys come round and suggest that it would be a pity if a nice fibre installation like mine "mysteriously" burned down and maybe they can help me avoid that, for a small fee?

YMMV.
 
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daelm said:
@websquadza

honestly? you know my deal, right. so the idea that i should pay a further fee for VT to deliver what they already should have is hard to swallow.

edit: for context, my ticket with them and their failed delivery has been "open" since February 16th.

on your side, it was updated yesterday or today with a message from them saying that i ****ing somehow need to prove to them that it isn't a "limitation on the device". this, after you and i have comprehensively and painstakingly demonstrated to them over many, many weeks using multiple machines and an infinity of tests and configurations that it has nothing to do with the LAN. that little episode cost me 2 weeks of work at the time amongst everything else. and i'm still doing it.

for more context, here's a picture of the box they installed at my previous residence:

View attachment 1036848


and here's a picture of their technician running away when asked to fix it, because "it's not my job" and you should call "the installation guys"...

View attachment 1036852.


so. yeah. weirdly, i'm not blown away at the idea of a tack-on fee to help them cover their over-indebtedness, bad business decisions, and consequent unsustainable exposure. especially when they suggest that the fee is to pay them to honour their ****ing obligations in the first place.

what's next? two guys come round and suggest that it would be a pity if a nice fibre installation like mine "mysteriously" burned down and maybe they can help me avoid that, for a small fee?

YMMV.
Click to expand...

This is my one large fear with the product that's been announced. There's a slippery slope where we're told that a client needs to be a "priority" client for better error resolution. And it doesn't help when the Operations team we deal with continuously push back - I don't see how paying a premium will resolve an attitude issue.

That said, your ticket is a unique rarity, which is why we're not letting up with them. Our team will be in touch in the morning to arrange a site visit to (hopefully) isolate the issue. Thanks for your patience here.
 
websquadza said:
This is my one large fear with the product that's been announced. There's a slippery slope where we're told that a client needs to be a "priority" client for better error resolution. And it doesn't help when the Operations team we deal with continuously push back - I don't see how paying a premium will resolve an attitude issue.

That said, your ticket is a unique rarity, which is why we're not letting up with them. Our team will be in touch in the morning to arrange a site visit to (hopefully) isolate the issue. Thanks for your patience here.
Click to expand...

no issue with you guys. and the problem blows hot and cold, so it might be an issue for a site visit if you catch it on a day when you can't isolate. i'm getting enough bandwidth consistently to work right now, though it dips far below what 1000/100 is supposed to be.

longer-term, i'm not a happy camper, but for now, they're about fifth on my list of problems :)
 
Thanks all for the feedback on the SLA question. We've received a product brief from Vumatel, as well as SLA and costs - and it's great to see the overwhelming interest in it.

Before we proceed to create the product from our end, we're waiting for some product clarification and clearer guidelines as to how the product is expected to operate and its exact benefit. And finally, we need to make sure that this is an improvement on the service levels we've come to know and love from Vumatel (generally), and not an excuse to drop service levels to drive up revenue.
 
websquadza said:
And it doesn't help when the Operations team we deal with continuously push back - I don't see how paying a premium will resolve an attitude issue.
Click to expand...

this.

this is the unique flaw in the whole idea. exactly what recourse do i have, after paying them extra to do the basics, when they don't do the basics? am i entitled to a claw-back? how does that help me when we're two weeks in and i can't work?

you're 100% right. the reality is this is monetizing their existent contract obligations. it's double-dipping, and once you do that once, and the precedent is established, it never ends.
 
websquadza said:
Thanks all for the feedback on the SLA question. We've received a product brief from Vumatel, as well as SLA and costs - and it's great to see the overwhelming interest in it.

Before we proceed to create the product from our end, we're waiting for some product clarification and clearer guidelines as to how the product is expected to operate and its exact benefit. And finally, we need to make sure that this is an improvement on the service levels we've come to know and love from Vumatel (generally), and not an excuse to drop service levels to drive up revenue.
Click to expand...

so, tell me: if i don't take it up, what kind of service level can i expect?
 
daelm said:
so, tell me: if i don't take it up, what kind of service level can i expect?
Click to expand...

