Eircom strike threat

probe

All you smug lot (95% of the market) who think you have DSL from a non-eircom source may find out that you do in fact have eircom broadband, billed by a third party, if this strike goes ahead…

In fact the number of unbundled lines (ie those using a real alternative DSL supplier) fell to just 19,300 according to today’s Irish Times.

Cable TV’s market share of broadband is also falling from a high of 11.3% of the BB market in Q3/06 to 10.7% in Q1/07.

Eircom’s not too distant cousins in the British post office are also threatening to go on strike. Le plus ça change plus c'est la même chose!

But at least the “Royal” mail lot have some justification to revolt against the EU’s tyrannical, ill-conceived plot to break up the national postal services. There is no point in having two or more postmen covering every road and street in the country. They would be better off modernising Britain’s antiquated sorting plant and postal addressing structure to continental standards.

.probe

http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/breaking/2007/0622/breaking5.htm

RuggieBear

thankfully i'm in the other 5%.

watty

Erm.. even LLU is still eircom, just using 3rd part DSLAM instead of eircom's in the exchange.

A tiny number of people are on actual BT copper, possibly.
Fibre, Cable & Wireless usually does not involve eircom.

Where do you get the 95%? Of ALL broadband inc cable, fibre, wireless, Eircom I think has 46%?
I'd have thought less than 1/2 of DSL is resold bitstream.

Analysys Research calculated that 2,270 local loops were unbundled by the end of June 2005. This represents 1.6% of the DSLmarket; one of the lowest LLU shares of the DSL market in Western Europe

Not sure what current LLU share is of DSL. Only Smart has any enthusism for it. Magnet does GLUMP but now prefers fibre as maybe only 10% of DSL is good enough for their TV sevice.

Most of the last 3 months growth was Wireless.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2007/0621/broadband.html

ComReg's quarterly report said there were 602,000 broadband subscribers at the end of March, with 84,000 added in the three months between January and March.

The number of broadband internet subscriptions is now ahead of dial-up and flat-rate for the first time.[\quote]
Lies.
1) There is no true "Flat Rate", it's prepaid timed dialup.
2) Comreg include Ripwave, which according to Manufacturers is a Wireless ISDN replacement, i.e. Narrowband, not Broadband.
3) Do they include Satellite & 3G/HSDPA (which are high speed Internet - possibly, but technically not Broadband)?

Cabaal

...and all those smug Pipex, Orange, AOL users in the UK who think they don't have BT Broadband in the UK are also wrong...whats your point?

Its a wholesale product, even if its LLU the Wholesale ISP (BT or Eircom) still get money for use of the space in the exchange.

mike65

Its Royal not "Royal" btw.

Mike.

Rozbeef

probe wrote:

Le plus ça change plus c'est la même chose!

That doesn't really mean anything you know. Try learning french before typing witty expressions.

jor el

probe wrote:

All you smug lot (95% of the market) who think you have DSL from a non-eircom source may find out that you do in fact have eircom broadband, billed by a third party, if this strike goes ahead…

Who actually thinks that the wholesale suppliers (BT, Imagine, UTV, Perlico, etc, etc) are not supplying an eircom product? It's pretty common knowledge that the resellers are doing just that, reselling eircom's broadband. They all charge eircom line rental and state it clearly (except BT who discount the line rental in a bundle).

I'd say that 95% figure is way off the mark too.

probe

watty wrote:

Erm.. even LLU is still eircom, just using 3rd part DSLAM instead of eircom's in the exchange.

The difference in my mind is that an unbundled other operator can see most cases of sabotage to their unbundled loop – from guys fiddling with the MDF to a chain saw job to a large capacity underground conduit!

But if you are just reselling eircom BB, any dirty trick sabotage can be done at a much higher level in the network where the unbundled operator is less likely to have access, and it will affect potentially larger numbers of customers.

Where do you get the 95%? Of ALL broadband inc cable, fibre, wireless, Eircom I think has 46%?

Total DSL 436,000

Unbundled 19,300

Not unbundled 416,700 = 95.57339%

Only Smart has any enthusism for it.

Loop unbundling access costs – both monthly fees and the zillions of extra access fees that eircom gets away with imposing in the awfully regulated Irish market clearly puts most companies off unbundling. However it is the only way to make the market profitable for independent operators, increase the speed, reduce contention ratios, etc. Bitstream is a low margin business and the service offering is controlled largely by eircom.

.probe

probe

Cabaal wrote:

...and all those smug Pipex, Orange, AOL users in the UK who think they don't have BT Broadband in the UK are also wrong...whats your point?

