Eircom Sulking

wexfordman

Long post, sorry!!


About 2 months ago, our phone line went down, along with about approx 15 of our neighbours phone lines. The lines went down after a storm, and it was fairly obvious the cause was due to lightning, as all our and our neighbours telephone sockets had been burned, blackened or blown out!!!

Such is life, things happen, and we waited for our lines to be repaired, having reported the faults. We waited and waited and waited, no sign of any eircom vans for the first week around the area. In fact it took almost 2.5 weeks before we got our line fixed. We were assured by eircom that they were working on the fault, and would have it back up as soon as possible. However, they told us under the customer charter, they would credit us 2 months free line rental because they had failed to repair the fault within the designated 2 days. The same credit was applied to all our neighbours (or those of us that complained in any case).

In the mean time, I had got Wireless BB in just before the fault, and it was not affected. The phone line being down for this long was a perfect excuse to try out voip, which we did for the duration of the fault with out any problems. So pleased were we with the voip, that we decided to port our eircom number over to it, and get rid of them altogether (porting takes about 6 weeks apparently. Mobile porting takes only a matter of hours, but Eircom takes 6 weeks, figure that!!).


Anyway, got my phone bill the other day, and guess what!!! Our 2 months free rental was given to us alright, but then they took it away again. Calls to customer service billing enquiry finally got me the reason why. Lightning strike is not our fault sir, see our customer charter it does not cover it. I know lightning is not your fault, and am pleased to see for once that Eircom do not place themselves in such high regard. But 2.5 weeks to fix the line is Eircom’s problem, and that’s what I thought the refund was about.

I wonder is this true, so I looked up eircoms code of practice on the web, and it does not mentioned this fact http://www.eircom.ie/cgi-bin/bvsm/bveircom/bladerunner/showContent.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@1412586307.1136974138@@@@&BV_EngineID=cccjaddgjjlmlkgcefeceiedffndffj.0&cid=OurCodeOfPracticeRes&site=Res&chanId=536888295#resolution

I enquired with my neighbours, to see if the same thing had happened to them. No, they all got their credit, and it was not taken away again. So whats going on here, are we being vindictive ? Are Eircom sulking ?

Anyone any suggestions on where I take this ? I wont even waste my time with Comreg. Then there is this whole 6 weeks porting issue (which I was told by my voip provider this morning would take 8 weeks now with eircom). Christ they have it good don’t they, that’s another 2 months rental they can squeeze out of me even after I've given them the two fingers.



Wexfordman

Sponge Bob

wexfordman wrote:

Long post, sorry!! About 2 months ago, our phone line went down, along with about approx 15 of our neighbours phone lines. The lines went down after a storm, and it was fairly obvious the cause was due to lightning, as all our and our neighbours telephone sockets had been burned, blackened or blown out!!!

I would forgive them for not meeting the normal 2 day repair standard in a case like this . Was it that wicked electrical that smacked into Wexford Waterford and Cork in October , a daytime storm IIRC !

Mobile porting takes only a matter of hours, but Eircom takes 6 weeks, figure that!!).

Have Comreg explained to you why so it is , thats their baby as Comreg 'own' numbers and eircom has an 'allocation' from Comreg under their general licence.

Our 2 months free rental was given to us alright, but then they took it away again. Calls to customer service billing enquiry finally got me the reason why. Lightning strike is not our fault sir, see our customer charter it does not cover it. I know lightning is not your fault, and am pleased to see for once that Eircom do not place themselves in such high regard. But 2.5 weeks to fix the line is Eircom’s problem, and that’s what I thought the refund was about.

Their get out is on page 25 of this part of their conditions of non service babble :

general conditioon are

http://www.eircom.ie/pricing

specific to you

http://www.eircom.ie/About/Activities/Sn4_pt3.pdf

and I make it an act of God (but they mentioned lightning in addition ) ..... and yes they are sulking, you got your rebate till they saw that you were buggering off and then they arbitrarily removed your rebate and locked you in for 2 months or more.

