Eircom and Customer-Service

disConnected

<Rant>
About three weeks ago, just after Eircom 'surprised' us with their 'unbeatable' ADSL offering I wrote back to them to get more details. Esp. to get more info on when the service would be available in areas outside of Dublin. Up to now I have not received any kind of feedback. Not one word! Not even a ' sorry, we have no idea when'. By now I am assuming that I will not receive any reply anyway...
This shows again the ignorant and arrogant way that Eircom treat their customers (to which I consider myself belonging to as I am paying for that phone-line into my house). And it also shows how seriously they consider offering any kind of DSL at all, as long as they can overcharge us for some other mediocre service they are offering. I also guess that Eircom do not see it viable to offer DSL in areas where they make less than 500% profit....
I am looking forward to that day when the Irish Government wakes up and realizes that this 'state-sponsored' monopoly is only harming the Irish economy. Hopefully then we will see some real competition to Eircom to be allowed in this country...
</end of Rant>

dahamsta

Gods disConnected, you don't think €ircon actually want to give people DSL, do you? To them, that's like donating to charity, with no PR return! Are you mad?

Fuppin baxtards is all they are.

adam

chernobyl

every time i have called Eircom support/CS i feel guilty for ever making the call.
it really is true that they are snobby and short with their customers.
if i have a problem now, i just cant be bothered asking, i havent got the time to waste.
i wish i could offer Esat my complete custom or even Chorus.

segadreamcast

Amazingly, I was pleased with Eircon's customer service.

On Saturday night I sent an e-mail to them, Monday morning I had two replies from two different people in Eircom...

Impressive I thought ^_^ considering companies such as Tesco have never replied to my e-mails.

segadreamcast

Speaking of Chorus...still waiting for 2 replies from them...for 2 e-mails I sent in July...

Urban Weigl

I remember sometime last year when there were rumors about Eircom launching ADSL, I decided to ring Eircom Net and ask when it might become available in my area.

The lady at Eircom Net said I needed to talk to the main company for this info, and promptly transferred me. Fair enough, I thought. But once I was talking to the main company, they said that I would need to talk to Eircom Net (!!!), because they were the part of the company in charge of Internet services. So guess what, they put me back onto the first lady! At all times I remained very friendly and civilized, but this lady proceeded to ask very rudely why I was back talking to her and didn't she just tell me that broadband was not an area which had anything to do with Eircom Net.

The moral of the story is that Eircom hates their customers, and consider them a mere annoyance. The only reason I'm still a customer is because I do not have any other option. A company like this would never survive in a free market, and if the government truly brought on competition, Eircom would be dead in the water in a few months.

PS: Eircom haven't even managed to get my 56k modem to work. I have to use an old 32k modem just to connect to the Internet without my connection dropping after a few minutes (if it manages to connect at all).

dahamsta

every time i have called Eircom support/CS i feel guilty for ever making the call. it really is true that they are snobby and short with their customers. if i have a problem now, i just cant be bothered asking, i havent got the time to waste.

I've been both extraordinarily pleased with Eircom's customer service, and downright insulted. There's no in-between with them, you either get a really nice girl who'll go out of her way for you, or you'll get some ignorant ex-TE gobsheen who talks to you like you're a child and obviously couldn't give a tuppenny fluck what you want. The problem is that the ould wans actually know their stuff, but couldn't be bothered their fat arses, and the new ones don't know their stuff at all and usually get it completely wrong, like the helpful girl last month who cost me an extra £75 because she didn't add an Optimiser plan to account like she said she would. So although I've been extraordinarily pleased on occasion, they normally manage to screw it up in the end.

I'll tell you when I actually *was * extraordinarily pleased though - the day before my holiday Eircom's market survey crowd gave me a ring to ask how I felt about the last customer service call I got. This actually wasn't the one I mentioned above, it was another recent call when I lost both ISDN lines on a Friday, and they refused to repair it over the weekend (I run my business at the weekend). It still stops working periodically, so I was, and still am, most unhappy with Eircom about it (if I could be any unhappier with them). On top of that, I got one of the aforementioned obnoxious ex-TE biddies, who riled me to the last on the phone.

