What are we Entitled to With Eircom ?

MS

These question was asked at a meeting i attended and PLEASE! i am not looking for an arguement just some straight forward answers.

Jim (not real name)

Question

Mike i live 18 miles away from the nearest exchange. I have a 56k Modem and the same computer setup as most people withen that radious. Why is it that a guy 500 yards down the road using the same IP can get better dowload speeds than me and he can log on first time every time ?

Answer: Eircom maby have your line multiplexed ?

Mark

Question
Mike i have ISDN and use if mostly for gameing with some friends of mine in Dublin. But i have noticed that on most servers my friends that only have a 56k modem have a much better ping time than me why is this so ?

Answer: I honestly dont know ?


Helen

Question
If we all pay the same amount to Eircom for the telephone and the internet are we all not entitled to the same sorth of service that people in Dublin have ?

Answer: We should be but i dont honestly know what the legal implimplications (scuse spelling) are. Eircom (last i heard) say that your line is only gaurenteed for Voice and 9,600 data trans.

Noel (not real name)

Question
If we are all paying the exact same amount for the services Eircom (cant post the rest) are supposed to supply but dont.
Why are we expected to pay the same amount as someone that has a much better service from Eircom for the same price we are paying ?

Answer:

Lost for words ?


A lot of stuff has been said about Eircom / IOFFL and BOARDS.IE too but for fear of getting my ass kicked from here im not willing to post them. I have only picked a few of the questions asked and to be honest i might have picked the wrong ones. One lady said this to me and i will put it in her exact words.
Hey i am an OAP i use the internet to talk to my daoughter and we both sit and talk for hours (ok im not going to post all this... im sorry but its really personnel ) The thing is she is an OAP and her daoughter can talk to her 24/7 for less than £30 per month. This old lady cant pay her Eircom phone bills. So what did Eircom do ? anyone guess ? Let me help you ....they didnt Help they did the opposite.
The general conclusion of the meeting was. If every Eircom subscriber paid the exact same amount for Eircom services WHY! do they not have them ? Only 1 person did not feel disscriminated against but she was fully informed by the end of the meeting.

Anyone any ideas on any answers (real answers not Eircom crap) that i should pass on ?



MS

Occidental

Eircom sees its remit as providing a working voice line to customers. Anything beyond this in Eircom's view is a bonus. The same also applies to ISDN, where if Eircom can make a voice call across an ISDN line, it is deemed to be working perfectly.

Eircom Net & Indigo, as Eircom will take great delight telling you on a regular basis, are separate companies to Eircom. They are tasked with providing you with Internet access, 'but because they don't control the PSTN and ISDN lines cannot give you guaranteed connection speeds, or quality'.

So in summary,

Eircom: We provide PSTN and ISDN lines for voice transmission.

EircomNet & Indigo: We provide Internet access via PSTN and ISDN lines. We would love to guarantee the speed and quality of these services, but we don't provide the lines.

The above becomes even more interesting when an Eircom sales rep promises you a seamless voice and data service (still, seamless things do have a habit of falling apart)

DeVore

A lot of stuff has been said about Eircom / IOFFL and BOARDS.IE too but for fear of getting my ass kicked from here im not willing to post them.

What meetings was this? Can you mail/pm me what was said regarding Boards.ie?

How did I miss this?

DeV.

MS

Many thanks Occidental. I notice a lot of people that know some answers just didnt reply or at least even try to. Maby its just becaouse of me or whatever. What u said helped a lot mate but it really bugs me to not be able to give people an honest straight answer. There must be legal implimentations on this somewhere and there must be someone out there that knows exactly what i mean even if i did put it rather badly. It really breaks my heart (yes i actually have one) to see someone thats old and worked all their lives to actually be happy to be able to talk to someone on the www no matter how far away. Only to have it taken from them becaouse of the stupid B's at Eircom becaouse thay can no longer afford the HUGE! cost. If anyone in Eircom is reading this i have but one thing to say to ye. Ye are 1 miserable shower of Heartless B's and when ye do go down im going to find the biggest rock i can find and dump it on ye.




MS

murcielago

Eircom is not oblidged to supply 9600 bps. See a previous post from Muck.

The odtr is required by law to ensure that any individual or firm that wants a phone/fax/data connection is provided with one.