That's what we want to know ourselves. Once the product is slightly more clearly defined, we'd be able to communicate that and also what effect it will have on non "priority" clients. While we wait for that, I just wanted to know if there's an appetite for improved service levels.
 
so, here's the VT terms and conditions of installation and maintenance:


the relevant clauses are these:

"Service Level Agreements” means the service level agreement entered into between VUMA and the Service Provider."

"The Customer must report all faults to his Service Provider and not to VUMA directly. The Service Provider is responsible for first line support and will contact VUMA if the problem has been identified as originating from the VUMA Network. VUMA will attend to faults reported by the Service Provider during Office Hours and/or as recorded in the Service Level Agreements, and will apply its reasonable endeavours to have the affected VUMA Services restored in the shortest possible time, and in line with its Service Level Agreements."


what this means is that it is literally impossible for a consumer to determine whether the proposed "product" - defined as "i will pay you extra to meet your service level agreements" - is actually worth it, because VTs current obligations in respect of SLAs are not revealed to us.
 
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daelm said:
so, here's the VT terms and conditions of installation and maintenance:


the relevant clauses are these:

"Service Level Agreements” means the service level agreement entered into between VUMA and the Service Provider."

"The Customer must report all faults to his Service Provider and not to VUMA directly. The Service Provider is responsible for first line support and will contact VUMA if the problem has been identified as originating from the VUMA Network. VUMA will attend to faults reported by the Service Provider during Office Hours and/or as recorded in the Service Level Agreements, and will apply its reasonable endeavours to have the affected VUMA Services restored in the shortest possible time, and in line with its Service Level Agreements."


what this means is that it is literally impossible for a consumer to determine whether the proposed "product" - defined as "i will pay you extra to meet your service level agreements" - is actually worth it, because VTs current obligations in respect of SLAs are not revealed to us.
Click to expand...

This is the issue. While there are a general set of service levels stipulated (generally around service delivery and core), the end user product (last mile) is still blanketed by the "best effort" term. Which leaves quite a significant wiggle room for the FNO.

daelm said:
you're 100% right. the reality is this is monetizing their existent contract obligations. it's double-dipping, and once you do that once, and the precedent is established, it never ends.
Click to expand...

And this is what we need to ensure this product does not do if we were to introduce it. We've been keeping tabs on general and average ticket performance for our clients, and we're monitoring to ensure these don't begin slipping in lieu of the proposed "priority" product. Another smaller FNO introduced a similar "priority" product last year, and we chose not to float it. Service levels haven't slipped and general ticket performance has actually improved (as they scaled up operations) in spite of the best effort service level on their standard product.

daelm said:
bad time to ask me about Vumatel and "service". :laugh:
Click to expand...
Fair enough - and this makes this a great time to debate the merits of this product. We are going to bring up tickets like yours in our conversation as we try to establish what the actual benefit of the "priority" product is.
 
websquadza said:
Question to Vumatel users: Would an add-on (IE a small extra cost per month) SLA interest you?
  • Assuming it provided you with the following:
    • Quicker access to support and escalations (We're talking from the Vuma end here) and;
    • Guaranteed Mean Time to Repair (ie, your line is repaired within a certain time frame between Monday and Saturday)
This would be a pseudo SLA (with proposed numbers that aren't far off what the FTTB providers provide). Comment below whether you would be interested in this add on and what you would be willing to pay for a service like this.
Click to expand...
Nope not interested. Already pay for a service, why should customers opt in to pay more for preferential treatment, ie: jump the que.. Simple, if I don't get the service I pay for, I jump ship to the next provider who can provide me with proper service.
 
I think another point you could raise with them is they're already starting to lag on price.

The public is now also aware of their precarious financial position so tacking on additional fees will simply feel like what it is - an income source for them in the absence of ordinary price increases.

It's the same reason they are letting go of the asynchronous lines.

Just make sure to let them know the public knows.
 
netstrider said:
I think another point you could raise with them is they're already starting to lag on price.

The public is now also aware of their precarious financial position so tacking on additional fees will simply feel like what it is - an income source for them in the absence of ordinary price increases.

It's the same reason they are letting go of the asynchronous lines.

Just make sure to let them know the public knows.
Click to expand...
Pretty sure they know - there have been several articles on the subject on MyBB.

Vumatel's parent company is in some pretty dire straights financially through from what I understand, and it seems some pressure is rolling downhill to increase revenue.
 
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