So the questions ran like this:

MS: "On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate your last customer service call?"
AB: "One."
MS: "On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate the politeness of the representative you talked to?"
AB: "One."
MS: "On a scale of one to ten, how..."
AB: "Can I use negative figures?"
MS: "No, I'm afraid n..."
AB. "One."

There were a couple of mid-range numbers thrown in, because I like to be honest, but even with being honest, I'd say it averaged out to about 2 in the end.

i wish i could offer Esat my complete custom or even Chorus.

Don't bother, they're just as bad. A good portion of Esat's staff are ex-TE too, and Chorus are famous for their customer service staff's ignorance. On top of that, like I said above, even if you do get a good one it's unlikely it'll work out in the end. The telecommunications companies in Ireland have it jammy, they don't give a fock about us, really.

adam

chernobyl

i dont care man, im now offically ABE, and im sure you know what that acronym means.
there is a difference to knowing the path and walking the path, but i aint Neo, this aint the matrix and i have no choice but to use Eircom.

gintyc

I would like to say I think Eircom never thinks of making "500% profit" on ADSL. but they do want to make profit.

Do you think Eircom is a non profit company?

No of coarse you don't. Eircom as a company needs to run it self as a company and in no way would it be practical (as it will not work far away from the exchange) to bring ADSL any further then cities large towns. First, they need to build up ASDL in the cities.

I would like to add I do not work for Eircom. However, it sounds like most of you think Eircom is a non-profit company (and it sound like some people think Eircom should serve them like a slave would).

In addition, I do support the Ireland Offline campaign, and I want the "cap" taken off the proposed ADSL and yes it probably could be cheaper.

About customer service, just think how many people are e-mailing Eircom about ADSL.

O and to try to answer your question on on when the service would be available in areas outside of Dublin, Eircom says some of Dublin now and in June more of dublin, Cork, Galway and . Limerick. They "hope" to have it in the north east, north west, midlands and south east in December 2002.

So unless I move to Dublin, Cork, Galway or Limerick. I will not get it for more then a year of maybe never!

Thank You

Cian Ginty
Editor, The Irish Gamer
http://www.theirishgamer.com/

R. Daneel Olivaw

Originally posted by gintyc
I would like to say I think Eircom never thinks of making "500% profit" on ADSL. but they do want to make profit.

Yeah but it's not like they are undertaking big expenditure for flat rate access. We had in the 80s with 12p/unlimited-call-length. They made profit then.....

It's so pathetic that they can grossly overcharge people, have a national monopoly, kill off progressive internet services like Surf No-Limits, and utterly and totally crash and burn on the stock market because even with all the overcharging and monopolising, they can not appear to run the company better than a <opens Slashdot> group of squirrels.

Perhaps they have missed the crucial step that good service = more profit. If they quit the childish crap, they'd get millions more every year.

Like so: statistically from the Internet Town Ennis or whatever it is known as, with broadband access, use triples.

Now, if they get the average 5 hours charge per month, that is only £2.50-£3.00. But lets say they introduce flat-rate for £20. Loads of people who don't use the net very much apart from email would use it (as seen in the UK when it was introduced, Irish people are not interplanetary monkeys who shun all things modem-related).

So they would increase by three times, so the average user "costs" around £9 now, but are paying Eircom £20 for the privelege. The user feels better about having exact amounts predicted on the bills in advance, and this cancels out the <1% of total that are heavy users.

Plus, those "costs" are totally artifically created, as once again, we had 12p per unlimited call length in the 1980s. They have shown that a national monopoly can not be profitable by charging per minute money-leech costs....and they could in the 1980s with the flat-rate equivalents.

And don't let anyone tell you that they have expensive international carrier charges for bandwidth. Those charges are fractions of pennies per GB, not the 2.6p ex VAT they are charging/want to charge.

Lemming

Originally posted by gintyc

No of coarse you don't. Eircom as a company needs to run it self as a company

Well ... you've got one thing right. They DO need to run themselves as a company (or should start to at least!!!!). Do you think the public's anamousity towards Eircom is unwarranted?? Of course not. It's been building for years and years.

I would like to add I do not work for Eircom. However, it sounds like most of you think Eircom is a non-profit company (and it sound like some people think Eircom should serve them like a slave would).

I would not expect them to behave like a slave. I DO however, object to them attempting to bend me over the nearest table so they can have their cake and eat it.

