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Monday 17th May 2004
BT Trial comments
The latest Q&A from BT was posted today.
The answer about ISDN inclusion in the trial is simply smoke and mirrors.
The technical detail of how an analogue line might or might not affect the
trial has absolutely no bearing on the issue of whether an ISDN or HH line
can be converted back to Analogue nor how easily it can be done.
The affect that a subscribers equipment has on the trial is going to relate
to that equipment that is installed when it is an analogue line, not ISDN,
so what is this point about? Just another bit of hyperbole!
I think that, given the ease with which a conversion order can be placed for
a line that has been given the green light, the point about difficulty of
conversion and non-BT suppliers is yet more hyperbole.
I would be interested to know how many of the 46 (at last count) have got
non-BT equipment? I have HH, supplied by BT.
I am absolutely willing to take the risk that I will not get the same number
on my ISDN line(s) if the trial fails, the only use I have for them is that
I dial the internet by ISDN. I suspect that most businesses would be able to
cope with this if they planned to lose the numbers in converting the line to
analogue for broadband anyway. If not they may have asked for the number to
be transferred to another line - I would.
Overall a far from satisfactory response demonstrating just how little BT
understand our needs as customers and why we are so keen to enjoy the
benefits of the trial.
Damon, Wavendon Gate |
BT forgot to mention that ISDN customers cannot be
converted because space aliens might be using spare bandwidth on the D
channel to phone home, and BT don't want to precipitate an intra-galactic
incident.
re:
> I would be interested to know how many of the 46 (at last count) have
> got non-BT equipment? I have HH, supplied by BT.
I also have HH, supplied by BT.
> I am absolutely willing to take the risk that I will not get the same
> number on my ISDN line(s) if the trial fails, the only use I have for
I also don't care in the least if my number changes. It changed when I
installed HH, and it could change anyway when I de-install HH, according to
the fine print on BT's web site.
> Overall a far from satisfactory response demonstrating just how little
> BT understand our needs as customers and why we are so keen to enjoy
> the benefits of the trial.
But I was so certain that you would be happy that BT "appreciate your
frustration", and is willing to consider converting HH customers if they
must in order to fill out the trial. I know that I enjoy being a
second-class customer.
Charles |
When Midband was first aired, the D channel was going to
provide an "always on" facility. Never implemented - shame.
Quoted from BT: Midband is "Designed to meet a need for higher speed
internet access for customers living in areas where broadband is not yet
available". |
BT wrote: "An
acceptable level of service is defined by the broadband product's
description. Please check this with your service provider. It's also defined
by the customer's satisfaction i.e. if the service runs acceptably customers
do not log faults."
My, what sloping shoulders you have! That's a bit of a poor answer to be
honest. Seems to me BT are simply farming all potential problems onto the
ISP, when in fact an issue could well lay at the infrastructure level.
If an ISP sells me a service to provide a 500Mb/s ADSL connection and it
turns out the service only delivers half the bandwidth due to problems with
reach and BT's infrastructure, what happens then? The problem is not really
something the ISP can resolve on its own, so will they be happy to cancel
any agreement I may have signed up for? I'm not so sure anyone is suggesting
this will be the case. If the line fails to work at all then yes, you can
cancel, but what if it works but at a reduced rate?Gareth |
This is what I am doing as a HomeHighway customer to be
connected to the trial:
1) I have cancelled my contract. Cost £135.46
2) I have paid for a PSTN conversion. Cost £50.00 (booked for 25th May)
3) I have no guarantee that it will work or I will be included.
4) Yes, I am stupid, but keen to be included. All this is entirely at my own
risk.
Colin, Middleton |
| Have members names and addresses been released to the trial
ISPs? [No!] I ask because I received a flyer/letter. The
postcode on the letter is wrong. No big deal but I'd like to get to the
bottom of this. Also it looks like somebody has mail merge problem!
BTW many thanks to you for sterling work on the trial. Fingers crossed we
will at last see something faster than dial up. I will at some point make a
pub evening to thank you all personally; at the moment work or work travel
always seems to hit my Thursdays.
As regards feedback on participating ISPs I was surprised by Powernet.
They expect applicants to printout applications, fill in and sign, and then
fax back! Now how many residential users have a fax machine (or scanner
since it must be signed)?
Somebody is not thinking about making it easy for the customer......
Peter, Great Linford |
| Why I chose NDO for MKTrial ISP 1. I emailed *ALL*
the ISPs at the same time on Tuesday 11th May
at 9:30am, stating my details, my intentions, and asking how they
differentiated themselves from all the others (!!)
