Loss of service reports

[sn]

...........However, a system elsewhere in which an engineer can flick a switch and wipe out entire company configurations or disconnect tens or hundreds of thousands of users, with apparently no checks and balances and no financial consequences for their employer, strikes me as a mightily borked system. Imagine if that switch was connected to a missile instead of a telephone line. Would you consider such a system a robust and secure arrangement?

I moved from NILDRAM (also once a small ISP) a year ago because Tiscali bought them and it was only a matter of time before my calls ended up in India. However there is no point in having a UK voice on the phone if BT ignore them as they clearly have since the last outage.

I agree with 'Fish' above and also agree with previous posters that BT obviously don't consider IDNET's business of any importance.   Clearly working "with" BT has not worked. Some times 'nice' gets misinterpreted for 'weak'. Perhaps IDNET need to hire someone who is not "nice".

Steve

[Steve]

I've just had a PPP drop now for 30 secs.

[Ray]

I've not seen one here, Steve.

[Nitz]

Mine's been fine since I reconnected at 19:41:09 last night. But like you Steve, I am on Max also.
Saying that though, I have been kicked down to a DownStream Connection Speed of 7904 kbps! Not that it matters as I can't get anything above 140 Kbps anyway

Thanks to the amazing throughput, I am slowly adjusting to a life without "high-speed" broadband and wasn't phased when the connection dropped yesterday or last week. I can't do any speed sensitive actions (such as online gaming, youtube, iplayer, downloading) anyway...

[Bill]

I've just had a PPP drop now for 30 secs.

Nothing here, but I usually get one or two of those over a week. Unless I'm unlucky with the timing, I only notice them by the red blip on the BQM.

[psp83]

At the end of the day yes downtime is inconvenient but most (apx 70%) of you have option of LLU or Virgin as either a replacement or backup.

if i had the choice i would have a cable (virgin) as a backup or LLU, I do not have a choice and am stuck with an antiquated exchange supplied by BT and IDnet as my provider, i like IDnet as they at least care and have a good package line up, Yes dearer than some but at least in my opinion the pipes are genrally congestion free.

I am looking at a router that supports 3G as a back up as internet for me is a critical tool (i am a remote engineer for a telecommunications company (no not BT or Virgin))

If I am on-call i need internet, at present i have a 3G dongle i can stick in my laptop, mess around with the software for 20 minutes (it is that unreliable) discover my credits expired, top it up and then finally actually get on the net. Or i drive 5 miles to my local McDonalds and nick there wi-fi-thats what i did on the last outage.

Router with 3G backup seems the way forward to make it more reliable and easier (and will help to keep my weight down)

ADSL I am at the Mercy of BT (althougth both phone lines and internet are with IDnet).


I would just like to say thank you to Simon & Tim, I expect they are now having sleepless night's and i know they are doing what they can for us there customer's.

And before anyone say's anything i have no connection with IDnet or any of it's staff apart from being a standard customer.

Dean

You might want to try the three mifi device, you don't have to change any of your home setup as the device gives out a wireless signal for upto 5 devices to connect.

You can also unlock them to use other 3G sim cards.

On a good day I can get speeds of 3mb down and 1.5mb up.

http://www.three.co.uk/Mobile_Broadband/MiFi

[JB]

Just a few comments from me on the outages. I've not contributed to any of the threads as yet, although I did suffer the outage last night and also one week ago.

Emotions are running high at the moment and many folk are expressing the gut reaction that even though these outages are not IDNet's fault they would be better with another ISP.

I honestly think people should think long and hard before making this decision. Sure, IDNet service (thanks to that great top heavy, inefficient, incompetent and uncaring mammoth called BT) has been down a couple of times in the last ten days or so. But how does that compare to the many months of efficient service that has been provided outside of the problem times? What about the excellent free UK customer service that is available if required.

Guys, let the dust settle and then have a good think. I've been with several previous ISP's and although IDNet is not the cheapest it is, (IMHO), by far the best for my needs.

I'm not an IDNet fanboy, I'm too old for that. If the IDNet service fell to the same level as some other ISP's, such as those taken over by large anonymous providers, then I would be off.

However, we are nowhere near that at present.

[Simon]

I know people need connections for different reasons, but for me personally, the downtimes remind me that there's a life 'offline'.  I am not considering leaving IDNet over this, and am looking forward to hearing what future plans have been made, and what the responses from BT will be to these events.

