UPC telephone problems - any suggestions on how to troubleshoot?

iMADEtheBBC

Moved to UPC (20meg service) in late August.
Delighted with the broadband service.

The telephone porting was quick and by early September I was free from Eircom.

Unfortunately the telephone service from UPC is very poor. My telephone connection will typically disconnect/fall over every day, the only way to fix is to restart the cable modem.

I have lost count of the number of calls to the otherwise helpful and polite tech support folk at UPC.

So far there have been 3 engineer call outs. The first call out was a waste of their time because the engineer just verified what I already told them (the phone service regularly breaks), the second involved an engineer checking something outside and saying he'd fixed it, the third was a call out to replace the cable modem entirely which was my request because at that stage it was the only troubleshooting measure that had not been tried.

UPC have admitted that there was a problem with this type of issue in my area but that it had been fixed and they could not explain why I was still having this issue.


So: have any of you out there experienced this problem? Any suggestions on troubleshooting steps I can suggest to UPC ?

I really don't want to have to find another provider - the actual broadband service is fine and I'm confident that blueface or similar could work. The UPC system seems to (unofficially) support my Sky box and alarm system whereas I don't believe there is any other VOIP provider that can do this.

Suggestions?

scorn

Do you have an ATA connected? I only ask as I have been using Blueface VOIP since November 2007, and that service requires an ATA. Not sure if UPC have some built in device in the equipment they offer...

Either way, make sure that the settings in your ATA (if you have one) are correct - I had similar problems and the service centre guys gave me non-out-the-box settings to use that worked.

Find someone with a similar setup to yourself who does not have issues and compare settings.

It's not much help - but you never know!

iMADEtheBBC

Thanks Scorn.

UPC supply a cable modem with built-in ATA and there is no consumer access to the modem settings, only to the router, no access to the ATA section at all.

drrkpd

I really don't want to have to find another provider - the actual broadband service is fine and I'm confident that blueface or similar could work. The UPC system seems to (unofficially) support my Sky box and alarm system whereas I don't believe there is any other VOIP provider that can do this.

Suggestions?[/quote]

I read the VERY small print from NTL/UPC and it says it doesn't support a home alarm!! Just asked question about same in thread- does it really support??

iMADEtheBBC

They don't support it. However my experience (and that of others) is that the system they use for VOIP works with some alarm systems. I had it tested (and coincidentally during annual maintenance today) and it works. My Sky boxes have been dialling back to Sky ok also. This is not officially supported by UPC and may not work for everyone. The alarm company I use has a number of customers with UPC phone service and it works for most of them but there is no pattern to the successful/unsuccessful customers.

I'm going to call UPC again tomorrow but don't want to go through all the usual script and want to direct them to something specific to check.

nehcra

Hi there I'm having the same problem. Let me know if you find a solution because I have been having to reset the modem twice daily if not more! I'm in the Rathgar area.

iMADEtheBBC

nehcra wrote: »

Hi there I'm having the same problem. Let me know if you find a solution because I have been having to reset the modem twice daily if not more! I'm in the Rathgar area.

Have you contacted tech support at UPC ? It will help us both if there are multiple calls on the same issue.

nehcra

Yes I have and they sent a guy out to look at the wiring. He didn't find anything really wrong except for a splitter that was not quite wired correctly. He tested the speed and it came up correct. The phone was working for the whole day. WOW. But tonight I just discovered the phone dead again! Will have to call the guy again to get him to come out. I think it's probably a server issue with UPC and not so much the cables coming in...

iMADEtheBBC

So I finally managed to get a callback from UPC on Monday evening. The tech/engineer said that next time the phone service went down we were not to reboot the modem and to call them so they could investigate while the service was down.

So this morning I called and was told by the tech support agent that an update for this Cisco modem was available and I was to force a factory reset of the modem. To do this I'm to press the factory reset button on the back of the modem for 20 seconds. The update will be sent to the modem as a result of this.

According to this tech support person a number of customers have had this problem and they met with Cisco last week. [I work in software development... I find it odd that they can deliver an update in such a short space of time... anyhow I'll let that one go]

So I've tried this and of course no such update has appeared. I called their tech support team again and was told it could take up to 20 minutes for the update to process. Fair enough I said... how would I know when it has been successful ? Would the Firmware revision have changed ? The tech support person had no idea.

So, here I sit online with a cable modem that is supposed to magically have an update appear in the next 15-20 minutes. It'll be quite something if the update can be applied without me going offline but let's see ...

Update - got a callback from the original tech support person I spoke with this morning.
So, apparently the update is on the UPC side and through using factory reset (holding in the reset button for 20+ seconds) this will be applied. I asked why I wasn't seeing any change to the main system screen (firmware revision, software revision etc) and was told that I wouldn't. The tech support person confirmed that they could see an update on their side.

