Getting out of UPC contract - Denial of service

richierichballs

Hi guys, has anyone ever had any luck with this?

Basically my mother got a call to the house offering horizon in which she agreed too. Unfortunately due to the mountain of technical issues and glitches it has been left to me to deal with.

The wifi signal from the horizon box drops out every 10-15mins, as a computer science student in my final year this makes it impossible to get any work done. As I have to reset the box every time this happens.

Having spoken to upc's technical support countless times (after waiting on hold for on average half an hour,) a solution does not seem to be available to our issues.

After getting the go ahead from my mother and again being on hold another half an hour, I eventually spoke to someone and explained we wanted out of the contract. After seeking legal advise, we where informed that this was a case of "denial of service," and we are entitled to walk away from the contract.

I'm actually making this thread from my iPhone through 3G as of now because once again the wifi is down. The horizon box is working with for tv but our other UPC hd box this evening has now decided to reset itself and is asking for engineers pins etc..

It's absolutely ridiculous at this stage.

Has anyone ever had any luck with this?

Bepolite

Get on to the Comreg.

Walking away from the contract is a matter for yourselves. Will UPC ever take this to court? Who knows. Will they win, again who knows. It will depend on the exact circumstances. You seem to have legal advice, follow it, would be my advice.

richierichballs

Bepolite wrote: »

Get on to the Comreg.

Walking away from the contract is a matter for yourselves. Will UPC ever take this to court? Who knows. Will they win, again who knows. It will depend on the exact circumstances. You seem to have legal advice, follow it, would be my advice.

I never thought about comreg, thank you for that.

The main problem is finding the time for me, it's difficult as my parents are fairly old and wouldn't be able to explain the issues to the upc staff over the phone.

I work 9-5 and do my masters 6-10, every evening I get home there is a new issue. It will probably be thursday or friday when I get time to call them.

I will let you know how it goes.

Cabaal

Just to be devil's advocate here,

UPC could very well argue that your wifi issues are due to environmental variables such as:
- interference from other sources (wireless phones, wireless video senders, microwaves etc etc)
- construction of the property (thickness of wall, metal lining in the walls etc etc)

These would be beyond UPC's reasonable control and as long as they can provide a workable service up to the upc modem/router they are providing the service.

Using an ethernet cable would allow you to easily confirm if it a wifi only issue of course, I imagine you've done this?

If of course you believe upc's modem/router is at fault then UPC should of course replace this as part of the troubleshooting. Provided you have exhausted the other steps.

Anyway, the important thing here is if you've exhausted UPC's troubleshooting. If you haven't exhausted their troubleshooting then you should do this.

If you contact Comreg they will ask you to first make a formal complaint to upc, if you haven't done this then you need to follow UPC's complaints procedure.

Melendez

This post has been deleted.

zl1whqvjs75cdy

Could you buy a wireless router from amazon and hook it up to the horizon box? I know when we changed our router last year the WiFi dropped off dramatically, as in couldn't get it upstairs. Now this was totally ridiculous but UPC the shower of ***** were adamant that it wasn't their problem. I bought a router from amazon and hooked it up. Cost all of 15 quid compared to 45 from UPC and the wireless signal is great now.

It might be worth it in the long run to just spend the 15 quid and be done with dealing with UPC for now. They are an absolute horror show of a company.

richierichballs

Cabaal wrote: »

Just to be devil's advocate here,

UPC could very well argue that your wifi issues are due to environmental variables such as:
- interference from other sources (wireless phones, wireless video senders, microwaves etc etc)
- construction of the property (thickness of wall, metal lining in the walls etc etc)

These would be beyond UPC's reasonable control and as long as they can provide a workable service up to the upc modem/router they are providing the service.

Using an ethernet cable would allow you to easily confirm if it a wifi only issue of course, I imagine you've done this?

If of course you believe upc's modem/router is at fault then UPC should of course replace this as part of the troubleshooting. Provided you have exhausted the other steps.

Anyway, the important thing here is if you've exhausted UPC's troubleshooting. If you haven't exhausted their troubleshooting then you should do this.

