After the Virgin’s visit – I proffer my apologies to Epson

Regular readers of my blog may well recall my angrily frustrated posts regarding several futile attempts at connecting an Epson photo-printer to my network (three postings between 19^th & 20^th December are the pertinent ones).

You will have seen there that it proved impossible to set the machine up wirelessly, as well as only being able to set-up an Ethernet connection by use of a manually fixed IP address.

Now that my previous VM super hub has been replaced (post of January 27 refers), I have been immediately able to establish a wireless connection to the printer. In response to a customer satisfaction survey from the Virgin, I commented:

the immediate experience, the politeness & efficiency of the engineer on this occasion would have lead me to a 10 rating but I have some misgivings about difficulty of getting through to the appropriate person on the 150 number.

Since this visit some problems that had been going on for a considerable time, and which I attempted to deal with via yr social media account, have finally been resolved. Ultimately, the problems seem to have been with the old hub and, a wireless connection problem with a new printer, for which I blamed the printer’s manufacturer, has also been resolved.

Perhaps a policy of automatically upgrading/ replacing old hubs should be undertaken, as that would have saved me considerable anxiety which could have proved injurious to my already chronic health condition.

For the time being, I am well satisfied with the Epson product and even reasonably satisfied with the Virgin’s broadband service. To Epson I proffer an apology.

INTACT – Virginity Restored

 It is with gratitude that I report the arrival of the engineer, well within the timeframe proffered yesterday. Apart from a phone call this morning confirming the arrangement, and an opportunity to cancel should we no longer require the visit, the engineer also contacted us when he knew that he should reach us within twenty minutes.

Of course we had access to the internet this morning, unlike yesterday, but bearing in mind the catalogue of underperforming, and even non-responding, events we have experienced over many months, I informed the engineer of these intermittent peculiarly slow ethernet speeds. He was as puzzled as I was about the slower speeds; had they been wireless ones it could sometimes make sense but over ethernet links…!!!

Anyway, he duly installed a (virginal) new hub and said that the one we had been using was the Super Hub, not even Super Hub 1; the newly installed hub is the Virgin Media Super Hub 3.

Hopefully, we will have no imminent need to trouble the Virgin’s Customer Services.

The Harlots Regress – just part of Branson's domain

Once again we’re having problems with our Internet connection, as supplied by Branson’s Harlot Media. For a few weeks we were having random brief losses of internet access even though connection to the hub was reasonably stable. On Thursday night the, by now not unfamiliar, “connected, no internet access” message appeared and re-booting the hub made little difference until, as if a miracle had occurred, the connection was quite arbitrarily restored.

Friday morning, on switching on the laptop a few new e-mail messages appeared. On following the link supplied, by a trusted merchant, I was surprised to receive the message that there was no internet connection. My first reaction was to try a different browser only to get the same result. On checking another pc I discovered that we had no internet access. I duly tried unplugging the hub and rebooting to no avail.

Next I contacted the 0800 number to check on internet status in the local area and was informed that there weren’t any problems. After several attempted re-boots I decided to contact the 150 number were they ran some tests after which they told me there were no problems but, then launched a further series of tests which they said would last up to ten minutes. Twenty minutes later, the problem not having being resolved, I once more contacted 150 and eventual was put through to a real live engineer of some kind. After answering a series of questions concerning account name etc, I was asked what date I paid my direct debit, to which I responded that I would require internet access to tell them that.  Another question followed for which I would have required internet access to give the correct answer. Security checks satisfactorily answered, the person on the other end of the line ran further tests and couldn’t find any problem.

At this end, the problem remained the same regardless of which pc or tablet I tried. I was eventually told to reset the hub and hold the pin in for a couple of minutes. Once again to no avail and, by this time the need to move to different parts of the house was playing havoc with my pain prone knees. After about 35 minutes of them running these checks they decided they would send an engineer on Saturday afternoon sometime between 12.00 – 4.00pm. They also commented that our hub was a rather old one, which caught me by surprise as I had assumed that the supplier would ensure that the equipment supplied would be up to the task. If it’s rather old, then surely, that is the ISPs problem and it shouldn’t be left to create problems for the end-user.

Wish I could say that it’s unusual to have any difficulties with our beloved ISP but, that wish remains upon its distant star. April of last year the problem was with our landline telephone, also part of the harlots domain (see: OfHEALTH and TAINTED VIRGINS ) a problem for which their response could only be described as dilatory. 

Later in the year for a considerable time I was getting speeds well below 20Mbps (Ethernet connection) on what was purportedly a 70Mbps service. I had considerable discussions with them regarding this problem via social media but the speeds temporarily improved so I duly thanked them. Not long after this we were upgraded to a 100Mbps service but, even here I’ve had occasions where the speed has once again dropped to the 20Mbps range, when checking via Ethernet connection, at different times of day and night to counter the prospect of it simply being a period of heavy usage. Needless to say, the wireless speeds at these times are even slower.

!9.10hrs: miracle of miracles we have an internet connection – the big question is how long? 

