Digiweb warning

ruairi

I've had Digiweb's (2-way) Satellite service for nearly a year, due to living in Rathcormac in Cork - where up until a couple of weeks ago, I didn't have the option of ADSL or wireless. It costs €99 ex VAT for 512k/128k service which was mediocre at best, but served my purpose.

A few weeks back the service started to degrade dramatically. I did a little investigation and discovered that they had dropped my upstream rate to 64k, and also that the increased latency I was experiencing was happening not at the satellite connection, but on their transit in Germany, provided by colt.de.

Two weeks ago, I called Digiweb customer support. The "technical" guy insisted that the latency was a normal feature of satellite services and and 5,000ms latency was "acceptable". He also said that because I had used more than my upstream allowance for the 30-day rolling period, my upstream bandwidth had been cut as per their "fair use" policy. Now, I know that I shouldn't realistically experience any more than about 900ms latency even on a bad satellite service, and their "fair use" policy advertises that the restrictions when imposed are only imposed during peak hours, so I asked to speak to their customer service division.

The customer service rep said that by accusing their technical staff of being misleading, I was making a libellous statement (I suspect she meant slanderous - which is also rubbish, as I hadn't made any accusations to a wider audience) and that they could sue me. She also accused me of lying and said that the fair use policy restrictions would be imposed 24/7. See http://www.digiweb.ie/athome_broadband_satellite_faq.asp?i=3&i2=6&i6=24#q6 for what they actually advertise.

At this point I left her with the promise that we wouldn't be renewing the service in July (she didn't care), and leaving a request for their "technical manager" ***[EDIT]*** to give me a call. I still haven't heard from him.

Luckily, it turned out that Castlelyons exchange which my phone line is connected to had only been upgraded for DSL days before. I now have a 3Mb/s eircom DSL package, and the satellite modem is switched off. The service expires in July some time, and it's a great relief to know I won't have to deal with Digiweb ever again.

That's all, I just wanted to warn everyone of the kind of service they can expect from Digiweb.

jor el

That sounds like a very bad customer service department. I'd be witholding payment too if I were you. If they are in breach of the contract by restricting your service outside peak hours then I believe you can legally terminate it without penalty. Threatening to sue your customers for pointing out your own usage policy is just daft.

Report them to Comreg (for all the good it'll do) and the Consumer Association of Ireland http://www.consumerassociation.ie/ if you feel like taking it a bit further. All it takes is an email.

juddd

I have the same speed(512-128) setup with irish broadband and it is only 18.95 and has no upload or download quotas, sounds like digi-web are also overcharging their customers....tarts.

ruairi

I've been considering going to the Consumer Association alright, and will probably get around to it later. I'm not sure if reporting them to ComReg would be worth the effort quite honestly.

However, just to clear something up from your post, the threat to sue was based on me stating that the "technical" guy was being misleading when he said that 5,000ms is acceptable latency for a satellite connection. As anyone who is even vaguely aware of the limitations of satellite will know, that figure is total rubbish. Quite apart from the fact of course that the vast majority of the latency wasn't occurring on the satellite link at all, but on the ISP beyond, colt.de (based on my traceroute).

ruairi

juddd, I'm not sure how much it costs to run the satellite service as opposed to a DSL service, and Mediasat seem to have similar pricing, so I won't comment on how expensive the service is. Comparing satellite pricing to DSL pricing is apples-to-oranges anyway though.

cxcully

Thanks Ruairi,I'll take your experiences on board.I live in really rural Roscommon and HAVE to get broadband in some shape or form-I've just posted asking for advice on satellite broadband.
I don't know that much about computers-you mentioned that the 512k was "mediocre"-do you mean that annoying few seconds waiting for every new screen to load/really slow music/video downloads or the way the whole system slows if you have more than a couple of internet screens open at once?Also,although it thankfully doesn't matter to you anymore-was there any hint from digiweb that they were actually going to fix that problem in Germany?That customer relations lady sounded unbelievable!

Sponge Bob

Lastmile cover lots of Really Rural Ros with Wireless , did you ask ?