If you contact Comreg they will ask you to first make a formal complaint to upc, if you haven't done this then you need to follow UPC's complaints procedure.

Hi Cabaal,

I've had no choice other than to do this and it has been no problem.
It's a nuisance to be honest but it works very well.

I have my ps3 connected directly to the horizon box and never have issues.

richierichballs

donkeyoaty0099 wrote: »

Could you buy a wireless router from amazon and hook it up to the horizon box? I know when we changed our router last year the WiFi dropped off dramatically, as in couldn't get it upstairs. Now this was totally ridiculous but UPC the shower of ***** were adamant that it wasn't their problem. I bought a router from amazon and hooked it up. Cost all of 15 quid compared to 45 from UPC and the wireless signal is great now.

It might be worth it in the long run to just spend the 15 quid and be done with dealing with UPC for now. They are an absolute horror show of a company.

I was planning on doing that, I wasn't there when UPC delivered Horizon to the house but my father explained to me that they actually took back the router they gave us for our previous UPC package.

I don't particularly want to spend on money on a service that we already pay for that isn't working, purely out of principal. But I feel I may have to for the moment. Can you link me to the one you bought off amazon?

slimjimmc

richierichballs wrote: »

Hi Cabaal,

I've had no choice other than to do this and it has been no problem.
It's a nuisance to be honest but it works very well.

I have my ps3 connected directly to the horizon box and never have issues.

So there is no "denial of service" issue then since you have confirmed there is no service problem. The service is working.

It seems your only issue is your WiFi reception dropping, which as you know is influenced by a number of factors as mentioned by Cabaal, including your own equipment. UPC are obliged to repair or replace their equipment if faulty, but if their gear is ok then they're not responsible. You could ask (push) them to swap out the box for another one.

What happens if you are sited within a few metres of the Horizon box in the same room with all other electrical devices off, is the signal more stable?

richierichballs

slimjimmc wrote: »

So there is no "denial of service" issue then since you have confirmed there is no service problem. The service is working.

It seems your only issue is your WiFi reception dropping, which as you know is influenced by a number of factors as mentioned by Cabaal, including your own equipment. UPC are obliged to repair or replace their equipment if faulty, but if their gear is ok then they're not responsible. You could ask (push) them to swap out the box for another one.

What happens if you are sited within a few metres of the Horizon box in the same room with all other electrical devices off, is the signal more stable?

Well the solicitor I spoke to claims it is a very strong case of "denial of service,"
A horizon box is supposed to have wifi, it is also supposed to have 100meg broadband and the only other electrical appliance in the room is a tv and it's off most of the time and yes there is still issues.

It is dropping every few minutes and that is not the service we paid for,
our HD digital box is also still offline, despite my father speaking to them today on the phone and not coming to a solution. They claimed they would call back and didn't. Again, a denial of service.

A joke of a company.

Cabaal

richierichballs wrote: »

Well the solicitor I spoke to claims it is a very strong case of "denial of service,"
A horizon box is supposed to have wifi, it is also supposed to have 100meg broadband and the only other electrical appliance in the room is a tv and it's off most of the time and yes there is still issues.

It is dropping every few minutes and that is not the service we paid for,
our HD digital box is also still offline, despite my father speaking to them today on the phone and not coming to a solution. They claimed they would call back and didn't. Again, a denial of service.

A joke of a company.

But the router does have wifi,

I think the solicitor misunderstands the difference between the service upc actually can control and provide to the router and the signal the router provides via wifi. To be honest alot of people don't understand the difference.

Interference with wifi signals can and does happen, its beyond UPC's reasonable control and there's nothing they can really do about it besides trying to perhaps suggest likely sources for the problem.

Now ok its possible the router could be in some manner defective so you could push for them to replace it. Provided you've completed normal troubleshooting steps fully I would imagine they may have an option to do this.

But if replacing it doesn't resolve it then its something local to the premises,

Maybe take a look at
http://www.7tutorials.com/layman-guide-solving-wireless-network-interference-problems

richierichballs

Cabaal wrote: »

I think the solicitor misunderstands the difference between the service upc actually can control and provide to the router and the signal the router provides via wifi. To be honest alot of people don't understand the difference.