2. discounting an instant auto-reply from Merula (simply acknowledging
receipt, but with no real info), I received:
a) an EXCELLENT personally-worded reply within 1 hour from Network I,
but stating they had forwarded my details onwards to Thames Global
Internet Services (Wasn't sure whether this was good or bad, but indeed
both Network I and TGIS then followed up with further emails and helpful
answers all within the next hour!)
b) a slightly less personal, but in fact highly informative, email from
Sam Hill at NDO, also with 1 hour! It provided some background info, and
said 'stay tuned' for signup details.
c) bits and pieces from most of the others over the next hours and days
(the BULK arrived typically about 6 hours later, with a few the next
day... I might chart these later). Local provider PowerNet proved very
helpful with detailed emails, answering questions by phone, and emailed
forms.
3. The next day NDO emailed a URL with a link to a signup sheet.
4. In the meantime, I checked out all the others... in a nutshell, EVERY
OTHER ONE (i.e. besides NDO) was just over my 'tolerance threshold' for
dealing with forms and/or explanations: they either required an existing
account, a registration sequence that wasn't immediately obvious
at-a-glance, or the submission of paper/fax forms (UGH: fax??? gimme a
break!). Or, to state this more positively, NDO had a no-brainer
credit-card-enabled signup sequence via the web; they also had a prominent
MK Trial link on their home page... promising! As the only easy-form-entry
provider, that was the conclusive piece I needed.
5. To be on the safe side, I also checked out the comparison guide on
http://www.adslguide.org.uk/isps/compare.asp and, in a nutshell, NDO
looked 'good enough' - not the absolute highest scoring, but then I didn't
know much about the scorers providing this info, nor even the scoring
algorithm, so 'good enough' was, well good enough for me!
In fact, the only 'black mark', if anything, was that I hadn't noticed the
'reference code' BB4MK on the bb4mk pages (!!), so wrote some blurb
instead... this should have been included in the NDO emails, since it
otherwise lowers your confidence in the form -- but this is really a trivial
point; I just steamed ahead, and am now signed up.
OK; hope that's helpful...
Marc, Loughton |
I'm much confused now. I have tried ordering broadband
several times in the last year. When the range went up to 6km I still
couldn't get it and the BT on-line checker always came back red. Something
has changed now; I just went on line and checked again and it's saying I may
be able to get BB.
Did BT plan to update the database? I thought not because otherwise it makes
nonsense of the criteria for selecting trialists (refused previously and
shows red on checker). Anyway, given a normal order not a trial order (which
I can place now because the checker doesn't say red, can't I?) I should be
able to get a conversion order to switch from ISDN. Perhaps this is the BT
way of solving the ISDN problem????
Damon, Wavendon Gate |
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My Inbox
|
All I can say is thank you, what a result! Due to your hard work and
persistence it would seem BT have seen the light and lifted the blanket ban
on all us poor ADSL bereft residents of Milton Keynes. As I had said before
I recently tried to get connected via Freedom2Surf without success but last
week I decided to try again but with Pipex Xtreme, I had tried them before
but got the usual message from the BT Wholesale number checker saying 'your
line is too long' but this time it said I may be able to get it.
So debit card in hand I submitted my order and low and behold this morning I
found my router had a green light on it suggesting I had a connection, only
problem was I had no user details as my line was not supposed to be enabled
till Tuesday. One very long call to Pipex customer services and I had all of
my details, with great excitement I entered them into my router and bingo
one broadband connection, fantastic!
I'm sorry that I didn't wait for the trial to start
but I thought it may be worth a shot trying the usual channels, at least I
may have left a space for another trialist to get connected. I do hope all
of the members of the action group get hooked-up and that the trial proves
that we can get ADSL even if the bandwidth is not quite up to scratch:
Results from broadband speed test recorded on Saturday, 15 May 2004, 21:52.
Direction
Actual Speed
True Speed (estimated)
Downstream 398 Kbps (49.8 KB/sec) 429 Kbps (inc. overheads)
Upstream 243 Kbps (30.4 KB/sec) 262 Kbps (inc. overheads)
Still miles better than dial-up but I do think that BT need to look at the
situation further as we should not be limited to a 512k connection, fine for
most home users but for any tele-workers using VPN will require more
bandwidth. For the moment I am just basking in the glow of a warm router
knowing I will no longer have to wait an eternity for a page to load.
Once again Nick well done for all of your efforts, the residents of MK owe
you big time!
Gary, Walnut Tree |
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