[krysia]

I just want to say how much I appreciate the way IDNet handles problems when they do arise, as has happened over the last week or so with the two BT faults.  In the past, when I had another provider and things went wrong, I would be left in limbo, anxious and tense, not knowing when or even if my connection would be restored (or when my phone call to support would be answered).  Now, on the very rare occasions when I lose my connection, I feel pretty relaxed, thinking IDNet a) knows it's happening, b) is doing something about it, and c) will make sure it works.

It's so refreshing to deal with a company that shows a genuine commitment to providing an excellent service to its customers.  I just hope that Simon and Tim never get fed up and sell the business!

(I just posted this message under the 'Regarding today's outage and next steps' thread, but realised it fits better here.)

[Steve]

I've just had a PPP drop now for 30 secs.

Forget that I'm losing sync occasionally - it never rains but what it pours

[psp83]

the downtimes remind me that there's a life 'offline'.

There is? no one told me! 

Hehe,

The whole reason why I'm going back to a 9 - 6 full time job so I can have my spare time back that freelancing has took away.

Like last night, I had a call from someone in Texas at 12:30am, now thats just rude! 

[Rik]

Rik posted @2100 ..........  It would be possible to build a network with enough redundancy to survive all but nuclear attack ............
Amendment list 1

Delete 'nuclear attack'

Insert  'Openreach engineer dickhead.


list ends

[esh]

For your information,

My latency is slowly returning to normal since around 2am. Now back to ~20ms from 150ms on 1 minute averages.

[Rik]

Mine is slap bang on normal today.

[psp83]

For your information,

My latency is slowly returning to normal since around 2am. Now back to ~20ms from 150ms on 1 minute averages.

Mines been alittle higher than normal today with more packet loss but will give it to tomorrow before I contact support.

[esh]

psp; I was on about 10ms before so it is still a little high. I am also waiting to see what happens.

[psp83]

actually taking alook at my tbb monitor, packet loss has stopped and my ping have got higher.

[Rik]

Most of the packet loss coincides with the outages, of course, Paul.

[klipp]

As inconvenient as these few loss of services have been, I remain a happy bunny with IDNet.  Their lack of traffic management make them an instant winner for me, combined with their usually excellent support (I've spent over an hour on the phone to them one time going through all my cabling and pinging routers and other stuff to fix a problem).  However, one thing I didn't understand was why they closed their support line yesterday.  Maybe they were too busy trying to fix the fault to be able to run the helpline as well.  Anyway I left a message on the answer phone and someone called me back later on.

In short, 2 blemmishes on IDNet's uptime this year is nothing really.  It looks worse than it is because they both happened within a short time frame of eachother.

[Rik]

You're right about the short time-frame, klipp. I think if they'd been months apart we'd all have been a bit more relaxed.

As to the answering machine, it was a faster way of telling people about the problem than having them wait in a queue.

[Technical Ben]

...
I honestly think people should think long and hard before making this decision. Sure, IDNet service (thanks to that great top heavy, inefficient, incompetent and uncaring mammoth called BT) has been down a couple of times in the last ten days or so. But how does that compare to the many months of efficient service that has been provided outside of the problem times? What about the excellent free UK customer service that is available if required.
... [shortened for quote]

I'm with you there. I was on O2 first. They blatantly LIED to customers for 3 years or more. Imagine having 3 years of disconnects and low throughput and not knowing why. I'm glad I was only with them for 30 days. I'd never have the speed and reliability I have now. Granted, I got the same speed during the day. But only with IDNet do I get that all day, all week. With O2, It was like a yo-yo.
[edit] I suppose there was nothing support could actually do for customers at the time. So a message was best. Until BT had been sorted out* IDNet could not help customers on an individual basis. The lines were, so to speak, "down".


*

[pctech]

O2 ADSL is the pits, which I was very surprised about considering how good their mobile customer service is.

[Technical Ben]

O2 ADSL is the pits, which I was very surprised about considering how good their mobile customer service is.

And their LLU, which is basically BE re-branded (not even resold AFAIK).
I suppose they picked up a service they could never, or never intended to, supply or afford.
Like I said, I would have been happy, if they had been honest. I'd still be with them, even with the bad connections. As I'd know when/how/if it was to be fixed.

[pctech]

As you probably know, O2 own BE.

[Technical Ben]

That's what I meant. Some companies have separate systems. Some companies, have a sticker on the phone saying "if o2 call don't mention you work for BE, if BE call, don't mention you work for O2" as they are the same office/software/hardware. But the customers are made to think there are 2 companies.