NeilF

Originally posted by gintyc
Eircom as a company needs to run it self as a company

If only.

Eircom phoned today trying to sell Hi-Speed. Being the only soul in the house I felt obliged to talk to her. I said I would wait for ADSL to come around. However, I was cautioned that it was £70pm, was really only for businesses and that I wouldn't see it for two years! I went on a bit and then she said it was still in trial and not being offered as a product yet! I can't avoid the ads for it on the web.

I would have talked further but I was fit to burst into laughter. Ever heard Navanman's Eircom directory enquiries operator? That's who I was talking to. No bother!

There is a more serious point to all this. IrelandOffline is composed of probably the heaviest users of telecommunications after the big corporates. Eircom still thinks that it is a state body who can dictate to their customers. Anyone trying to run a business in a competitive market would leap at the opportunity to sell a higher value product. Eircom should have started asking if I knew my exchange, if they could take my name as a possible trialist in my area etc. Instead I was fed misinformation and patronised.

However, the day will come when there will be full and complete competition in the market. It is only a matter of time. When that day comes Eircom will pay for their shoddy customer service because the vast majority of IrelandOffline's members will give their business to other companies while Eircom discover how to operate in a competitive market without any monopolies.

aidan_dunne

Of course, that is the obvious reason for Eircom's attitude. They are no longer a monoploy but are desperately trying to cling onto their "pseudo-monoploy" and stifle competition because they know that as soon as there is proper competition they will be exposed for the greedy, ignorant, shoddy, sh***y company that they are and their competitors will hammer into the ground them in a fair, level playing field. And personally, I can't wait to see that day, the day Eircom is declared bankrupt or goes out of business for all the years they've been f**king us all in our a$$es.

MiCr0

i've got ntl as phone/tv/inet provider
bit off topic i know but anyway

they have been v.good
service is good and 99% they actually get back to me when i email querys - last time i got a reply in 45mins on a sunday afternoon (college guy working part time???)

only problem is that they don't want my business
just turn on the port ffs - but that is a different rant

just my 0.02e

MiCr0

dahamsta

I would like to say I think Eircom never thinks of making "500% profit" on ADSL. but they do want to make profit. Do you think Eircom is a non profit company? No of coarse you don't. Eircom as a company needs to run it self as a company

There's a big difference between running a company at a profit and screwing consumers for everything they've got Cian. Which is precisely what Eircom have been doing for the past few years. They're taking us to the cleaners man.

I would like to add I do not work for Eircom. However, it sounds like most of you think Eircom is a non-profit company (and it sound like some people think Eircom should serve them like a slave would).

They shouldn't serve us like slaves, but they *are* our servants. Businesses are there to supply services and serve their customers, and in a competitive market an unhappy customer can take their business elsewhere. Telecommunications in Ireland is not a competitive market, it's a downright shoddy market run as a cartel. They need to be controlled.

About customer service, just think how many people are e-mailing Eircom about ADSL.

And as a telecommunications company, Eircom should be prepared for that.

O and to try to answer your question on on when the service would be available in areas outside of Dublin, Eircom says some of Dublin now and in June more of dublin, Cork, Galway and . Limerick. They "hope" to have it in the north east, north west, midlands and south east in December 2002.

And you believe them?

So unless I move to Dublin, Cork, Galway or Limerick. I will not get it for more then a year of maybe never!

If Eircom are allowed continue the way they are, you won't get it then either, even if you do move. How many times do I have to make the point - Eircom don't *want* to roll out DSL in Ireland. The only way to get DSL rolled out it to promote competition via bitstream and LLU so Other Licences Operators can compete fairly with Eircom. Until that happens, take a deep breath and bend over...

adam

gintyc

They shouldn't serve us like slaves, but they *are* our servants. Businesses are there to supply services and serve their customers, and in a competitive market an unhappy customer can take their business elsewhere. Telecommunications in Ireland is not a competitive market, it's a downright shoddy market run as a cartel. They need to be controlled.

Your wrong eircom is not REALLY there to serve their customers, but to serve the stock holders

O and to try to answer your question on on when the service would be available in areas outside of Dublin, Eircom says some of Dublin now and in June more of dublin, Cork, Galway and . Limerick. They "hope" to have it in the north east, north west, midlands and south east in December 2002.

