We had that happen when we lived in Hounslow. Took weeks to get them to=20 fix it, in the end they replaced the wiring from the pole to our box,=20 from the street-box to the pole and eventually swapped us to a spare=20 pair back to the exchange, which finally fixed it.
Six months later we got a cheque for, IIRC, around =A370 to compensate us= =20 for the hassle. And it was a hassle, too - ringing them several times a=20 week.
--=20 Skipweasel - never knowingly understood.
I had this last year. Intermittent fault - phone would be ok for a couple of hours, then off for 6 hours or so, no pattern to the fault. Bloke came out on Easter Monday to test. Said there was no fault, and it must be a faulty phone he said. Half an hour later, the phone didnt work again. Another bloke came out a couple of days later. He said it was the extension leads for the phone, under the floorboards (to my daughter), so not his problem. I got home, phone was not working, and I did a quick search for the non-existent telephone extension!
Third visit, and someone who had a clue fixed it - he looked up at the cable from the pole, and said "that needs changing, I cant believe it hasnt been done". He changed the cable, and all was well. The old cable was original, probably mid-70's he thought. Was solid, and had multiple cracks - it would expand, and contact was lost. Cool down, it'd work again.
Luckily, I am not with BT (Plusnet), so I dont have to put up with their awful call centre. Alan.
This technique has a name, do you know what it is called please?
Dave
We had a similar problem. We reported the fault (using the very crackly line). 'Customer service' had problems hearing us and said something about it being a bad line.....!!!!
We explained we had tried everything they suggested. Would we agree to an engineer coming and pay if there was no fault? First I checked they had recorded the call for 'training purposes'; Yes; then send an engineer.
Engineer checked everything, went up pole - found no fault but line was magically clear again.
We got a bill.
I suggested they replayed their recording. It escalated. I refused to pay and produced my own recording.
The bill was withdrawn.
In wet weather the line is still poor.....
Yuk!, Ally cable. Can't induce some Pikey's to nick it ?..
Well Dave, in my 17 years as a BT Faultsman Jointer I never came across a specific name for the technique - just comes under the heading of 'fault-finding' as far as I know :-)
Phone them up, report and state categorically it's their side. I've reported voice faults for people a couple of times recently having already discounted their wiring and being sure it's the BT side and:
a) been dealt with by someone in the UK, both times ex-line team too so they actually understand what you're talking about. I *think* I did this by using the website to report the fault such that they then phoned back.
b) had them do everything they said they would with regards to phoning back and booking engineers at relevant times
c) had engineers appear on the dot, locate & repair the dead sections of cable and phone me back to let me know all was well
Boggles the mind it was the same BT that drives me to tears with their incomprehensible special offers and pricey tarriffs. :-) Actually, bar once or twice, I've always found BT engineers knowledgeable and useful.
Only 2 grand/tonne compared to copper at 9. Lead is worth more...
The length(s) in question are only 20 pair, armoured and directly buried. Not in a, nice easy to pull out of, duct.
They use something like:
The old methods are still worth knowing. In fact this thread might have been useful on the last couple of outside broadcasts I have done. Cables have been left in since August and have been well an truely frozen, soaked, refrozen, buried in snow, soaked, you get the picture and now we are l lucky to get one, just about, useable pair out of eight in a cable. At least ten cables involved, all crawling with buzz and hum... It's been decided that all these cables are going to be removed and replaced with fresh ones, hopefully tested in base first! They have eight days before we are back there again...
I don't think it's simple hi-z connections but hi-z to earth (probably real) through corrosion or salt deposits in the back of the connectors. Shorting the pair and tone disappearing (or not) could be a useful test, if only to elminate hi-z joints.
What sort of resistance are we talking about in a HR joint fault. The pairs I'm working with are for microphone level signals and phantom powered microphones. Phantom power is +48v fed via 6k8 resistors to both legs, return via the screen. On these buzzy lines phantom still worked with no obvious imbalance.
A very operative word in there "decent". Mine will go into "terrier mode" and not let go until the fault is really cleared. BT are know to just run the remote line test which comes back OK and close the fault. Many ISPs will take that fault closure as proof that the fault has been cleared and won't contact their customer or monitor their own systems to confirm it. BT Openreach won't contact the end user either as they have no contract with them but with BT Wholesale who have the contract with the ISP. Lot's of pillars and posts...
Well by the sounds of it his connection speed is crap as well. They will also take into account the number of disconnections.
Also worth keeping in mind that if the ISP won't hassle BT for you, ask em for a mac code and tell them you are taking your custom to an ISP that will.
When you can get to talk to the guys on the ground, they are fine. The moment you have to go through the normal channels of their call centres or management it drives you mad!
Aha, thanks Dave. IIRC our moles were the "Tester 301(a?)" and nothing like that, using a small CRT display.
[...]
Well, it's either the constant pain fogging my brain or the pain releif medication fogging my brain, but I honestly can't remember, sorry.
Binary chop
Take a problem and cut it in half. Which half still has problem? cut it in half again. eventually you end up with atomic replacement of a single bad unit.
A opposed to the 'drunkards walk' where you randomly fiddle till things spring to life.
Yep. I'll second that. Zen is second to none. I had a connection fault recently and they battered BT to get it fixed. Done within six hours. Not only that, they then investigated exactly what it was and why, after it was fixed. A few quid a month more but well worth it.
Peter Scott
The 2wire router is brilliant on poor (long) phone lines. However I doubt it would mitigate the effects of a line fault like the OP describes.
I'm with Zen. I dumped BT Internet during the Phorm thing. I've never regretted it.
The real problem lies in BT Retail. Their idea of Customer Service is an alien concept; it's just a measure in a manager's "Balanced Scorecard" (what the senior management bonuses are paid against). As you might guess, what's actually measured has little to do with anything in the real world.
I know. I was there.
But Zen are still powerless in terms of actually getting Openreach to apply sensible engineering effort to a problem.
For example, Zen first reported problem to Openreach 26 July last year.
At the ***seventh*** site visit, the Openreach technician identified that the junctions at the top of the nearby pole are crudely wrapped in a plastic bag - he investigates and requests a complete rework, which is completed a couple of weeks later. Line actually working properly on 7 September. So
***six weeks*** from Zen's first contact with Openreach to Openreach actually fixing the problem.Line parameters went from about 500k download and frequent disconnects lasting hours at a time, to 4.8bits/sec download with 1 minute breaks occuring once every 3 or 4 weeks.
Is there an ISP that has a sensible degree of control over Openreach?
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