Blaster99

ruairi wrote:

The customer service rep said that by accusing their technical staff of being misleading, I was making a libellous statement (I suspect she meant slanderous - which is also rubbish, as I hadn't made any accusations to a wider audience) and that they could sue me. She also accused me of lying and said that the fair use policy restrictions would be imposed 24/7.

That rep should be fired. That's just an incredibly stupid thing to say to a customer. I would take my business elsewhere ASAP.

cxcully

Sponge Bob wrote:

Lastmile cover lots of Really Rural Ros with Wireless , did you ask ?

Aye.There's a lovely wireless point on the water tower in Ballinlough,Co.Roscommon a couple of miles away.....but there's a large hill looming behind me blocking it.they told me you simply must be in view of the transmitter.

ruairi

cxcully, when I say the service is mediocre, I mean that - in my personal experience - download speed was lower than it should have been at any given time. I would frequently be online at about 3am on a weeknight and even at this time, I was not getting anything approaching the 512Kb/s (64KB/s) that I was sold. I usually got under half of that in fact. There were also occasional outages of up to a few hours.

Generally, it was not what I personally would call a good or reliable service. Others may disagree depending on their needs.

Regarding the latency problem with transit in Germany, I doubt that it will even be investigated, as they seemed determined to blame it on normal satellite latency (if it had been just satellite latency, it would still have been ridiculous).

My personal recommendation would be to investigate every other option before dealing with Digiweb.

watty

With satellite if the system is caching ARP data and DNS data then a ping can't be much less than 780ms. If there is an issue with ARP and DNS caching and any other of the wierd things satellite systems do to eliminate handshakes of the IP data, then the RTT goes from 780ms to 2540ms or more.

So the first access of site you haven't been to could be a RTT of a lot more than 2600ms, but repeated access should drop to the minimum of 780ms.

Not exciting compared with Terrestrial Wireless of 20ms typically.

All this assumes no contention on the uplink to Satellite from Customer site and perfectly aligned dish.

ruairi

watty, agreed. However, sustained latency of over 5,000ms across a period of hours, spiking to over 8,000ms is an abominable service in anyones book. I had better connectivity in Nairobi, and yes, that was a satellite connection, but connected to the satellite-based ISP via a leased line.

3.16

digiweb wireless is the only option that is available to me , do i have 2 keep it for a year.... and is it worth it???????????. should i wait for eircom ..... god only knows how that will take

lucernarian

Digiweb wireless and Digiweb satellite are two completely different things... I would reccomend Wireless if you can get it.

JJ

In my extremely limited experience with Digiweb, I found their customer service to be quite good, about 1000 times better than Eircom. I rang on a Saturday to get installed and they were able to show up on Thursday morning 9AM sharp to get installed. Compare that to Eircom when I tried to get reconnected and it took over a month to do so.

But...if a Digiweb CSR was threatening to sue me for libel I'd run 1000 miles from them too.

ruairi

I know it's fashionable to do a hatchet-job on Eircom any chance one gets, but I've never been one to follow fashion.

My DSL was provisioned within days of ordering broadband from Eircom. When I ordered a static IP address, I received a phone call on my mobile from a customer service rep who was pleasant and made an effort to ensure that I got the number correctly written down, and who then confirmed my email address so he could email it also.

In the last few years in fact, I have found Eircom's service to be excellent. This of course is in comparison to what they used to be like 12 years ago when I had my first direct dealings with them, when I found them to be remarkably arrogant.

I can honestly say that dealing with Eircom now (and even in the past) is so much preferable to dealing with Digiweb. This is entirely my own opinion of course, and you are perfectly entitled to your own.

ruairi

3.16, if you find your internet service from Digiweb to be adequate to your needs, by all means stick with it. I certainly wouldn't try to break contract and jump providers on the back of someone elses comments about my provider. So unless you see a need to leave Digiweb based on your own experiences, don't inconvenience yourself.