Odtr sub-contracts (designates to) with Eircom to supply the required service.

Where the cost of supply exceeds the revenue obtained the odtr must make good the difference to Eircom. (Alternatively odtr authorises Eircom to recover directly from the subscriber).

Cost and quality are always inter-related. A phone line is no exception. So, how does odtr keep down the cost to itself. Keep It Simple Stupid - the KISS formula - is used. Odtr specifies 2400bps!!

Odtr as the regulatory authority has or should have responsibility for specifying and enforcing technical standards. There is a clear conflict of interests at work.

The LOFFI committee members need to abandon the mutual admiration relationship with odtr. But firstly the general members need to raise the standard of discussion and to correctly identify the issues. For many of us the quality of service provided by telcos and ISPs is the primary issue.

There is a need to sort out the whole issue of regulation. Is odtr concerned with technical regulation to which the cucumber story gave a bad name? Or, is odtr concerned with economic regulation which began its demise under the Carter administration in USA - now many years ago? The Dublin taxi situation is a good example. We have a lot of talk about competition. But, in the case of a highly sophisticated technological service competition will not exist in practice unless there is some independent body to guarantee compliance with unseen standards and thereby provide customers with the confidence and information with which to make informed decisions.

MS

Ok after reading murcielago's post. I have a question. Has ANYONE got a contract that they signed for Eircom to supply a Telephone Line to their Dwelling and if so what is the criteria laid down and does it stipulate what they should / have to supply ? If you think about it anyone that has a phone from Eircom they pay Top $ for what they get. And it brings back the same question once again. If everyone is not getting the same service why should everyone have to pay the same price ? This is being said over and over to me again and again. I cant argue against it. I really think this is a valid point and everyone seems to ignore it ??????



MS

MS

What meetings was this? Can you mail/pm me what was said regarding Boards.ie?

No offence Dev this was only a meeting of 218 people none of which have anything to do with IOFFL or the Boards here and just over 70% of them are just about capeable of accessing the internet and only about 3% of them are able to actually type letters that take less than a hour to write. Im sorry if i misslead you about any meeting that u might have or should have been involved in.


MS

jd

Originally posted by MS
If everyone is not getting the same service why should everyone have to pay the same price ? This is being said over and over to me again and again. I cant argue against it. I really think this is a valid point and everyone seems to ignore it ??????

MS

Not justifying it but..
I suppose the argument could be made that it doesn't cost the same amount to provide the same service to every customer.
jd

MS

I suppose the argument could be made that it doesn't cost the same amount to provide the same service to every customer.

But they thing is They DONT!! So why should everyone pay the same amount ? Eircom ......... awwwwwwww hell i give in.... for now that is ...but remember what u said ...

This is an arguement that has been brought up many times but people seem happy with it or just dont understand.




MS

Pragmatica

U tell me buddy ... I can only connect @ 16,800 on my best ISP ...

I know other people liveing about 100 yeards away getting 4 time the bandwidth I'm getting ... it's really not fair ...

And it was even more unfair getting kicked of nolimits because I had to spend 4 time's longer online than the average person to get the same amount of information or value from the net ...

Still takeing into account certain factors beyond the point where the line enters the house ... it not possably to guarntee that everyone has the same throughput but the line quality outside the house should be guarentted to a standard level and 9,600 is pethetic by any standard ...

Yeah .. u lot might laugh @ the fact that eircom a phucken us all over ... but just remember that they are phucken me over 4 time's more than they are phucken u ... and I'm really really phucken pissed ...

So in answer to ur question ... Yeah ... the only people who are happy here are our ever so popular mods n' all who have great connections and deep pockets and think spam or gladiator is a bigger problem than flat-rate ... and all they do scour the net for articles and is sit waiting for others to sort the problem out like the EU just waiting to be the golden boy the get the article first and claim something stupid like "And I did it all myself" ...

Flat-Rate, DACS, Fraico haven't even been mentioned here in weeks ... Might as well reaname this group to the ADSL community ...

I know one thing ... This Community for all it's good after 7 months has achieved nothing and will not be the cause of securing affordable net access ... it will be brought about by some other pressure group ...