And you believe them?

Not totaly but some of what they say... You Do Know that eircom has launched their ADSL service? do you? its called i-stream.

"Eircom will begin accepting first orders on October 2. The service will intitially be advailable to 277,000 customers in the Dublin area. ..."

SkepticOne

Originally posted by gintyc
Your wrong eircom is not REALLY there to serve their customers, but to serve the stock holders

You have inadvertantly hit the nail on the head there. In a competitive market, serving the stock holders would mean that Eircom have to serve their customers. Since it is not a competitive market, Eircom just have to "sweat the assets".

dahamsta

Well said SkepticOne, you voiced my thoughts admirably. He also brings up another point, or disbelief in my case to be more accurate:

Eircom are serving their stockholders? Since when? Alfie Kane has difficulty running to the toilet, never mind running a company like Eircom.

Not totaly but some of what they say... You Do Know that eircom has launched their ADSL service? do you? its called i-stream. "Eircom will begin accepting first orders on October 2. The service will intitially be advailable to 277,000 customers in the Dublin area. ..."

gintyc, for a start, drop the attitude and try and communicate more politely please. I don't have the energy to deal with smartasses.

Secondly, if we're going to be picky about it, you just proved yourself wrong in the space of a paragraph. Eircom haven't actually launched i-Stream, they've marketed it. The product isn't available, and in fact they're *not allowed* make it available until three weeks after the Regulator decides their pricing is cost-oriented.

Taken from today, that means Eircom can't start selling i-Stream until at least two weeks *after* their proposed launch date, and going by the litigation taken against the ODTR by Eircom WRT LLU pricing, it's looking pretty unlikely it'll be then either.

Take your head out of your bottom, young man, and face reality.

adam

sceptre

Good posts as always Adam.

I'm going to analogise as usual to explain my view.

Let's say that in the morning the government decided to sell off our national electricity infrastructure or our national roads infrastructure. The reasons behind the analogies are clear. Things that the nation can be considered to have an interest (albeit a non-financial one) after such a sale and are important to the businesses and individual lives of people.

The newly floated companies now have the power to set prices - they own the assets after all. Can't they set prices as they wish? Can't they make an attempt to block others from targetting their customers? Can't they block new services from being introduced? After all, they paid for the assets so they should be able to dictate what products are available, to whom, when and at what price?

My answer to all of the above questions is "no". Where the government would lack powers to make the answers "no" in a legal sense, under the circumstances of parts of a country's infrastructure being controlled by a non-state entity, I would believe that government should enact legislation and give its organs powers to enforce a position whereby the answer would be "no".

That's my view. No-one is denying Eircom's right, as a company (private or public) to make a profit. But, if like me, you view our telecoms and communications infrastructure as having as much importance as our roads and electricity network (because it is, especially now) you have to agree with the above.



(aside - if it were my choice, I would either renationalise the actual phone lines and exchanges or place them with a company structure as with Railtrack in the UK, leaving Eircom to compete like any other licensed operator. Unlikely to happen but it still does not subtract from my unrelated point above)

NeilF

Originally posted by gintyc
Your wrong eircom is not REALLY there to serve their customers, but to serve the stock holders

There are lots of threads here with well-reasoned arguments and thoughts on the current Internet situation in Ireland. Read them. You would have to be naive to think that we are a group of upstarts who want fibre to the door for free. We want to see proper competition in the market so that we can be sure we are getting value for money.

No one is against Eircom making a profit. They employ thousands and Eircom going under would benefit nobody in this country. However they should be making their profit in a competitive market. They should be fostering and encouraging competition (*GASP*) to build a strong company rather than using every means to block competition and relying on a monopoly which will disappear some day soon.

I also agree with sceptre's post to renationalise the actual phone lines. I think it is something too important to entrust to a company whose main interest is profit and not the national good. It wouldn't surprise me if TE didn't become Eircom we would be a nation with broadband rather than a nation of poor shareholders!

gintyc

Sorry about that, I did not included that my quotes were from Mondays Irish Independent "Get Connected" magazine. MAYBE the Independent was wrong printing words like "...Eircom has finally launched its broadband ADSL service..." or MAYBE your wrong???