*** EDIT ***

It seems I should have read your post properly. If Digiweb's wireless service is the only option available to you, then you should probably go with it, unless you are willing to wait for other providers to come into the market. Are you in an area where DSL is due to be rolled out shortly? If so, are you near enough to the exchange that it will be a viable option? Bear in mind that my experience is limited to their satellite service.

Asok

cxcully wrote:

Aye.There's a lovely wireless point on the water tower in Ballinlough,Co.Roscommon a couple of miles away.....but there's a large hill looming behind me blocking it.they told me you simply must be in view of the transmitter.

Your not missing out on much mate tbh. I live / folks house is in direct line of site and the service is still ****e I mean it gets to the ap fine but from there their network and backhaul is just pants.

3.16

i'm not with digiewb YET but its my only option . do you sign up to 1 years contract or what?????? also i have 1 desktop and a laptop . will it work with both of them and will i need a wireless card??? How Much is Installation???????? Do You have to stick to a limit of how long you go on per month with digiweb?? is 1mb fast enough to watch videos???

So manys Question BUT!!! I Need ANSWERS .............PLEASE HELP!!!

lucernarian

Digiweb give you a wires-only router, the Dlink DI-604. Up to 4 computers/laptops can work off it.

Most website videos (e.g. off youtube) will work properly on a 1 Meg connection. It all depends on the quality and size of the video, the better the quality, the faster the speeds needed.

I think you do sign a 1 year contract though the online direct debit form is enough as far as I can remember.

Last time I checked the install fee was about €89 for their wireless though mabye there is a special offer on at the moment?

I don't know about cap enforcement as I don't think I've ever exceeded it. At the moment Digiweb seem to be on top of installations so there isn't a big delay in getting connected.

Cuddlesworth

3.16 wrote:

i'm not with digiewb YET but its my only option . do you sign up to 1 years contract or what??????

Try looking on their site for contract lengths. With most providers its a year.

3.16 wrote:

also i have 1 desktop and a laptop . will it work with both of them and will i need a wireless card???

To use both you would need to get a router, or if you had 2 ethernet ports in the pc could hook the laptop through the pc. Wireless service does not mean that the network in the house will be wireless but rather that the connection from the box in your house to the mast is. If you want internal wireless in your house you would also need to buy a wireless router and recievers for both the laptop and pc.

3.16 wrote:

How Much is Installation???????? Do You have to stick to a limit of how long you go on per month with digiweb?? is 1mb fast enough to watch videos???

These questions should be answered on their site. Its more than likely capped to a few gigs a month. 1mb is just fast enough to watch videos over the net.

watty

I use a Dlink DI-624M router/NAT/MIMO Wifi giving 108Mbps wireless and four ethernet ports plus firewall functions on Digiweb Metro.

Install is free. Cap varies with package. Put a 49.50 Euro "onetel" TWIN DECT cordless phone (from Tesco) on the phone port on Saturday and it is working well too.

j2dab

Digiweb is a load of ring, under restriction at the moment. Im on the DSL Xtra. I am moving to Irish Broadband where they have good customer service, reliability, and no download caps. I CANT WAIT!!!!

Asok

And you felt the need to tell us this by dragging up a year old thread?

jonnybax

I don't mean to seem pedantic or trolling, but your definition of slander and libel is also incorrect.

The people it reaches doesn't matter, it's the medium in which it was said which defines it.

Slander is defined as though transitory media (ie speech - even if it's into a crowd) whereas libel is through fixed means like a newspaper, picture etc.

ruairi

jonnybax wrote:

I don't mean to seem pedantic or trolling, but your definition of slander and libel is also incorrect.

The people it reaches doesn't matter, it's the medium in which it was said which defines it.

Slander is defined as though transitory media (ie speech - even if it's into a crowd) whereas libel is through fixed means like a newspaper, picture etc.

Under Irish law slander and libel are both aspects of defamation which is the act of making FALSE and DAMAGING claims against an individual or organisation. As my statements were demonstrably not false, nothing that I said was either slanderous or libelous. Also, as my statements had not been made to a wider audience (i.e. their customer base), they could not be said to be damaging to Digiweb, hence I had no liability whatsoever.