This is just a talking shop for the rich and infamous muppits not bumb muppits like myself

SkepticOne

Originally posted by MS
Ok after reading murcielago's post. I have a question. Has ANYONE got a contract that they signed for Eircom to supply a Telephone Line to their Dwelling and if so what is the criteria laid down and does it stipulate what they should / have to supply ?
MS

For a standard telephone line, there is only one product and this is governed by Eircom's "Universal Service Obligation". This states:

A connection to the public fixed telephone network must be capable of allowing users to make and receive national and international calls, enabling speech, facsimile and data communications. Such a connection must be capable of transmitting data via modems at 2,400 bits per second.

This is clearly too low in this day and age and needs to be changed.

You are free to specify to Eircom that a line is for data use but Eircom are under no obligation to comply.

I had a separate line for Internet and it was working for a couple of years, then one day the data rate dropped to next to nothing. The line was specifically ordered for data use. I was able to get an engineer to call out and after checking the line he told me, quite bluntly, that Eircom was under no obligation to fix the problem. He then reported to head office that everything checked out fine.

ISDN lines do have specific standards that must be met, but Eircom have no obligation to supply these. If you are out of range or Eircom can't spare the copper pair, that's your problem. Plus, they are expensive. For most people, an analogue connection of about 46kbs is what they require.

SkepticOne

Originally posted by Pragmatica
Flat-Rate, DACS, Fraico haven't even been mentioned here in weeks ... Might as well reaname this group to the ADSL community ...

I know one thing ... This Community for all it's good after 7 months has achieved nothing and will not be the cause of securing affordable net access ... it will be brought about by some other pressure group ...

You seem to be holding IOFFL responsible for your crappy connection yet your only suggestion for action is to riot in Dublin.

IOFFL can only influence. It cannot make flat-rate happen or improve your connection. If anyone can suggest a way to force Eircom into giving use flat-rate or broadband or LLU or whatever, please say so. I don't think it's possible.

In terms of influence, there are several options available.

1. Political lobbying. There is such a level of ignorance out there among people with power and we need to put this right. The disadvantage is that it needs to be done in secret. We can't publish details on a public message board.

2. Public meetings, seminars etc. The hard thing is getting the major players to speak at these events. It takes weeks of full time work for the committee to organise. At the last seminar, Eircom threatened to pull out because of (joke) threats of violence on these message boards. On the plus side, they are good at raising publicity. They give IOFFL a professional image.

3. Peacefull protest. The hard thing here is getting people to turn up. A danger is that things can get out of hand and undo any gains from 1 and 2 above. The advantage is that it allows us all to get involved. Again, these involve a lot of work especially when dealing with the press. One of the committee members spent two weeks full time organising the blackout in addition to many more weeks of part-time work.

Now none of these in themselves will actually force the aims of IOFFL (flat-rate Internet, LLU, broadband). They simply exert influence. It will always be possible to say that they are a waste of time and achieve nothing. For everything that IOFFL have done, there have been people saying it's a waste of time.

Should the committee be doing more? Of course. While the goals are unmet, there will never be enough that could be done.

MS

Many thanks for the information SkepticOne. Its not what everyone wanted to hear but at least it explaines most of the questions i was asked.

Such a connection must be capable of transmitting data via modems at 2,400 bits per second.

A lot of people have expressed that in this day and age of technology, where are Eircom.... are they still stuck in the year 1970 or what ? Eircom seem to be under no obligation to actually do anything that actually might bring this Country into the 20th Century or guarentee that anything they supply to any of its customers will actually work after they have installd it.

And we actually pay for and accept a service like this ? In America phone companies actually ring 'YOU' and ask you to go with them so if you dont like one company you just switch to the next and they actually reward you for your custom. At this stage in Ireland all one can do is wish for something like this to happen here.


MS

MS

Origionally posted by Pragmatica

U tell me buddy ...

Tell you what ?


I know one thing ... This Community for all it's good after 7 months has achieved nothing and will not be the cause of securing affordable net access ... it will be brought about by some other pressure group ...

I very much doubt that. IOFFL has a lot more going for it than you think. I might get a wee bit frustrated waiting at times and make a bit of a stab at them too but from what i have seen of their performance so far i doubt if any other pressure group would even come close to acheiveing all the work that IOFFL have done for us.

