Telkom cable theft costs R 3bn per year

Cut their hands off

rpm said:
Cable theft costs Telkom R 3bn

In the past three years Telkom has suffered almost three billion rand in losses because of cable theft
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This is a clear present and valid case for the DEATH penalty -- for the scrap merchants that buy this copper "scrap"

Still -- kill a policeman and get out on R1000 bail -- WHY not steal some Telkom cable. Money for jam:erm:

I speak from the experience of someone affected by it. Major cable stolen and cut right in town:eek:

NO comms for TWO days -- added a couple of rand to the BILLIONS in lost revenue ;):D


MW
 
I agree... they should have switched to fiber a long time ago. Can some technically clued up person tell us why they have not done this?
 
Too expensive to replace as it will not only be the cable but the exchange/transmission equipment as well.

Too vast an area.

Majority of consumers still are POTS users (don't want broadband).

//off to dinner - will add more later!
 
wasnt there an article from telkom a while back saying that laying fibre was too expensive and that the thiefs took it out anyway. what would thieves do with fibre? they'd only do it once and move on, until they run out of choices? unless I am missing something?
 
Garyvdh said:
I agree... they should have switched to fiber a long time ago. Can some technically clued up person tell us why they have not done this?
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Telkom runs their National transmission highway on a fibre backbone. This is thousands of km's. Imagine deploying ftth to each subscriber including pre-paid. This is like hanging yourself. Though fibre itself is relatively cheap, around three to eight rand a metre (depending on the size), the cost is mainly in the equipment and the laying of the fibre. Further to this, the theft includes fibre as the cable thief cannot differentiate between copper and fibre. The best alternative is to deploy wireless, however this also comes with its disadvantages.
 
Nefertiti said:
wasnt there an article from telkom a while back saying that laying fibre was too expensive and that the thiefs took it out anyway. what would thieves do with fibre? they'd only do it once and move on, until they run out of choices? unless I am missing something?
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Far easier to replace stolen copper from point A - B. Rather than upgrade the whole area with fiber equipment and than lay fiber to the rest of the neighbourhood. :(
 
Perhaps we can get these thieves to start LLU...

Pun intended!
 
@Slooth and Imoe

if you had to compare the cost of laying it all vs the cost of replacing it with copper, protecting it, lost business etc wouldnt fibre be a better option? if there is no more copper then the guys would stop pulling it out.
 
@Nefertiti

Point taken, however you would have to communicate with each thief and indicate to them what is fibre and what is copper. Have you ever been involved in a fibre deployment project? To provide each of the +/- 5mil subscribers with fibre will be more than the odd 3 billion lost.
 
Nefertiti said:
@Slooth and Imoe

if you had to compare the cost of laying it all vs the cost of replacing it with copper, protecting it, lost business etc wouldnt fibre be a better option? if there is no more copper then the guys would stop pulling it out.
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Don't get me wrong I agree with your logic, but as I said it was far EASIER to replace the cable.
 
The cost of security has risen sharply during the past three years from 127 million rand in 2006/07 to 231 million rand last year. But as a result then cost of replacing or repairing the copper stolen has dropped from 179 million to 141 million. The loss of revenue has however shot up from 368 million to 907 million. The minister pointed out that the revenue loss figures are estimates only.
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So security is R104m more, and it saved them R38m? How does that work?
 
/me wonders if i were to blow up the neighbourhood's non adsl exchange will telkom install a new adsl-compliant one?
 
Imoe said:
@Nefertiti

Point taken, however you would have to communicate with each thief and indicate to them what is fibre and what is copper. Have you ever been involved in a fibre deployment project? To provide each of the +/- 5mil subscribers with fibre will be more than the odd 3 billion lost.
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Wouldn't the deployment of fibre be a great investment, rather than a loss? It would sit on the balance sheet as an asset, not on the income statement as a loss. Unlike the recurring copper theft...
 
Telkom uses outside contractors to improve their protection against theft, Nyanda said. "The vendors have intelligence capacity and are specialised in curbing cable theft," he added. "The decision to use vendors has also assisted the Telkom Group to efficiently manage limited internal resources."

The minister said that the nature of the protection being provided has now changed from reactive patrol to proactive operation.

He also said that penalty clauses have been in effect since last year which mean that the payments to the contractors are reduced if they fail to cut the amount of cable stolen.
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I knew someone in Durban, years ago...an aircon service...he'd create faults that would take a week or two to happen, whenever someone called him to look at an aircon system.

My brother's area near Ceres, has had the cable being stolen 4 times in the last 2 months.

If you're a contractor replacing cables, there's a very large incentive for removing them, then simply placing the same cable back.

Thus, being paid for looking after the cable....getting paid for replacing the cable...never paying for actual cable...

Very clever telkom...bet you don't have a covert investigative team, that keeps an eye on your contractors.

Bet you don't even have one for investigating scrap dealers. All this copper just disappearing...How convenient for you.

You absolutely pathetic bunch of leeches.

R3 Billion in three years is what telkom has gone and taken from us...to pay for their stupidity.

Of course, as the minister said, it's only an estimate...Best the public do not hear about the actual waste.
 
Wasn't there an issue with the fiber that Telkom were using was wrapped in kevlar, and that the it was being stolen for the armour? Has Telkom changed this?

I still think Telkom should slowly start replacing the copper to fiber, would be cheaper in the long run. Secondly, I also still think that Telkom should perhaps have their fiber with a specific marker, that differentiates it from copper, ie, have the outer colour a different colour, like brown or blue as opposed to just black, or every meter have like a thick red line around it. At least, well, hopefully, the copper thieves would be able to distinguish between the two
 
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