Meteor broadband to go dongles

Chris_5339762

Hopefully I'll manage to compress this into a few paragraphs... but my parents have to use mobile broadband due to lack of availability of UPC/DSL/etc and herein lies the issue!

They bought a meteor broadband system which is a wireless router which has a SIM card that connects to meteors mobile network for the internet. That initially worked fine. This got good speeds of 5-6mb down with a ping time of about 65ms.

This then started working really slowly all of a sudden, with speeds of <0.1mb down and ping times of 600ms. Totally unusable. When they brought it up the road and presumably connected it to a different mobile tower, speeds improved to normal. Bringing it back home, it worked for a few hours then started acting slow again.

They brought it back to Meteor who sent it off for repair. This took a week and they gave it back saying they had done a software upgrade. It still doesn't work here post repair, though we have yet to drive it up the road to let it connect to a different mast.

In the meantime, they were given (reluctantly) a USB dongle from meteor. This has no wireless component and plugs directly in to the computer. It then connects to the same mobile phone tower (presumably). This has worked flawlessly since day 1 (with the same SIM) and proves that the computer and the cell tower is working. That means, in my book, that the original wireless broadband-to-go system is faulty.

So my parents want to being this wireless broadband-to-go system back. I understand from this forum the repair/replace/refund thing and I also understand that mobile companies are typically awful to deal with. We have had a repair that did nothing and isn't permanent. Are we likely to be told they have to send it away again for a second repair, or can we attempt to insist on a refund? I know we can threaten the small claims court but I feel thats a bit premature.

Do the consumer rights gurus here have any advice? Whats the best way to proceed? Obviously we want our money back as this is basically a POS that for whatever reason doesn't work here, but does when they test it elsewhere.

slimjimmc

The fact the USB dongle works is not proof the computer is working perfectly because with the dongle you are no longer using the computer's WiFi adaptor. There may hardware/driver/configuration/radio interference problems with the WiFi link between the computer and the broadband router which don't affect the different technology of the dongle.

Test the router wirelessly at home for a good few hours with another device (such as a mobile phone or another laptop computer) to verify it's not your computer's WiFi connectivity. Having eliminated these other potential sources you would be in a better stance to push the retailer for a refund or replacement if the problem recurs.

Chris_5339762

Thanks. Should have mentioned this has been tested on my laptop and my parents computer, as well as their laptop

slimjimmc

Aaah, ok then.
However if the USB dongle is working fine at home then it would be hard to argue the 3G reception is poor and if there's no problem when 'up the road' then it kind of confirms their opinion that the router itself is ok (assuming you tested it for a sufficient period). If that's the case you might not have any entitlements at all since it hasn't yet been shown that the router is actually faulty.

If you can consistently reproduce the problem anywhere in the house (try repositioning it) then you may have that proof which would very much strengthen your case. But if the router is faulty don't be surprised if they only offer a replacement. They're within their rights too and it's a reasonable offer if only the device itself is faulty and not their 3G service.

Chris_5339762

Yup, the router will not connect to the 3G network at a decent speed anywhere in the house... it will connect at a decent speed if we drive four miles down the road. Presumably its connected to a different mast.

The USB key dongle will connect at a decent speed anywhere, thats why I'm thinking that the router is faulty

I think they'd prefer a refund, but a replacement may just have to do them. We'll see....