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[ryant704]

ryan the policies have changed, it used to be charge if EU equipment fault found.  Now its charge if no fault found 'or' EU equipment fault found.

If it's changed within the last 3 weeks but I still believe it is true from my experience.

[NewtronStar]

Same here I was under the impression anything inside the customers premises if found to be the fault was chargeable (excluding faulty modems & routers) and anything ouside the premises the ISP picks up the bill.

Would like to see these new ISP chargable conditions 

[Black Sheep]

I think folk are getting confused, which is understandable, as we ourselves can't keep abreast of the ever-changing rules that apply to TRC (Time Related Charges).

The same basic rules still apply, i.e.: You are covered by your line-rental agreement for anything up to and including your NTE5. As long as it's not malicious damage, vandalism etc. We can't be held responsible for the jealous 'Ex' who puts an axe through the drop wire. Yes … it happens.

The changes that have happened, where 'sometime confusion' may occur, is on the CDTA (Concsious Decision To Appoint) tasks. Basically, if the EU raises a fault, the recent 'Line test' history will also be looked at. If there's been evidence that a fault has existed recently, but everything tests ok whilst we are on-site, then the TRC will not apply.
Conversely, if the test history only shows 'LTOK', and still does whilst we are on-site, then TRC will apply.

Please, I can't help anymore than that, as I don't get involved in TRC. It's always going to be a grey area.

[kitz]

If you do, request that the engineer use 'Quiet Line Test' and also ring your landline whilst the circuit is undergoing the DSL Close-out test. If there is a HR, then chances are the errors will increment under this particular 'loading' test ??

I'd back this one up.   The thing is you need a decent engineer though.  One of the early ones I had said that CRCs didnt matter because they auto-corrected and since I didnt have any FECs my line was ok  (hmmm my line isnt interleaved  ).  Anyhow once I got a decent engineer and by the time voice had started to fail too, the engineer did the above test and said my CRCs were way above what he considered the threshold for a line of this length.

[NewtronStar]

if the test history only shows 'LTOK', and still does whilst we are on-site, then TRC will apply.

So basically if you report a line fault to many times and nothing has been found as a fault then your classified as "Cry Wolf" that I can understand wasting resources & time when others need it more.

have a nice link -> http://www.openreach.co.uk/orpg/home/updates/briefings/generalbriefings/generalbriefingsarticles/gen10412.do

[Black Sheep]

I can't say, 'Cry wolf', as half the forum would be slating me and OR in no time. 

As I say, TRC isn't my forte, but I have just glanced over the 'War & Peace' document that covers this awkward beast. My lord, it's deep stuff.
Of course, there are going to be many genuine 'intermittent faults', that are going to fall under our TRC criteria, that may not be found instantly. But in the same breath, there's many more that fall under the TRC criteria that cover 'EU mis-operation', 'Faulty EU equipment', 'Vandalism', 'Damage on EU's curtilage', 'Flood', 'Fire' etc etc etc ...........

The genuinely faulty ones that are covered by the rental T&C's, will usually get repaired first time, but if it requires a couple of visits to nail it, the TRC's will be waived. A ball-ache, yup, but a necessity to minimise manpower wasteage.

I feel I may have left myself open here to the pedants that will scrutinise every possible scenario. It won't make any difference, the processes in place are there for a reason. To protect both the business and the EU. That's why we all get sick to death of being asked if we've plugged the phone in the test socket, blah-de-blah, but it's asked for a reason.

[Chrysalis]

ryan the policies have changed, it used to be charge if EU equipment fault found.  Now its charge if no fault found 'or' EU equipment fault found.

If it's changed within the last 3 weeks but I still believe it is true from my experience.

in your case either your isp may have waived the fee or the engineer put in report he found an issue and fixed (I think some do this to prevent charges).

Its in the openreach doc's somewhere regarding the charges, aaisp director revk has also blogged about the charges.  It is also in zen's t&c's in more detail than most isp's they specifically state if the engineer cannot find a fault a charge is likely to be raised.

The change was much more than within last 3 weeks, I cant remember the date but its been for a while now.

[Chrysalis]

if the test history only shows 'LTOK', and still does whilst we are on-site, then TRC will apply.

