Eircom DSL not syncing

rwallirl

Hi,

My DSL sync has been down since 14th December (no changes made at my end).

Unsurprisingly to many people the Eircom support line is not proving to be the most helpful place to go with this.

I've tried changing routers (I have three available to me), and have just had a new drop box and filter installed with no positive impact.

I don't hold out much hope for my next (7th) call to the Eircom call centre - so any hel pthat can be provided here would be appreciated!

Cabaal

I've you've disconnected all telephony equipment from all sockets in yoru house and your router is connected to your main socket with one filter and one phone (no ext leads or splitters) and its still not syncing then its extremely likely its a line fault or similar issue. (It doesn't matter if it worked before, you should do this anyway)

If you call support and they tell you crap about it being login information or your PC then their lieing as it wouldn't matter if your PC was on fire your router would still sync once its powered on and in working order and connected correctly to your line.

Call them again and see how you get on,

rwallirl

Yup Cabaal,

Tried all that, and have brought the equipment on the line all the way back to just the old Netopia Router.

On my first support call to Eircom I suggested that an engineer might have taken me off-line at the exchange by mistake.

I've even made sure that they have my billing record up to date on their end.

I've now been charged EUR85 for a call-out by Eircom Phonewatch (along with the hassle of making sure someone was in the house for the engineer) which did nothing to rectify the issue. At least Eircom are going to refund that amount.

I would have thought that the fact the line dropped completely (no degradation or intermittent supply issues) would immediately indicate a line fault. Thankfully I'm on top of the technology enough that I seem to know as much as the support person on the other end of the phone and am well able to discount most of their comments immediately (e.g. is the Sky box connected).

The phone support policy seems to be to balme someone else for issues instead of trying to help the customer. Sometimes offering to help the customer, but charging them for the help is a much more constructive way of operating!

I think the key to getting this resolved is going to be hounding the Team Leader in Eircom until it's fixed. If it wasn't for the fact that the Broadband is paid for as part of a company account I'd be long gone. As it is, I might just drop the service and go with Magnet/NTL/UTV (who I was previously with and never had any issues with). My exchange isn't yet serviced by Smart.

_blank_

This is quite bizarre. If you say you have carried out the full troubleshoot as is mentioned the the previous post, and you explained this to the agent in eircom, then they will simply escalate the case to the engineers, who will then go and check the line.

My suggestion is this. Ring them back, and tell them you have no sync. They will ask you to go through the motions again, humour them and even pretend to do it while on the phone (at most this will take ten minutes) and then they'll send the case to the engineers.

rwallirl

That's exactly what I'd say. But it is proving extremely hard to get that to happen.

At one stage in the process I got that agreement (back before Christmas), but the engineer was never sent, and a Phonewatch engineer was deemed necessary first.

I'm about to try another call now.....

rwallirl

For Eircom to return my calls....

The Roach

I actually had pretty much the exact same fault, and I think it started at about the same time. One day the DSL sync light on the router switched off and there was no net connection from then on. Although in my case about a week later the dial-tone disappeared too. I was working nights at the time so I just logged the fault on the eircom website. However, when I checked the fault status a week later it said that the fault had been repaired, despite the fact that there was still no dial-tone or DSL signal. I logged another fault with them, and this time they seem to actually be doing something about the situation. They managed to get a dial-tone working on the line over the weekend, and I was just talking to one of my housemates who said that an engineer called out today and got the DSL sorted.

So my advice would be to just keep bugging them until they get things sorted. It's probably something simple from their end, but I get the feeling that everyone in Eircom will try to avoid actual work at all costs.

Good luck, and I hope you get it sorted soon.

rwallirl

I finally got Eircom to send an engineer to the exchange - as I had been originally promised in mid December. Strngely enough that fixed the problem.

All it took was

• 2/3 calls per week
• much shouting and screaming down the phone
• payment of a completely unneccasry EUR85 for a new drop point in the house
• the inconvenience of making a weekday appointment for the drop point
• threats of involving the regulator in the case

Will Eircom now klive up to their customer charter and cover the lost time, refund the EUR85 for the unnecessary new drop point and ciompensate for the bad experience?

It took a threat of escalating to the regulator before Eircom took action!

Another happy customer (NOT!)

Flaccus

I am more or less in the same boat as you or at least the early stages.
Had broadband 2 years and every now and again it goes up and down. Last time was over Xmas where it was disconnecting every 15 min. In fairness the Engineer did go out to my exchange (although a week later) and rang me and said nothing was wrong. That was last week. It mysteriously started working again. He put it down to the 38db attentuation on my line and just because that was fine 2 years ago, more people have signed up since

Anyway as of 2 days ago my dsl will not synch at all. Eircom want to charge me 90 euro to check my line at home. Told them to get lost and I would refuse the charge as there is positively nothing wrong on my side. Master box with just tel and router/modem plugged in. No sky, extensions or other stuff. Changed out all cables including router and filters. But to no avail. Even had someone who used work in Eircom look at the box the wires are coming into and it's fine too. So now I am waiting for them to check the exchange again.

Anyway, I will probably give up on Eircom at this point. Going to make sure they refund me 2 months broadband rental too. When I signed up it was 2 months free but they pulled the stunt where they charge you anyway, and you get it back after your trial ends or your contract ends.

Have already ordered a check with IBB to see if I am eligable for the 3meg breeze package. They will ring me back in a couple days, so I will see.

rwallirl

I think you're saying the same thing as me in terms of the Eircom customer service process Flaccus.

I know a reasonable bit about the technology and identified to Eircom that the most likely issue was at the exchange. Unlike you, my DSL sync dropped completely rather than deteriorating over time - indicating that it was NOT new customers coming on stream. I had disconnected all other equipment and tried several modem/routers. Eircom's reaction to my knowledge was derisory, even asking me what was I doing with different routers!

It seems that the ethos is to avoid delivering on any reasonable customer service levels. They have no statutory duty to provide a DSL line, leaving users in a right state.

My personal preference would be to go completely wireless, so as to avoid dealing with any Eircom facilities even through a third party, but my account is part of a larger corporate account so my decision is actually to move from completely free internet to something more expensive. To be honest I might just do that anyway after my experiences with Eircom. It has cost me more in time of work than a third party package would have cost in the last 2 years anyway.

I pay for Broadband for another family member and that is not with Eircom. I am about to enter into another supply for my father in law, and that will not be with Eircom either.

At some stage they will figure out that the amount of time they spent on the phone to me, along with the lost revenues from accounts, is far in excess of the cost of providing some resonable level of customer service. It's not like Eircom is a cheapest provider or anything, so there is no reason to expect this kind of shoddy treatment.