The solicitor happens to be married to my brother (who is also a barrister,)
and they fully understand the difference, considering they first hand have seen the problem.

Nobody is disputing whether the horizon box is receiving a fibre optic connection or not, but we are disputing the fact this Horizon box is part of what we are paying for and it is not working correctly, combined with the poor customer service (which is included in the contract) they feel this is a strong case of deinal-of-service.

Cabaal wrote: »

Interference with wifi signals can and does happen, its beyond UPC's reasonable control and there's nothing they can really do about it besides trying to perhaps suggest likely sources for the problem.

I fully understand wifi interference, I am a fully certified Cisco CCNA engineer in the middle of a masters in computer science, I have tried everything to try fix this matter myself. The UPC engineers can't seem to come up with a solution either and we have not been offered a replacement box.

We had regular UPC broadband in the house prior for the last 3 years at least and didn't have any major issues with it that I couldn't resolve. So I don't think interference in the house is an issue. I take into consideration that this is a new box and is not a Cisco box anymore (which I think is the main issue.) But that is out of my hands.

Of course there is something they can do, the horizon box is again part of the service they provide. It should at least be replaced.

keithclancy

richierichballs wrote: »

The solicitor happens to be married to my brother (who is also a barrister,)
and they fully understand the difference, considering they first hand have seen the problem.

Nobody is disputing whether the horizon box is receiving a fibre optic connection or not, but we are disputing the fact this Horizon box is part of what we are paying for and it is not working correctly, combined with the poor customer service (which is included in the contract) they feel this is a strong case of deinal-of-service.

I fully understand wifi interference, I am a fully certified Cisco CCNA engineer in the middle of a masters in computer science, I have tried everything to try fix this matter myself. The UPC engineers can't seem to come up with a solution either and we have not been offered a replacement box.

We had regular UPC broadband in the house prior for the last 3 years at least and didn't have any major issues with it that I couldn't resolve. So I don't think interference in the house is an issue. I take into consideration that this is a new box and is not a Cisco box anymore (which I think is the main issue.) But that is out of my hands.

Of course there is something they can do, the horizon box is again part of the service they provide. It should at least be replaced.

All the Horizon boxes have a poor Wifi signal (actually most all in one jobs are rubbish) buy a decent Wifi Router with dedicated external antennas for good coverage in your house, is it in a cabinet under your TV or something, you'll get better signal if you move it away from other equipment.

Wifi is prone to environmental issues, everything from Video Senders, Old Cordless phones and Microwaves can interfere with them.

I'm assuming you did a self install, which means your stuck trying to fix it yourself.

richierichballs

keithclancy wrote: »

All the Horizon boxes have a poor Wifi signal (actually most all in one jobs are rubbish) buy a decent Wifi Router with dedicated external antennas for good coverage in your house, is it in a cabinet under your TV or something, you'll get better signal if you move it away from other equipment.

Wifi is prone to environmental issues, everything from Video Senders, Old Cordless phones and Microwaves can interfere with them.

I'm assuming you did a self install, which means your stuck trying to fix it yourself.

The only thing it is close to is the TV, that is the only electrical appliance that could cause interference and that shouldn't be the case considering its a box made to work with TV's.

The phone is also nearby, but again it has to be as it's connected to the box also.

And yes I did the self install, thank you for your help.

keithclancy

richierichballs wrote: »

The only thing it is close to is the TV, that is the only electrical appliance that could cause interference and that shouldn't be the case considering its a box made to work with TV's.

The phone is also nearby, but again it has to be as it's connected to the box also.

And yes I did the self install, thank you for your help.

Can you login to 192.168.192.1 ? (Standard user/pass admin/admin)


Go to 'Wireless'


Under Wireless for to 2.4Ghz, give it a different name to the 5Ghz Radio.



Click on apply and try both to see which gives best signal, 5ghz is more prone to interference.

Apologies for the Dutch pics, I've never seen an Irish horizon box before.

richierichballs

keithclancy wrote: »

Can you login to 192.168.192.1 ? (Standard user/pass admin/admin)


Go to 'Wireless'


Under Wireless for to 2.4Ghz, give it a different name to the 5Ghz Radio.



