Technology & Social Media ArgghhH!!! NBN Woes....

FINALLY!!!!!

We have NBN, we got connected at 7pm Saturday night.

Connection tech was booked for Saturday between 1-5pm, it got to 4:45 and I'd written it off as another no show.

He called just before 5 to say he was on his way. I still didn't think it would happen as it would be dark before he got to us and I thought he was the one that had to connect the Telstra copper lead in in to the new DPU in the new pit.

He turned up about 5:30, I met him down the drive at the pit (which is full of water and with all the rain we've had is in the middle of a muddy bog). Straight away he said there was an issue, (nothing would surprise me at this stage I said).

He explained the fibre techs had already connected in the DPU to the copper and had I switched the NCD on in the house yet to check? I said no as I thought he was here to make the copper connection, so we fired up the NCD in the house and surprise surprise...nothing, as he expected.

Went back to the pit (working under cover of van headlights), he really struggled as there was no slack in the copper connection so he was trying to do things under about 2 foot of muddy water. He managed to free up some slack and worked out the fibre guys had connected the DPU to the wrong pair on the lead in, he tested the line up at the shed and found the correct pair then re-wired it at the DPU, did another test at the DPU, still an issue, then worked out the fibre guy had put the copper into the wrong port at the DPU too. He sorted all that out then we went back up to the house and fired up the NCD.

Still nothing!!!

We went back though the whole history to try and trouble shoot, as in theory everything was set correct. We worked out that NBN still had our DPU set as the original they wanted to patch us in at 400 meters up the road. He had a little app on his phone that showed the GPS of the DPU we were assigned and it showed us way up the street, so back to the pit to get the correct DPU serial number and he called the NBN techs, the re-coded us, still didn't work, turned out they also had the wrong fiber serial number too!! He spent a good while on the phone to NBN techs who re-coded everything from their end while he was here.

Back up to the house, fired the NCD up and a few minutes later we synced! NBN tech was on the phone the whole time and ran a speed test from their end, 109 down, 44 up. Connection chap said that's as good as we'd get even if the NCD was wired straight into the DPU.

Really nice chap, he'd been working all day Saturday, was from out of the area (2 hour drive home), and this was now getting on for 7pm Saturday night but he was determined to get us finalized and connected.

I put the ISP modem on, we were up and running in a minute or two and the wireless connection to the phone is giving me 44 down 18 up. Can test it hard wired yet as the phone point is in the kitchen larder cupboard so I'm stuck until I get some new data points installed.

So, initial NBN order date was January 7th and connected 15th June, 5 months and a week.

Got back onto the NBN Civil guy yesterday and sent him some phot's of the pit and drive, they've left a bit of a mess when they installed (can't fully blame them, it was wet, the back fill has compacted and/or washed away since the day the did it) it so they need to come back and fill some pot hole sin the drive, back fill around the pit with soil and fill a couple of super deep tyre tracks their fiber guy left from parking on the soft grass. It's a right mess. I'll give them the chance to get back out and tidy it up before I have an official whinge about it.

The tech on Saturday did say that the way the pit has been put in and the copper connection made, it wont last more than a few years and will have to be done again!! We had a general chat about the way they whole NBN has been administered, he said when they first announced it all he thought he'd get maybe 4-5 years of work out of it, but since they made it mixed tech and ballsed it all up he reckons he'll see his working life out patching up and rebuilding it.

 

Yay!

And, as usual from your stories, the guys that come out to do the work are usually really good chaps. Hard working and determined to get the job done - they simply get mucked up by the backroom stuff too

 

When it fails, request & pay for FTTP.

 

Interesting....NBN is now live in my area and my Optus Cable speeds have gone from max 15 Mbps to now 28 Mbps

 

I know I do. He he.

Sorry. Couldn't resist.

 

Gone with Optus NBN as I currently have Optus Cable,ordered now and tech due out Tuesday..fingers crossed!!

 

I look forward to reading about how smoothly the transition goes.

 

Anyone using Optus NBN?

How much are you paying and is it worth it?

 

You don't need to look too hard.

 

Lol doesn't ansr all the Q's

 

Little piece in this mornings news pretty much sums up this thread...

How did the 'clever country' end up with a $90 billion botched NBN? - Michael West

Particularly this paragraph:-

"Because of the way the NBNCo “hands over” its service to the resellers, it is technically not responsible for the customer service experience. The reseller, on the other hand, does not have end-to-end control over the service either. Consequently, customers are so often caught between the promises made and the realities of a fundamentally flawed system of fulfillment and delivery, being shifted between wholesaler and retailer, both shunting responsibility."

 

Yep - I was forced onto Skymuster (satellite) for two years ... really expensive, limited data and very ordinary speeds. To up/download documents was a nightmare and often had to be done in the wee hours of the morning.

Can't believe the freedom now that we're actually connected. Don't care about the speeds, just the fact that one can "do" work without worrying about running out of data

 

What's different between this statement for NBN and the arrangements for your electricity? There is no relationship between the customer and the owner of the 'poles and wires' or with the companies who own/run the generators.

 

Who owns the poles and wires? In our area, if we have an outage I can call United Energy and they tell me what the expect it to be resolved, yet we're billed and provided power through Origin. Do United own the poles and wires or are they also another middle-man acting for someone else that owns the poles and wires?

If United are the equivalent of NBN and iiNet the equivalent of Origin then I should be able to speak to someone at NBN when the there's an issue with the fibre/DPU and not have to wait for Me-iiNET-NBN-iiNet-Me etc etc for months on end just to get someone to acknowledge what the problem is.

 

Macquarie Generation (or other entities) own the power stations, Ausgrid own the distribution. Retailers then do their bit.

 

I think what Prop is getting at is that, if there is an issue with distribution, you are able to call and talk to someone at Ausgrid - whereas there is no one at NBN you can talk to, and they don't even have a contact option asides from a complaints email

 

It’s quite pricey for the upgrades unfortunately . NBN offers a technology choice program where for $330 you can pay for a quote for FTTN or FTTC to be upgraded to FTTP . Its crazy expensive though for short runs. I just got quoted 10.7k for a relatively short run of @300-400 metres from the nearest node. whirlpool forums have threads on this topic ....

They should have just built this thing properly . The multi technology mix is providing really bad outcomes for more than a few people.