I did not say its available, I just quoted what the Independent printed... "Eircom will begin accepting first orders on October 2. The service will initially be available to 277,000 customers in the Dublin area. ..."

Before you reply I was wrong in not saying who I was quoting, but at the time I was in a bit of a rush.

Cian Ginty
Editor, The Irish Gamer
http://www.theirishgamer.com/

gintyc

Originally posted by gintyc
Sorry about that, I did not included that my quotes were from Mondays Irish Independent "Get Connected" magazine. MAYBE the Independent was wrong printing words like "...Eircom has finally launched its broadband ADSL service..." or MAYBE your wrong???

I did not say its available, I just quoted what the Independent printed... "Eircom will begin accepting first orders on October 2. The service will initially be available to 277,000 customers in the Dublin area. ..."

Before you reply I was wrong in not saying who I was quoting, but at the time I was in a bit of a rush.

Cian Ginty
Editor, The Irish Gamer
http://www.theirishgamer.com/

Wholesale

Or Maybe they have launched it...

"eircom can launch its retail offering 21 days after it has satisfied the Director that its wholesale offering is compliant with its obligations regarding cost orientation, non-discrimination and competition. The Director regrets that the benefits to consumers and business users arising from bitstream will be delayed until eircom complies with its obligations but believes that this action is necessary to prevent a price structure which would stifle competition."

- Bitstream ADSL and Line Sharing Costs, Document No: ODTR 01/75, Dated 26 September 2001

sceptre

Originally posted by disConnected

I am looking forward to that day when the Irish Government wakes up and realizes that this 'state-sponsored' monopoly is only harming the Irish economy. Hopefully then we will see some real competition to Eircom to be allowed in this country...

(forgot to add this in my post)

Agreed. Firmly. I don't think of them as a "State-sponsored" monololy, admittedly, I see them as a "state-tolerated" monopoly, which I think can be just as bad.

disConnected

Thanks for the great discussion here, and sorry that I don't post more regularly. I have to watch my online time a bit to avoid overstretching my budget...
Thanks for all your replies esp to gintyc's comments.
I just have 3 questions left for you, gintyc:

1) to following statement from you:
I would like to say I think Eircom never thinks of making "500% profit" on ADSL. but they do want to make profit.
Have you compared Eircom's prices with those in other EU countries (and I am not only talking about their data-communication pricing)???

2+3) regarding this statement:
Your wrong eircom is not REALLY there to serve their customers, but to serve the stock holders

Well, where I am working the customer is king... How is it for your company?
And: Have you looked at Eircom's share-values lately? Oh, and please do tell me now that the low share prices are only caused by outside factors. Even Alfie does not believe that any more...

And at long last a comment on this comment from you:
About customer service, just think how many people are e-mailing Eircom about ADSL.
Well, at some stage I used to work for an extremely good and extremely customer-focused Computer Manufacturer to provide customer support.
Basically, we would not have even dreamt to leave a customer waiting for such a long time without any answer at all. Well, but on the other hand this company is facing real competition

dahamsta

(Oops-a-daisy!) Originally posted by sceptre:

under the circumstances of parts of a country's infrastructure being controlled by a non-state entity, I would believe that government should enact legislation and give its organs powers to ebnforce a position whereby the answer would be "no".

If you're saying "we should give Etain Doyle and her department more power to deal with Eircom", then I agree with you 100%, of course. That's a long-term solution though, and one we have to draw to the government's attention. Enacting that legislation would be painstaking and painful, and a terrible battle because of Eircom's strong lobbying powers. There will be fights about punishments and solutions, and definitions and details, and I don't think there's any doubt it would end up in the courts. I mean, let's look at the obvious solutions:

Take Eircom's licence off them. This is impractical in the extreme, because Eircom own the telecommunications infrastructure. What do we do then, shut up shop? Take the infrastructure back? Can you imagine the legal minefield you'd be getting into?

Curtail Eircom's activities. Impossible, Eircom are already curtailing their own activities as much as possible to kill costs (how about sacking a few people Eircom, eh?) and boost revenues and profits. This would be detrimental to consumers and business, and ultimately to the state.

Fine Eircom. This in my view is the only possible solution - we're talking percentages of revenue here, not fixed fines - but can you imagine trying to enact the legislation? Eircom would be bawling their eyes out in court and to every politician, lobbyist and journalist they could get their hands on, saying the government is bullying them. And worse - and you know I'm right - they'll believe them.

