(another) Chorus Nightmare

Roar

Got chorus broadband installed, on the reccomendation of a mate.

Was working very well for the best part of a fortnight, however before work yesterday it had stopped. I assumed it was only a temporary outage, and that it would be back when i returned from work.

It wasn't so i restarted the computer, and reset the modem (a motorola cable surf something or other)..

that didnt work, it had a flashing "send" light on it, and i was getting the "limited or no connectivity" warning bubble on the computer.

so i phoned chorus customer "care", and was told by the girl that it was a "downstream problem", which, she told me, is a problem with the cable and that and engineer would have to call out. She then told me that he wouldn't be out until Monday. So I said that's simply not good enough blah blah blah, so she said she'd phone my neighbours to see if it was an area fault and get back to me whether or which to book a time for the engineer to call out.

That call, obviously didnt arrive, so i phoned customer "care" again this lunchtime. Told them i logged a fault and was waiting on a call back, they took my details. The guy on the end of the phone said that i was only due a call back if it was an area fault, and that an engineer had been booked for the 21st... MONDAY WEEK!!

Again I went on the offensive but i knew i wasnt getting anywhere.. just the usual "we'll credit your account blah blah!.. then the vague "if we can get him out there quicker we will"..

It's an absolutely farcical situation, however I get the feeling that I'm not the first or last person that this will happen to?

Any advice? I'm drafting an email which I want to send into them, but I cant find an email address on their site, only the customoer contact form..

I'm so unbelievably angry about the whole thing...

*edit

I should mention I'm in cork city, on the 3meg package, running windows XP

RangeR

I'll be honest with you, I didn't ready your full posting. Not because I couldn't read it [I could], but because this is a WELL known issue.

Although this may have been a temp outage [out in Naas too yesterday or day before], you will experience this every week or two. It won't stop until they fix their new network.

For my experience with MANY Chorus outages, any green flashing lights mean a Chorus problem on their end, NOT with the modem or ANY of your computers or devices in your house. 7 times out of 10 they will organise to send out an engineer to "fix" the problem. The engineer will come out and leave just as quick.

Sometimes they will send out an engineer when you tell them that you don't need one. Happened to me last week. Engineer came out, checked and said there was nothing he could do. I told him that I knew that and had told Chorus that over the phone. He was understanding but fuming at CS.

Why didn't you come here first, before you got Chorus? Unless you can get out of your contract, have a nice 12 months.

From my experience... Document EVERY outage and EVERY slowdown. Ring CS EVERY time these happen. Get them to put notes on your account. Tell them you want to lodge a complaint. After about 2 or 3 months, when you have racked up 10 or 15 complaints, ring them again. Ask to be transferred to cancellations. Tell THAT department you want out of the service as Chorus have not upheld their side of the contract. You WILL NOT get a fight over it.

Roar

came home from work today to find all the lights on the modem on, and broadband working flawlessly.. no engineer has called out.. curiouser and curiouser...

RangeR

Well, that should back up what I said. The problem isn't with the modem, it's with their network. It's just a pity you didn't get here before you signed up.

Having said that, Chorus works wonderfully, when there are no problems.

Roar

IrishTLR wrote:

Well, that should back up what I said. The problem isn't with the modem, it's with their network. It's just a pity you didn't get here before you signed up.

Having said that, Chorus works wonderfully, when there are no problems.

Went with chorus as i cant afford to get a landline in..

it does work very well i have to admit, although it dropped twice last night for a few seconds..

I hope that's the last time it'll happen, but i have my doubts

RangeR

Roar wrote:

I hope that's the last time it'll happen, but i have my doubts

I'll see you back here in a few days then, because doubts are all you will have. Chances are that the service WILL drop every week or two.

dub45

IrishTLR wrote:

Well, that should back up what I said. The problem isn't with the modem, it's with their network. It's just a pity you didn't get here before you signed up.

Having said that, Chorus works wonderfully, when there are no problems.

Don't most things work wonderfully when there are no problems?:)

RangeR

dub45 wrote:

Don't most things work wonderfully when there are no problems?:)

True. I was almost not going to post that line but I didn't want to be TOO bad to Chorus. However, that half hearted attempt was all that I could manage so stuck with it. In reality, that one line means absolutely nothing at all and can be attributed to almost any person, company, product or service. It was even semi sarcastic as there are usually problem times with them.

Well spotted

dub45

IrishTLR wrote:

True. I was almost not going to post that line but I didn't want to be TOO bad to Chorus. However, that half hearted attempt was all that I could manage so stuck with it. In reality, that one line means absolutely nothing at all and can be attributed to almost any person, company, product or service. It was even semi sarcastic as there are usually problem times with them.

Well spotted

Well I was going to be even more verbose (can you be verbose in writing? ) and point out that in fact this is what we pay our isps for! Not just the service but to make sure problems are few and to sort them out quickly when they to occur - not really all that much to ask for is it!

cilldara

Thanks for the tips on Chorus. Was half-thinking of changing to Chorus, from BT. I'm in Naas too. I've had very few problems with BT, but wanted to get the 6Mb line, as opposed to BT's 3MB.
Sounds like it's not worth the hassle of the change.

Cilldara.

JNive

most likely not, on OFF CHANCE that you are able to exceed the 3mbps speed you get on BT it will most likely be cancelled out by weird outages, modem errors, or sites not being reachable, in addittion to occasional crazy slowness just when you want to download a large file lol

suppafly

I was thinking of gettting the 6mb package when they came out but decided agains it. Definetly glad i gave them a miss!

zen63

I have the 6mb service in Cork City - and with the exception of some patchy access about 12 months ago - it has been excellent.

I regularly get 700Kb+ speeds and have not had any of the problems you are describing. I beleive its to do with the location, as I am in a new development.

Its really hit and miss if the service will be good.

JNive

you are definitely one of the luckly few.
I was in Model Farm Road area with Chorus before, speeds were crap.
A person i know who also lives in bishopstown had the 6mb service and said the same, pretty crap.
My friend in mayfield had the 3mb service and it was total crap and was off for a week or two at a time.
My cousin in ballyvolane has chorus and is sick to death of it.

Roar

no real complaints since it came back of its own accord. in fact (whisper it) i'm actually quite happy with it...

(now i've said that when i go home it wont be working... )

com7

I have their:cool: 6 mb product also and i m happy with it !

pkarpiozo

I have such a problem: i have those small drop outs every few minutes. It's just a milisecond break in the connection and it is back on straight away. Cant play any online games, download any file using windows downloader or files that don't support resume. Winamp stream stop every few minutes as well. I though that it is wireless router fault but i connected xbox360 with the cable to the router and got same story. I'm using auto dns from chorus, tried free dnses and it didn;t help.
It is so annoying. It was ok for a few weeks and it started again. Anyone help cause i think them chorus people won't help me because they don't know what 's going on at all in their company. and i'm tired calling them and ask hem for support.