Click on apply and try both to see which gives best signal, 5ghz is more prone to interference.

Apologies for the Dutch pics, I've never seen an Irish horizon box before.

Cheers for that mate, I'll give that shot and see how it goes. It will more than likely be tomorrow before I get a chance.

Straight to college after work this afternoon.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

keithclancy

richierichballs wrote: »

Cheers for that mate, I'll give that shot and see how it goes. It will more than likely be tomorrow before I get a chance.

Straight to college after work this afternoon.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

Check 192.168.100.1 .. or lookup your local IP and stick 1 on the end also.

Will be something along those lines anyway.

creep

You really are making a mountain out of a moehill. Your connection is perfect wired. Just change the wireless settings as suggested or buy a wireless router off amazon for 15 euro and then your wireless will be perfect. Most equipment that comes default with internet providers isnt the best

niallon

richierichballs wrote: »

Cheers for that mate, I'll give that shot and see how it goes. It will more than likely be tomorrow before I get a chance.

Straight to college after work this afternoon.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

I was having issues with the Horizon box, laptop coming out if hibernate and the Wifi connection would be dropped or limited, phone would inexplicably slow to a crawl etc. Turns out this was the problem. Seems the boxes are set to 5 by default when they most certainly shouldn't!

keithclancy

creep wrote: »

You really are making a mountain out of a moehill. Your connection is perfect wired. Just change the wireless settings as suggested or buy a wireless router off amazon for 15 euro and then your wireless will be perfect. Most equipment that comes default with internet providers isnt the best

Yeah, same for most unfortunately, I got an all in one thing from Orange here in the Netherlands, the Wireless function wasn't great, bought a Linksys WRT54G and it was vastly improved.

jimmycrackcorm

richierichballs wrote: »

The solicitor happens to be married to my brother (who is also a barrister,)
and they fully understand the difference, considering they first hand have seen the problem.

Nobody is disputing whether the horizon box is receiving a fibre optic connection or not, but we are disputing the fact this Horizon box is part of what we are paying for and it is not working correctly, combined with the poor customer service (which is included in the contract) they feel this is a strong case of deinal-of-service.



I fully understand wifi interference, I am a fully certified Cisco CCNA engineer in the middle of a masters in computer science, I have tried everything to try fix this matter myself. The UPC engineers can't seem to come up with a solution either and we have not been offered a replacement box.

We had regular UPC broadband in the house prior for the last 3 years at least and didn't have any major issues with it that I couldn't resolve. So I don't think interference in the house is an issue. I take into consideration that this is a new box and is not a Cisco box anymore (which I think is the main issue.) But that is out of my hands.

Of course there is something they can do, the horizon box is again part of the service they provide. It should at least be replaced.

You're solicitor seems to be rubbish if he thinks poor wifi is denial of service. Otherwise I could go to the bootom of my Garden and claim denial of service because my wifi signal won't stretch.

Get homeplugs and/or a cheap wifi router. TBH As a C/S student I'm surprised you'd give up the fastest / best value broadband service over this.

beauf

That you can find a workaround, is a different issue.

If the wifi on the Horizon box is unusable, it could be faulty. So they should replace it. Or at least send an engineer out to test it.

creep

I'm surprised someone who claims to have a CCNA doesn't know about wireless settings. I just find that funny and also contacting a solicitor over something as minor that he doesn't want to buy a 15 euro wireless modem, Mind is boggled. UPC has been boosted to 120 MB minimun connection speed today and the dearer one 200MB.

richierichballs

creep wrote: »

I'm surprised someone who claims to have a CCNA doesn't know about wireless settings. I just find that funny and also contacting a solicitor over something as minor that he doesn't want to buy a 15 euro wireless modem, Mind is boggled. UPC has been boosted to 120 MB minimun connection speed today and the dearer one 200MB.

I don't have time to configure something that they should've done it in the first place.

And since then I have bought an external router and connected it to the horizon box, still no resolution on either SSID.

I want to avail of there full services and the thoughts of 200MB is mouth watering. An engineer is coming out on Tuesday.