So basically if you report a line fault to many times and nothing has been found as a fault then your classified as "Cry Wolf" that I can understand wasting resources & time when others need it more.

have a nice link -> http://www.openreach.co.uk/orpg/home/updates/briefings/generalbriefings/generalbriefingsarticles/gen10412.do

yeah that says it quite clearly, thanks for finding it.

PQT pass and access gained - charges apply.

Although I respect also what black sheep has said that if there is faults on the recent history the fees can be waived, maybe thats what happened to ryant.

Also plusnet absorb some of these fees as I beleive when they do charge they only charge £60 whilst openreach charge the isp more then that.

My point of view in the original post was that for a fee of £115 I want value for money, I think £115 merits more than a 5 minute JDSU test, even if they diagnosing for 2 hours they still getting over £50 an hour, and that the contract between openreach and isp is frequently different from isp to end user.

[Chrysalis]

I done the test and its a fault finder.

My thoughput crawls during calls on the upstream, downstream not really affected tho.

That seems more conclusive now black sheep?

19mbit/sec not call.
2-5mbit/sec during call. but takes about 5 secs to start slowing down.

[Black Sheep]

I would absolutely say so, based on your findings.

However, (and I have to put this), to all intents and purposes, 'throughput' doesn't fall under our remit. Now that's out of the way, I would hope that you get a decent broadband engineer who is willing to accept you have an issue there ??

Lap of the Gods, I'm afraid. Broadband should have remained a 'Closed User Group' (CUG), as it was during its infancy. The guys who were on it back then, had a genuine interest and were very capable. By moving it into the 'multi-tasking' queue's, it lost that edge.   

[Chrysalis]

who's remit does it fall under when the slow throughput is caused by line errors?

[Black Sheep]

Chrysalis, please try and see through what I'm trying to say here, without me having to type down every scenario.

Throughput is not our remit. If the line is 'erroring', we have to perform various tests as laid out in the agreements, of which throughput is not one of them, and if they pass, then we are at liberty to close the job.

REIN causing extreme amounts of errors, and can slow the throughput down to 128Kbps, but it's jack to do with us.

If your line is faulty, and tests faulty, then by repairing that fault one would hope the throughput would be restored. But I will say it again, throughput (OFFICIALLY) is not our concern.

[Chrysalis]

I understand what you saying but its an eye opener.

High errors will reduce throughput, its certianly not the isp's remit as they dont own the line.

I appreciate you posting the internal policies but from a customer point of view this isnt a good situation, openreach sidestepping what should be their problem to deal with, obviously at this stage we have no idea if its REIN, HR fault or something else but seems a HR fault is most likely given my symptons.  As I understand tho a HR fault is hard to diagnose, JDSU tests often fail to diagnose it so engineers would typically look for other symptons hence getting back to this dipping snrm, reduced performance and so on.  But I believe you are trying to state openreach will only recognise such a fault if the problem is extreme (ie. disconnections).  So its like a car sales man selling a car he knows has faults but not telling the customer.

Hopefully i get a good engineer with his head screwed on right and this doesnt blow up.  As I wont sit back accepting this if openreach just throw it back saying tough luck deal with it.

If I am wrong and there is such a tests you know off thats reliable for detecting HR, maybe you can tell me and I will ask the engineer to carry it out.

I wish kitz in her own thread before revealed what her engineer told her was an acceptable error rate as that could help other people if they get fobbed off with error rates above that error rate.

[JGO]

 " As I wont sit back accepting this if openreach just throw it back saying tough luck deal with it."

IF it proves to be RFI, then sorry, that is what you are liable to have to do, since it is outside BT's control. ( HMG seem to have washed their hands of RFI - you might hope that FFTP is their long term plan but I doubt it,  and that won't help other services anyway. )

In my professional experience (in another field) the biggest problem with RFI is getting the complainant to consider the possibility that their own installation could be at least contributing to the trouble.
Way back when the GPO investigated complaints of interference to TV for HMG, each year some 80% of cases were due to faulty TV receivers or aerials !

 An explanation.  I deliberatly use the standard radio term "RFI" because it doesn't have to be impulsive ; you can b-- most things with a white noise jammer !
 

 



 

[Chrysalis]

ok but it would be a weird RFI for it to only occur when I am using the phone

I have tested different handsets including none wireless ones.

Generally speaking tho its not a good way to do business, if I said to one of my customers its out of my control deal with it (even if speaking the truth), I dont think they would be my customer for much longer.