This is just a talking shop for the rich and infamous muppits not bumb muppits like myself

Im not rich or even an infamous muppit and at times i can be a really dumb muppit but i enjoy comeing on here to meet people and exchange views and information. So what does that make me ?



MS

SkepticOne

Originally posted by MS
A lot of people have expressed that in this day and age of technology, where are Eircom.... are they still stuck in the year 1970 or what ? Eircom seem to be under no obligation to actually do anything that actually might bring this Country into the 20th Century or guarentee that anything they supply to any of its customers will actually work after they have installd it.

Eircom have the monopoly so there is little incentive for them to improve on their own. The ODTR can raise the standard of their USO, but that may mean another court case from Eircom. They need to be given extra powers. The Telecommunications (Regulation) Bill would help here.

And we actually pay for and accept a service like this ? In America phone companies actually ring 'YOU' and ask you to go with them so if you dont like one company you just switch to the next and they actually reward you for your custom. At this stage in Ireland all one can do is wish for something like this to happen here.

It is not all rosy in the US. Of course, their urban areas have facilities far superior to our urban areas in general. However, in some rural areas Internet access means a metered long distance call. Even though there is fierce competition among telcos in the States, like here, the local loop is provided by the local "baby bell". If you have a bad physical line, it is they that need to fix it. Since they have a local monopoly, there is little incentive for them to do so. Local monopolies are little better than national monopolies.

The big difference between here and the US is that in most areas of the US, local calls are unmetered. This was the situation in Ireland until the mid-eighties. They also have far better cable TV infrastructure there which is capable of two-way cable Internet. These services started around 1995. This has stimulated the telcos into developing commercial DSL.

Pragmatica

Origionally posted by MS

Q. "Tell you what ?"

A. Origionally posted by MS - " ..... people seem happy with it or just dont understand" ...

I had to do without the internet for over 1 month now because of eircon, other people here just seem happy in comparision about the whole affair ... this qoute is not mine but is well known "When you are able to keep your head while others around are loosing theirs ... perhaps u dont understand the situation!" ...

I dont really dont have anything against IFFOL really ... but I have lost all confidance in them ... at the start I though this group was really going somewhere but the arnt going anywhere now ... judging from topics views there is very little activity on this board @ all ... even the sticky topic @ the top only has 600 odd views ... we are only a drop in an ocean ... and 70% of the active members on this forum were likely already here and could afford to be ...

I sorry about spaming the board with riot stuff ... but after getting back on the net for some time ... I wasn't impressed ... the only people are here are those like the man said that " ... seem happy" and are really only here waiting for a better ADSL solution ...

About the riot stuff ... after the first post ... I though ... I'd make a laugh out of it to wake some people up ... by using broken english to reach their subconsious and check the level of anger for eircon ... and u know what ?

People are not angry enough ...

I wouldn't riot ... it's not me ... I wouldn't really want anybody else to riot either ... socially adept people wouldn't riot no matter how much they'er incited but socially adept people do think when riot breaks out ... "Yeah .. those rioters are Phucken right ... It's just sad that it had to get to that point ... "

My understanding is that if your not felling angry like :- "I'd like to strangle them phuckers" ... Then ur not going to be much of a complainer!

If I sold you something and u found out that it was completely usless ... u'd better wanna give me a kick in the head cause your not gona get what u want from me ... Sad I know but the strong pray on the weak ... I did make the world like that but that's just the way it is ...

If your completly happy or complacent with what I sold you and are waiting to buy something supposidly better from me ... I'd be happy to see u comming like eircon ...

Alright we've all sent letters to eircon, OTDR etc ... and nothing has changed although were moving, it's onlt moving @ a snails pace ... If we dont increase our efforts 10 fold ... the status quo is only gona remain ...

Yeah .. sure theres alot of stuff happening behind the scenes ... but it's small numbers against a big comapny ... yeah ok ... I can find articles on the net about this that and the other etc ... but seriously ... it's only people that are involved in the bussiness that know or understand it ... "Static Ion Tracing is another method of retreving lost information from a central processing unit" is just a dumb sentance to you, me and everybody else if they dont Pucken know what the whole thing is about ... We need to educate people ... not just the several hundred members here but half the nation ... and as of yet ... I haven't seen a damn word of IFFOL or Eircon on the NEWS about the situation here ...