Considering past experiences going back to at least 2007 (see: AVIRGIN FAILS to provide a service ) I would be ill advised to cancel tomorrows visit from the engineer!

Of HEALTH and TAINTED VIRGINS

I’m currently re-discovering how an element of anxiety exacerbates, to a considerable extent, the symptoms of a chronic illness. On this occasion the anxiety is caused by the inept and dilatory response of Virgin Media to a known issue which is preventing us from receiving incoming ‘phone calls on our landline; the telephone is not only a lifeline for me but, there are several vulnerable elderly people who depend on my beloved OH for lifts. These vulnerable people only have our landline number as they are not mobile phone users. As for myself, the mobile phone is scarcely ever used, as I’m rarely away from my own house and garden and, therefore have little cause to switch it on.

We are still able to make outbound calls and, it was only by accident we discovered that friends and acquaintances had been unable to contact us. Other ‘phone users are also affected by, and may still be unaware of, this glitch.

The VM website online phone-tester reported no problems with our ‘phone, and we were also informed the line was engaged. I spent considerable frustrating multitudes of minutes on their help-line and, even there they suggested no real problem. Eventually an admission was made that someone else on the same exchange had reported the same problem, namely that callers only heard a continuous, high pitched whining drone when they dialled our number.

During the first phone call, I was frequently put on hold whilst my ear-drums were blasted with an execrable noise (which they maybe call music) for what seemed a like a multiplicity of eternities. Eventually, I was assured that the engineers would have the problem sorted by the end of the day. Of course this didn’t happen so I contacted them via social media with my complaint in reply to which I was informed that they had assisted me: the assistance I seemed to be proffered was to be told that there was nothing they could do via social media.

Later that day I had a webchat with VM, the outcome of which seemed positive. The positivity was short lived; the time in the afternoon, by which I was assured the problem would be resolved, swiftly passed with no action having been taken.

By the evening it was back to the 150 phone-line to enquire what was happening. At first having tapped in sundry digits in response to the robotic voice I was on hold for at least 20 minutes, my eardrums once again assaulted by shouted words & excremental instrumental accompaniment. When I got through to tech department I was at least able to quote a reference number for the issue but, was told that he couldn’t find any evidence of there being an issue so, he would put me through to network problems. Once again my eardrums were assaulted by a demonic cacophony whilst I awaited the transfer department.

Maybe I was getting somewhere. I was informed that it was a known issue, something to do with ported numbers (i.e. numbers which were originally BT numbers) but for decdes our line had been via Cable & Wireless which became NTL which became part of Virgin Media. Although they knew exactly what the issue was/is they are unable to say when it will be dealt with. To put it simply – THEY DON’T KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING.

As I said, at the beginning, these events & frustrations have certainly had a deleterious effect on my already shot nervous system. Not only did I undergo more sustained, sleep depriving, pain last night but it also does few favours to my emotional well-being. A tainted Virgin and a chronic illness / chronic pain partnership could so easily become lethal.

WEBSITE Disappears - VIRGIN MEDIA (surreptitiously) reduce package content!

Having been with Virgin Media since they took over NTL, I'm always being told what wonderful value we get from their packages! My response is that they talk considerable b*ll*cks! 

I've been so blinded by their exaggerations that I've only just discovered that I no longer have a website. 

If they told us about this in advance it must have been hidden in the small print amongst their usual promotional bullshit.

Update on Blankness

Whenever I enter, or click on any link with, my Luv4Sinners website address, I'm still greeted with a blank screen. At least when I go to my UK Geocities page, it has reverted to showing the uk.geocities.com website address and, the File Manager takes me to the files but clicking on 'View', against any of the html files, still results in a blank screen.

I have used both Firefox and IE7 as browser, utilizing four different PC's. As yet I've not had any reply from Yahoo to the enquiry, regarding this problem, that I made online yesterday morning.

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P.S. 03 October '08 - 3.40pm

According to an entry in the PC Advisor Forum

http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/forums/index.cfm?action=showthread&threadID=338220&ForumID=16&sr=1

it seems as if the problem could be with my ISP (Virgin/NTL); that's all I need after recent wranglings with them!

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PPS: 03 October '08 - 8.35pm

Having contacted Virgin Media with a link to the PC Advisor Forum, I am now able to view Geocities web sites once again. It may just be co-incidence but, I'm certainly a happier chappy!

Reluctantly Staying Put

After considerable soul destroying hassle with our ISP, Virgin Media, we have now agreed to a new 12 month contract giving us the same broadband & phone package as we’ve had for a few years at £7.00 less per month. Of course, had we not been existing customers, it would have been a further £4.50 less for these 12 months.

Although we had threatened to move to another ISP, I doubt whether I could have coped with the upheaval that would cause. As it is, I’m in a physical and emotionally lower state than I was before these “negotiations” began. Oh, how I longed for the stamina and resilience I knew several years ago.

Although we’re staying put for the time being, I could not honestly recommend our service(!) supplier to anyone that I respected! And that’s despite the profuse apology, passed onto me by my beloved, proffered by the helpful lady who finally sorted things out.