Any bets your number port will complete the very day after they billed you for 2 months rental ??

wexfordman

Hi Spngebob, thanks for the reply,

Yep, I agree, they could not have fixed the fault within 2 days, and I dont hold this against them, but 2.5 weeks is a bit much and the least I should have gotton was, and was 2 months free rental. Eircom should be equipped to ensure that circumstances like these are dealt with in a reasonable time frame, whic 2.5 weeks is not. I would have been okay had it taken a week, and to be honest, probalby would not have trialed the VOIP, so Eircoms loss here anyway.

Act of god fair enough, but time to repair gods work, not on, he only took 6 days to do the whole f'ing planet for christs sake!!

As much as it pains, me, I have sent an email to comreg regarding the numbner porting with a few queries (pasted blow), so I will expect the usual guff response from them on this. Maybe they will surprise me though!!

wexfordman

Hi Spngebob, thanks for the reply,

Yep, I agree, they could not have fixed the fault within 2 days, and I dont hold this against them, but 2.5 weeks is a bit much and the least I should have gotton was was 2 months free rental. Eircom should be equipped to ensure that circumstances like these are dealt with in a reasonable time frame, whic 2.5 weeks is not. I would have been okay had it taken a week, and to be honest, probalby would not have trialed the VOIP, so Eircoms loss here anyway.

Act of god fair enough, but time to repair gods work, not on, he only took 6 days to do the whole f'ing planet for christs sake!!

As much as it pains, me, I have sent an email to comreg regarding the numbner porting with a few queries (pasted blow), so I will expect the usual guff response from them on this. Maybe they will surprise me though!!

It was the same lighting storm you speak off, had a load of electirc gear go bang at the same time, except at least insurance companies are not blaming god. I t was some storm though, I'll never forget it.

Porting form went in on the 13th december, so this gives me till the 13th feb to move over at the latest. I reckon if comreg were worth their salt, they should impose penalites on whoever ()whats the bet its eircom) is responsible for the delay in porting over. Penalites equivelant to the additional cost I am bearing by having to maintain two services.

Is there no depths Eircom will not sink to

Anyway, here is the mail I sent them:-

Hi,


I was wondering if you could advise or provide me information as to number porting from one landline provider to another ? Could you please advise me:-

1) How long should the process take when porting from Eircom to another provider.
2) Is there any specific reasons why this process should take longer than the mobile porting process.
3) Are there any limits in the time it takes to port over set by Comreg, or do comreg have any views on what would be considered an excess amount of time.
4)If an operator is seen to be taking excessive amounts of time to port a number over, is there ane recourse for the consumer based on extra costs imposed (additional line rental etc).

This enquiry relates to residential number porting only, as I am currently in the process of doing so.

I would appreciate any feedback.

Thanks,
Eamon


Wexfordman

Sponge Bob

wexfordman wrote:

It was the same lighting storm you speak off, had a load of electirc gear go bang at the same time, except at least insurance companies are not blaming god. I t was some storm though, I'll never forget it.

I was watching it develop on this lightning detector here , it was a Biscay storm that reached the south coast about Midday one day in October was it not. Here is the early warning system for ya the next time .

http://www.isleofwightweather.co.uk/live_storm_data.htm

Damn clear set of questions, I would love to see the answer to those in the public domain.

Eircom have developed a series of pat answers that Comreg accept when it comes to difficulty porting a line to another operator with number (its about number = database key for line) . This is one of the key procedural planks underpinning Eircom anti-competitive behaviour in the LLU arena . Comreg accept this resistance and seem to refuse to do anything about it or offer direction or asisstance .

As you are voluntarily losing your line because you are going wireless the same arguments are not applicable at all.

The process should take a week if porting to a Wireless operator or VoIP operator, tops. a day longer for wired.

wexfordman

Will post any response I get from them. Sent one to Phil as well, asking basically why should I stay with eircom, seeing as they pretty much have nothing more to offer me than what they could offer 30 years ago.

Dont think he's going to bother replying though cos I told him I was going anyway.

Wexfordman