I'm still skeptical but will roll with this for a few days to see if it makes any difference.


nehcra - it might be worth trying this. Before doing a factory reset you should note any settings on the router that you will need (your wireless SSID etc, any port forwarding you have set up). These settings might be lost when you do the reset. In my case they weren't. Tech support confirmed that the settings might be lost during a factory reset.

iMADEtheBBC

Well the factory reset didn't work.... it's not like there was anything different on the system settings afterward to indicate any software upgrade.

Phone service gone again and am now trying to escalate this to someone in UPC who will give me a clear answer as to what they're doing to troubleshoot and fix this.

Also asking why I was told there was a software fix which would be enabled through my performing a factory reset. Tech support person this morning said the most recent software update was in June. I've had the service since September. Firmware on cable modem is dated July.


If they'd at least admit that they have no clue why it's happening I'd be a bit happier. It's the runaround and lack of callbacks that is most annoying.

Tiesto

iMADEtheBBC wrote: »

Well the factory reset didn't work.... it's not like there was anything different on the system settings afterward to indicate any software upgrade.

Phone service gone again and am now trying to escalate this to someone in UPC who will give me a clear answer as to what they're doing to troubleshoot and fix this.

Also asking why I was told there was a software fix which would be enabled through my performing a factory reset. Tech support person this morning said the most recent software update was in June. I've had the service since September. Firmware on cable modem is dated July.


If they'd at least admit that they have no clue why it's happening I'd be a bit happier. It's the runaround and lack of callbacks that is most annoying.

Hi there
Did you manage to get the issue resolved?

I'm looking into getting UPC phone but just wanting to find out how the service is before going ahead and making the order..
Whats the general concensus? Is it a decent product now? Last time I did some research, a lot of people didnt seem to be happy with the service

cheers

nehcra

Tiesto wrote: »

Hi there
Did you manage to get the issue resolved?

I'm looking into getting UPC phone but just wanting to find out how the service is before going ahead and making the order..
Whats the general concensus? Is it a decent product now? Last time I did some research, a lot of people didnt seem to be happy with the service

cheers

Yes it still sucks. Don't get it if you can avoid it.

Tiesto

ok thanks. I'll leave it then

Fresh Pots

Surely someone is happy with the service? I just ordered it a couple of days ago. Reading this I'm starting to regret It.:(

Kensington

No problems out here with the service! Did have some teething problems at the start, similar to the problems experienced by the OP but this was down to a fault in an amp on the cable run on my road. This was sorted and its worked grand ever since.

Sky boxes work fine on it.
Fax machine works fine on it.
Many people have a monitored alarm working fine on it.

Officially they do not support it though. If there is a power cut in your house, then your phone service goes too as there is no power to the cablemodem. If your cable line is cut going into the house then your phone service goes. So unlike with a landline, if a burglar turns off your mains power on entering, your alarm has no way to alert the monitoring centre.

iMADEtheBBC

I'm still having problems with the telephone service.

Unfortunately I won't be able to update with any further details due to the recent changes in Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy.

vibe666

iMADEtheBBC wrote: »

I'm still having problems with the telephone service.

Unfortunately I won't be able to update with any further details due to the recent changes in Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy.

the what with the what and the what?

did they change the terms of use to say that you're not allowed to tell people if they give you $h1t service or something?

i was having troubles for a few months with the phone service, but it seems to be fixed now after i called them about it (the second time i called after the first thing they tried didn't work).

whenever i was heavily downloading multiple torrents the phone line would fall over (would ring at the other end on incoming calls but nothing in the house) but it's been working fine for ages now and my downloading habits haven't changed at all.

iMADEtheBBC

Finally appear to have fixed this.

They repaced the Cisco modem with a Scientific Atlanta modem.

I had to escalate to the head of customer services to get a resolution.

Now it's working I'm going to request refund of line rental since installation. I'm not holding my breath.

gurramok

They replaced yours? They refused to replace mine with regards to my broadband problem.

How do you get loudspeaker on the phone they provide? I can't find it, its quite annoying been put on hold for years when calling them and you'd have to hold the phone to your ear to make sure you don't miss an answer.

SerialComplaint

gurramok wrote: »

They replaced yours? They refused to replace mine with regards to my broadband problem.

.

They replaced my modem when the RJ-11 port for the Ethernet cable failed just hours after first installation. It took a week with a few support calls, but after the 2nd-line techs couldn't find anything, they agreed to send out a tech, who replaced the unit.

shanemort

4 tech visits and 4 Cisco routers later they aggreed to swop out the cisco with the older Scientific Atlanta modem, Phone has worked fine since.

Only took them 2 months to sort! have since got on and abused the customer service dept and got a refund on my line rental for the 2 months i was off the air