Again though, in my view, the latter is the only option. But this process should have been started an age ago. It's never too late in the grand scheme of things, but it's already too late for businesses and consumers. I don't need to say this to you, but it does need to be said - we're being robbed.

(aside - if it were my choice, I would either renationalise the actual phone lines and exchanges or place them with a company structure as with Railtrack in the UK, leaving Eircom to compete like any other licensed operator. Unlikely to happen but it still does not subtract from my unrelated point above)

Of course both would be lovely, but would they be right or viable? If it's in fact feasible to renationalise the network (doubtful), and if the government could actually be convinced to do it (very doubtful), would it work or would we be beset with the problems TE were faced with? That is, civil servants who don't give a damn, gross overemployment, underinvestment in the infrastructure, etc, etc?

As to the second, a Railtrack style organisaion, think about that for a second. Think about Railtrack. Railtrack is a shambles, and has been from the very start. They left the network rot (just like Eircom), and they quite literally killed people. I know the same is impossible (or at least highly unlikely) with a telecommunications network, but isn't there a huge risk that we'll just be shifting the problem?

This is all rhetoric really, I'm not looking for real answers, but debate is a good thing. But the most important factor of all here is exactly that - you and I are sitting here typing at each other and debating, and it's not us that should be doing that, it's the politicians, and the comms companies. It's quite sad really, that in the past three years or so that I've built up all this knowledge of the politics of Irish comms, and the only people I can talk about comms with are my peers.

adam

dahamsta

NeilF said: No one is against Eircom making a profit.

Absolutely, and to be honest I find the suggestion, however vague, that we're being unrealistic or mean or nasty quite insulting. All we want is what's fair. If Eircom's costs are higher than BT's, well and good, I'll pay a higher price for services, I'll accept it. But Eircom are literally screwing us to the table and sticking silver candlesticks up our butts. We're just decoration with money to them, and they're like the doctors in Monty Python: "Yes nurse, we need to perform a full walletectomy on this patient, and that one over there needs a bank account enema immediately."

gintyc said: Sorry about that

And then he said: or MAYBE your wrong

And then he quoted his entire message again and said: Or Maybe they have launched it...

and then quoted a passage from an ODTR document proving the previous statement wrong

Cian, I appreciate your apology, but would you please read what you're writing, never mind what I'm writing? The passage you quoted says that Eircom can launch the retail product three weeks after the Director is satisfied with the wholesale offering, and it's dated today. So the product hasn't been launched, and even if the Director says tomorrow that pricing for the wholesale product is ok, it won't be launched until the middle of October, minimum.

disConnected said: sorry that I don't post more regularly. I have to watch my online time a bit to avoid overstretching my budget...

Oh, there's another choice quote for the site. Bard, you should be collecting these man, like on the Linux.ie site. Some of these quotes are choice!

adam

gintyc

I think you all are getting me wrong here, I don’t like how Eircom treats us, in pricing and with things like capping on ADSL, and how they are getting away with

and by the way I was just saying maybe to it being launched and maybe not, I was not saying yes or no.

And I also think the government should of used the “Railtrack style” where Eircom did not own the phone network. Where all the phone companies (including Eircom) paid the government for use of the phone network, like in the UK with the railways. But this could of caused problems with who does repairs etc... however, it’s two late now Eircom owns the network

dahamsta

and by the way I was just saying maybe to it being launched and maybe not, I was not saying yes or no.

I realise that, but I told you, in no uncertain terms, that it wasn't. I wasn't guessing or bluffing, I knew. Anyway, never mind, let's leave it at that, eh?

And I also think the government should of used the “Railtrack style” where Eircom did not own the phone network. Where all the phone companies (including Eircom) paid the government for use of the phone network, like in the UK with the railways. But this could of caused problems with who does repairs etc... however, it’s two late now Eircom owns the network

It's never too late. In certain circumstances the government could still take the network back, it would just be highly complex and it would take years in the national and probably European courts. But as I stated in another thread, is creating another Railtrack really a good idea? Look at the carnage - literally - that Railtrack have created in the UK. It's a shambles of a situation, and it's not getting any better. I'm not sure it's the best idea.

adam