And UPC have said if the engineer can not resolve the contract they will terminate the contract and refund the last two months. Your right, my solicitor is awful.

creep

richierichballs wrote: »

I don't have time to configure something that they should've done it in the first place.

And since then I have bought an external router and connected it to the horizon box, still no resolution on either SSID.

I want to avail of there full services and the thoughts of 200MB is mouth watering. An engineer is coming out on Tuesday.

And UPC have said if the engineer can not resolve the contract they will terminate the contract and refund the last two months. Your right, my solicitor is awful.

How far away are you from the new router. Have you tried a different Laptop/ computer, could be a problem with that. If the wired is working perfectly then there should be no reason why the new router isnt working correctly. Im guessing its a problem with your wireless card because a new router will definitively work wirelessly with Horizon. You are also not experiencing Denial of Service.

richierichballs

creep wrote: »

How far away are you from the new router. Have you tried a different Laptop/ computer, could be a problem with that. If the wired is working perfectly then there should be no reason why the new router isnt working correctly. Im guessing its a problem with your wireless card because a new router will definitively work wirelessly with Horizon. You are also not experiencing Denial of Service.

My mother bought a new laptop yesterday, I set it up for her and we are picking up a signal but it's only "limited access" and can't actually browse the net.

I've changed the channel from 11 to 7 on the horizon box and from 7 to 11 on the external Cisco router still nothing.

Horizon box needs works with WPA2pk but can't seem the get full signal. Other devices can connect, just signal keeps dropping. Her laptop can't connect at all.

Five Lamps

richierichballs wrote: »

The solicitor happens to be married to my brother (who is also a barrister,)
and they fully understand the difference, considering they first hand have seen the problem.

Fail to see how this is a "denial of service" when the service which is the broadband is being provided to the address.

Nobody is disputing whether the horizon box is receiving a fibre optic connection or not, but we are disputing the fact this Horizon box is part of what we are paying for and it is not working correctly, combined with the poor customer service (which is included in the contract) they feel this is a strong case of deinal-of-service.

Perhaps somebody should read the contract that a customer signs with UPC and what warranties or guarantees they give.

I fully understand wifi interference, I am a fully certified Cisco CCNA engineer in the middle of a masters in computer science, I have tried everything to try fix this matter myself. The UPC engineers can't seem to come up with a solution either and we have not been offered a replacement box.

A replacement box would be fair. Is there any way you can bench test the box?

creep

richierichballs wrote: »

My mother bought a new laptop yesterday, I set it up for her and we are picking up a signal but it's only "limited access" and can't actually browse the net.

I've changed the channel from 11 to 7 on the horizon box and from 7 to 11 on the external Cisco router still nothing.

Horizon box needs works with WPA2pk but can't seem the get full signal. Other devices can connect, just signal keeps dropping. Her laptop can't connect at all.

Which router did you buy?

richierichballs

Five Lamps wrote: »

A replacement box would be fair. Is there any way you can bench test the box?

They are coming out on Tuesday, I presume they will give us a new box. not much else can be done

richierichballs

creep wrote: »

Which router did you buy?

Cisco EPC2425

richierichballs

Right an update on the situation as people seem to think I am overreacting.

A UPC engineer visited the house yesterday afternoon, unfortunately I was in college so couldn't be there. My father was there (in his mid 70's and completely clueless to any form of technology.)

Long story short, the engineer acknowledged that the service was not working properly but instead of trying another replacement box he told us we OURSELVES(or pay a contractor) would have to rewire the UPC cable coming into the house, as they do not do internal wiring anymore.

He wanted us to get a electrician in to run a cable from where our UPC horizon box is and run it up into the attic, drill a whole and have to feed it outside the house to the external UPC wiring and they would connect it. This is absolutely outrageous as we where sold this box and it was as easy as "plugging in and its ready to go." Which it is clearly not and they have acknowledged this.

The issue is that the UPC line they ran in a few years ago for the broadband is at the other side of the house to where the horizon box is,
Therefore it's either move the TV from our living room into the corner of our dining room (where they originally ran the line) or pay an electrician to run in a new line to the living room.

Thoughts?