Its a wholesale product, even if its LLU the Wholesale ISP (BT or Eircom) still get money for use of the space in the exchange.

Please see my reply to Watty - which covers this point to save repetition[FONT=&quot][/FONT]. With full LLU, the other operator is only using the "last mile" of copper which is far more likely to last in proper working condition during a strike than kit controlled by eircom above that level.

.probe

probe

Rozbeef wrote:

That doesn't really mean anything you know. Try learning french before typing witty expressions.

The more things change, the more they remain the same or words to that effect. But you knew that anyway.

.probe

probe

mike65 wrote:

Its Royal not "Royal" btw.

The reason I used “Royal” is that it is everybody’s postal service – not just the Royal family’s method of having their mail delivered. “Royal Mail” has connotations for me of a guy with a horse and carriage wearing white gloves or whatever, delivering mail for a royal family!


.probe

LumoColor

You will probably find that when they go on strike productivity will actually increase as the remaining staff will be contractors and that they will be able to get on and get the job done without interference.

probe

jor el wrote:

I'd say that 95% figure is way off the mark too.

At the expense of tautology:

Total DSL 436,000

Unbundled 19,300

Not unbundled 416,700 = 95.57339% = eircom’s real DSL market share.

My source is ComReg http://www.comreg.ie/_fileupload/publications/ComReg0734b.xls
published 21.06.2007.

While ComReg seem to sloppily round everything to the nearest 1,000 of late, I suspect that their number is materially correct. When you say my number is "way off the mark" what is your basis for making such a statement, please?

.probe

wheresthebeef

probe wrote:

The reason I used “Royal” is that it is everybody’s postal service – not just the Royal family’s method of having their mail delivered. “Royal Mail” has connotations for me of a guy with a horse and carriage wearing white gloves or whatever, delivering mail for a royal family!


.probe

Is that not what the Royal Mail actually is??? Silly me. Oh when will i stop taking everything at face value.

probe

wheresthebeef wrote:

Is that not what the Royal Mail actually is??? Silly me. Oh when will i stop taking everything at face value.

One is not trying to be offensive to people who were educated in certain kingdoms…

In most other countries it is “The Post” or similar.

La Poste in France
An Post in IRL
Die Post in Germany
Posteitaliane in Italy
Die Post/La Poste/La Posta/SwissPost in Switzerland
Correos in Spain (in Castellano, Català, Euskara and Galego)

A universal postal service.

A reality even recognised by King Charles I in 1635 in GB when he extended the use of the Royal Mail to the public. If he was in control now, no doubt everyone would have access to loop unbundling!


.probe

Rozbeef

probe wrote:

One is not trying to be offensive to people who were educated in certain kingdoms…

In most other countries it is “The Post” or similar.

La Poste in France
An Post in IRL
Die Post in Germany
Posteitaliane in Italy
Die Post/La Poste/La Posta/SwissPost in Switzerland
Correos in Spain (in Castellano, Català, Euskara and Galego)

A universal postal service.

A reality even recognised by King Charles I in 1635 in GB when he extended the use of the Royal Mail to the public. If he was in control now, no doubt everyone would have access to loop unbundling!


.probe

to be fair, who cares. really ? i think someone needs to get a life.

probe

Rozbeef wrote:

to be fair, who cares. really ? i think someone needs to get a life.

Precisely. One wonders why you bothered commenting on this element of my posting. Nothing to do with broadband.

.probe

wheresthebeef

probe wrote:

One is not trying to be offensive to people who were educated in certain kingdoms…

In most other countries it is “The Post” or similar.

La Poste in France
An Post in IRL
Die Post in Germany
Posteitaliane in Italy
Die Post/La Poste/La Posta/SwissPost in Switzerland
Correos in Spain (in Castellano, Català, Euskara and Galego)

A universal postal service.

A reality even recognised by King Charles I in 1635 in GB when he extended the use of the Royal Mail to the public. If he was in control now, no doubt everyone would have access to loop unbundling!


.probe

most informative.

jimmycrackcorm

An Eircom strike only affects people who have problems. Normally the electronics gets on with the job.

watty

probe wrote:

At the expense of tautology:

Total DSL 436,000

Unbundled 19,300

Not unbundled 416,700 = 95.57339% = eircom’s real DSL market share.

My source is ComReg http://www.comreg.ie/_fileupload/publications/ComReg0734b.xls
published 21.06.2007.

While ComReg seem to sloppily round everything to the nearest 1,000 of late, I suspect that their number is materially correct. When you say my number is "way off the mark" what is your basis for making such a statement, please?