We need a 6.01 headline ... roit would be the quickest way of getting it ... I know u dont agree ... neither do I ... but I agree that it would be the quickest way ... I'm sure there's other methods of getting a 6.01 slot ... why haven't we gotten one yet ?

I dont care what it is but we have to get it ... not just the once slot but sevral ... and we need a spokes person to explain the saitaution well .. not just for net users .. voice user's are being treated unfairly too ... Get 1'000's involved .. then things will move like lightling ...

Doesnt matter what we do ... Chaing ourselves togeather infront of eiron buildings ... U name it ... let's be a real pressure group and put some pressure on and foget being complacent and waiting forever ...

"If u dont incite people to do things ... they'll never do anything even for their own good" ...

MS

I have much the same feelings built up inside me as do many others Pragmatica but you made the same misteak as i did and you flamed off at the people that are trying to actually help us. I have to admit it took me a while to realise this too. And for someone like me to actually be responding to you in this way seems bad. I know exactly how u feel. I have done the same as you and expressed my anger on the Board but i directed it at the wrong people and i have to admit if felt great getting it all off my chest. Ok they could have kicked / banned me for it but they didnt. They listened and gave their opinions and helped in any way they could. Im not being a turncoat and as i have said i am one of the people thats lets off a lot of steam here and will prolly do it again and maby i will eat these words in a later post. Give IOFFl a chance mate. Get to know them and hear what the have to say OFFLINE! Let them try do what they can for everyone and im sure if it all fails u and i will see a totally different stratagy from IOFFL but at least give them a chance first ok


MS

DeadBankClerk

Originally posted by MS

Question
Mike i have ISDN and use if mostly for gameing with some friends of mine in Dublin. But i have noticed that on most servers my friends that only have a 56k modem have a much better ping time than me why is this so ?

Answer: I honestly dont know ?

your game config is set up wrong.
all the network console variables can be tweaked to your favour.

MS

your game config is set up wrong. all the network console variables can be tweaked to your favour

U have a lot of listeners so SPILL it!


MS

Pragmatica

Pragmatica doesnt feel any more optimistic but takes ur point ...

MS

Cheers P


MS

Occidental

Pragmatica,

Best response to Eircom has to be a measured one.

If you rant and rave, you scare off your allies and discredit the whole group. Eircom would love nothing better than to be able to dismiss IOFFL as a bunch of extremist cranks, lets not give them the opportunity.

From my own point of view, I will continue to wait patiently until a viable alternative to Eircom ISDN (be it satellite, ADSL, leased line etc) becomes available. Then I and my £1500+ a month bill, will be off and will never darken Eircom's door again

My criteria are as follows

1. Customer Service
2. Reliability
3. 128k or higher
4. Pricing

As you can see 1 and 2 effectively rules out dealing with either Eircom or Esat.

The good news is that there are plenty of people out there like me and i-stream or any other new Eircom product will do nothing to change their opinion. Come the right company with the right product, the exodus will be sizable indeed.

Pragmatica

Occidental, Thanks for input ... 4 is the only critera that needs satisfyied ...

1. Customer Service ... U never get good customer service anywhere ... I dont expect it ever ...

2. Reliability ... being on dialup and genral computer unreliability @ all times ... Would be nice to be relighable but I expect problems all the time ...

3. 128k or higher ... have 16,800kbss connection speed for over 2 years now ... anything looks good ... but depends what u need bandwidth for ... yup .. I think 128 is an good speed that eveyone should have equlivent to dual ISDN ... Some may require more ... but I have survived on 16,800 without great problems surfing ...

4. Pricing is the main concern, espically for anybody that needs to spend alot of time online irrespective of their online activity and mode of connection ... it is unfair to charge by the min ... I cant see the problems with all these arguments ... If a gig of bandwith cost eircom 10p @ whole sale price they sould not be adding charges by the min and or extra charges for the method for reciveing that gig of bandwidth ... with my connection it would cost me literally hunderds of pounds to download that gig of information ... certaily that is not anyway fair ?

Saying ... oh well this and that or wait and see doesn't comfort me

I wanna see something real happen that will change this situation ...