Getting Broadband in New Zealand (The teleban!)
Getting Broadband in NZ in the 21st Century,

aka working with Telecom NZ, Telstraclear and Slingshot.

or Life in the Dark Ages under the “Teleban”!


What a freaking saga!!!!!!!!!!!!

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My questions,
  1. In the 21st century with all our "sophistication and technology" how come there is not a seamless process for dealing with telecommunications companies to get good quality and on time service, like broadband?

  2. How come all the telecos seem to go out of there way to make life difficult and do not see the travesties and frustration that they cause, and do not get it (they are the problem)?

  3. How come the telecos are unable or refuse to cooperate with each other for the benefit of the fee paying customer. the person they all make mega bucks out of?

  4. How come the telecos can not see there is a problem and fix it seamlessly?

  5. How come slingshot can detect I am no longer using them as my primary toll provider (because we have been cut off), and penalise me accordingly, but cannot do the same with our broadband connection and fix the bloody thing?

  6. How come in the 21st century we are incapable of getting it together and acting like 21st century people and not like we were still in the dark ages under the "teleban"?

  7. Do these Teleco companies practice insulting customers as an art form, talk about adding salt into the wound!!!!!!!!!

The Saga

NZ Telecom in NZ for 20 years has had a monopoly on telecommunications and has had a wonderful time making exorbitant profits of around $900m a year, paying exorbitant salaries, like a CEO on $1.7m plus all the perks (let alone the wonderful golden parachutes they all seem to get), and doing all it can to frustrate competitors and regulators.

It all goes back to Rogernomics in NZ in the 1980s were Telecom was "sold" three times. First it was the NZ Post Office a government department were you waited many months to get a phone on, you had the choice of a black phone or nothing and were happy about it. Unless of cause you got a P1 status, i.e. a Post Office employee, a diplomat or had a serious illness etc., when you got the phone on in 24 hours. Any way NZPO was made into and SOE (State Owned Enterprise) and sold for around $4b. This "sale" was of something that the government did not even really own as it was owned by the "subscribers". A couple of years down the track labour decided that was not good enough and sold it to American private interests for around $7b. The Americans then floated it on the stock market and eventually sold up and left town!

So something the government never owned was flogged off three times, but the biggest "crime", was labour MP one Richard Prebble, selling Telecom and the Numbering system. We are the only country in the world to sell off the numbering system to private interests. This means that 20 years on we have no number portability or unbundling of the loop

Number portability is the ability to take your number were ever you go and using it with any telecommunications company. Unbundling, is not having to have the telephone and broadband via copper wire with the same company, or having to have a telephone at all.

In 2006 the labour government finally got some some balls and decided to deal to Telecom NZ and split into three operations, to get some competitiveness into the whole telecommunications industry in NZ.

So that leads to 2007 and my attempts to get broadband internet at our home in the Waikato.

In November 2006 I spent some $1300 buying new technology and made round $600 selling off some of our older technology. This included a wireless router with a built in ADSL modem. I installed these and put Linux Kubuntu on all the computers (one desktop and two laptops). This works great with Wifi as you get broadband and a WLAN network all at the same time as opposed to Windows XP Home were it is almost impossible to network the computers (only available in XP Pro). By November 2006, things were finally beginning to loosen up to the point were I could get broadband with no 12/24 month contract. So after studying all the deals I decided Slingshot.co.nz had the best deal.

Currently I was paying $16.95 per month for dial up internet, $40 per month for a telephone line and tolls (long distance) on top of that. Slingshot broadband was $39 per month plus the phone through Telecom of $40/month. I justified at it as slingshot had a toll deal of $2 for 2 hours calls. I figured all added up I was paying much the same as it was.

BTW if I was in Canada or the UK I could get 30gb 2mps broadband for $30/month.

Now I should also say we had the actual telephone connected through Telstraclear. So in November I spent most of one day trying not too lose my cool and talk to Slingshot, Telecom and Telstraclear to get broadband connected. We had to change the telephone back to Telecom as slingshot "did not have an arrangement with Telstraclear". Slingshot could then not talk to us because we did not have a Telecom account number "for security reasons". So we had to talk several times to Telecom to get the connection process started and an account number so slingshot would start their process of connecting broadband.

The other funny thing was that I had done some research and found that ADSL broadband will only work on a few kilometres on copper wire, I asked the Telecom guy were the local Whatawhata telephone exchange was and if we were in range. He said he could not tell me "for security reasons" despite the fact I could probably find it in few minutes on Google Earth.

Still in early December 2006 we finally got broadband all be it at 256kb download and 128kb upload and a cap of 25gb per month (hardly world breaking speeds and a joke in the 21st century).

There was some hiccups getting connected at times and slingshot said "it was a known issue with Telecom, and it was being worked on".

Sigh, so by this time the average little old lady would be suicidal or being committed to the loony bin!!!!!!!!!!!

After one month we got a Telstraclear phone bill as normal, except we not with them any more. I rung Telstraclear but they refused to talk to me as I am a mere male. IE the telephone is my Nieces name and if I had been female and given her name, address and date of birth it would have been accepted for "security reasons". So my niece rang and was told there was no one there of the holidays to push the button and we have to wait.

On Wednesday 4-1-07 my niece rang telstraclear to cancel the telephone we no longer had, which lead to the telephone being completely disconnected that day. Sigh, my niece rang Telecom on the 5-1-07 and after an hour got the telephone reconnected, unfortunately she not knowing all the technical issues and the incompetence of Telecom and Telstraclear, we wound up with just the phone and no broadband or tolls with slingshot.

On Friday 5-1-07 I rang slingshot and was informed there was nothing they could do till the 8-1-07 "as with normal business practice, all our staff are on holiday", to which I said you are joking, you do not have one person on who can push the right button! But alas she was not joking, but did give us our dial up back till they sort it out.

On Saturday 6-1-07 I got an email from slingshot saying "we note that you no longer are using slingshot as your primary toll call provider, and we are going to charge you more next month". Shoot by now you gotta laugh, or you would blow a fuse. So I rang slingshot at 8am only to be told after being disconnected twice that technical staff do not start till 10am on the weekends.

Yippee the Saturday mail has just arrived which includes a ADSL modem from Telecom as they are trying to get us to do a deal with them!

Rang slingshot at 10am Saturday 60107 “2nd in cue”, I was then asked to wait and was put through to the technical support people and a recorded message said “thank-you for calling technical support, our hours are 8am to 10pm Monday to Friday and 10am to? Saturday and Sunday” and then I was disconnected.

Rang back and was disconnected, rang back again, for the first time I am told I am ringing new sales and should ring a different number 0800-89-2000 and select option 3 then 1 then 3. It is 3, 2, 2. Great music! 15 minutes later, I am 4th in cue,. After 40 minutes I get through, they have to have an account number, my name, telephone number, logon id, will not do. We get to discuss my problem, after my calls yesterday the connection request has gone out to the team that connects broadband at slingshot, but I have not been scheduled for connection, I can not find out when that might happen, but it might be today (Saturday). I will not hold my breath!

The saga continues????????????????????????????????


This rave is in total frustration and desperation and so I do not become suicidal!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL

Bill Rosoman

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