.probe

I was talking about total Broadband Share. Eircom makes most of the money from the 19,300, they rely on eircom for backhaul in some cases and power & line repair in all cases.


eircom share of dsl in terms of Profit, backhaul and copper = > 95%

(Comreg may include ripwave, 3G/HSDPA and Satellite 2 way in total of course)

Dialup 440,000 almost all eircom lines
Non DSL = 166,000
Add unbundled DSL (91,000) to non-DSL = 186,000
So eircom share of Total Broadband = 55% to 62% if Comreg's figures are correct, (Lower figure if you think LLU is not eircom).

Are we sure how accurate Comreg's figures are? Do they include "unlicenced" wireless? Have all the WISPs accurately told comreg how many they have? How accurate are eircoms figures?

martin84

I doubt they will strike, people are pi**ed off enough as it is with the line rental going up a again, a strike isnt exactly going to make them more popular.

BluesWeeper

Thats a silly comment...its eircoms Australian management that this should be directed at not at the workers who are looking for a measily 2% wage inceease with inflation over 5 %.

Babcock and Brown, eircoms new owners only care about making profit, hence the price increase...

mike65

I posted this elsewhere

With the sudden surge in wireless comms for both data and voice traffic and having reched the point where companies (both 'traditional wireless (!)' and mobile providers) are now activly suggesting in advertising that you'd be mad to pay eircom 25 euro a month for line rental is that legacy company now dead teleco walking?

The main union has overwhelmingly voted for industrial action with the smaller unions expected to follow I dunno how quickly, if at all it'll impact on consumers sat at home but the timing could'nt be much worse I think.

Is this the tipping point for telecoms in Ireland?

I'm now one of the 5% who are'nt beholden to eircom copper.

Mike.

the_syco

FYI, its not the pay that the strike is about. Its about the fact that conditions were added to the pay deal AFTER the pay deal was done.

whufee

their staff just dont care of all the eircom users... i mean over 400,000 ppl are using eircom...and we are paying the top rates for the shxt service(BB)....... if any strike needed, we should be the first guys not them.................

Xennon

the staff dont care...

after reading that nugget of wisdom, can i ask that you might cast your eye over the reasons theyre taking strike action;
http://www.finfacts.com/irelandbusinessnews/publish/article_1010561.shtml

mike65

This is the bit that caught my eye.

On July 2, 2007, the Sunday Business Post said that "the ATM machine that is the Eircom Employee Share Ownership Trust (Esot) is getting ready to spew out some more cash for its members.

In the coming weeks, some 14,000 Eircom Esot beneficiaries, made up of current and former staff, will share tax-free cash payments totalling €80 million.

This arises from the distribution of a second tranche of preference shares held by Esot to its members. The last distribution took place before Christmas and amounted to €80 million.

The average payout will be €5,500 each but for those longer-term staff with full allocations of the trust, the cheque will be for €8,000. Once distributed, it will bring to €585 million the amount of money handed out tax-free to Eircom trust members since May 2002."

Mike.

BluesWeeper

actaully im quite impressed by the eircom unions success up to now..., i just wish the rest of the irish work force was as unionised and had the balls to take on other greedy employers...

how many of you out there just wish you wernt alone in ur IT company?

hip hip hurray for the eircom workers who took on the private equity barons and played them at their own game.

as for that esop payment I know workers that get a bonus every year in other companies and its even more than that. Its probably jealousy with the begrudgers that in their companies they are powerless when they grovel before the boss once a year ...

wake up !!

thefinalstage

BluesWeeper wrote:

actaully im quite impressed by the eircom unions success up to now..., i just wish the rest of the irish work force was as unionised and had the balls to take on other greedy employers...

how many of you out there just wish you wernt alone in ur IT company?

hip hip hurray for the eircom workers who took on the private equity barons and played them at their own game.

as for that esop payment I know workers that get a bonus every year in other companies and its even more than that. Its probably jealousy with the begrudgers that in their companies they are powerless when they grovel before the boss once a year ...

wake up !!

*Cough* Eircom Worker *Cough*

lucernarian

Yeah, those eircom unions were very successful... Look at Comrade Con Scanlon. He surely did well for himself. What about the employees?? They didn't fare quite so well:rolleyes:

aidanodr

Hi Guys,

One thing that has puzzled me about this AND is not mentioned much in the media -

Alot of the EIRCOM workers are Shareholders [ ESOT ]. As far as I know Shareholders are classed as owners of the company. So, HOW can company owners go on strike IN THEIR OWN COMPANY? Never heard such a thing. AND how can company owners belong to an EMPLOYEE Union?

More puzzled now,
Aidan, a small company owner (Just Me!).

MMMM - I think I will go on strike now!