Online support: Who sucks and who doesn’t

Rudolph Muller

February 23, 2012

14 Comments

We put Telkom, Vodacom, MTN, Cell C, Virgin Mobile and Neotel’s online support systems to the test

Telkom and Vodacom came out tops in a recent MyBroadband survey which set out to test the online support channels of South Africa’s largest telecoms operators.

MyBroadband sent all the operators a simple request for information on slow broadband speeds, asking them for feedback on how to address the issue. The operators were asked to respond via e-mail (and hence not telephonically).

Here are the results.

Telkom (support e-mail sent on 11:35 on 21 February 2012)
Telkom immediately responded with an automated e-mail message confirming receipt of the e-mail and providing me with a reference number.
At 12:14 (hence only 40 minutes after the initial e-mail was sent) Telkom officially responded to the e-mail and provided the details needed to resolve the issue.

Vodacom (web support form completed 11:23 on 21 February 2012)
Vodacom immediately replied with an automated e-mail with the message “We are looking into your query and one of our consultants will contact you within 24 hours”. The e-mail also contained a reference number.
At 14:57 (3 hours 29 minutes after the initial e-mail) Vodacom officially responded with all the details to solve the problem.

MTN (web support form completed 11:28 on 21 February 2012)
MTN’s online support system does not have an auto-response system, and the company also did not respond to the online support request by the time of publication.

Cell C (web support form completed 11:31 on 21 February 2012)
Cell C responded immediately via an automated e-mail saying “We have received your query. One of our support staff will contact you shortly if necessary.” This is however where it stopped and there was no feedback from Cell C by the time of publication.

Virgin Mobile (web support form completed 11:41 on 21 February 2012)
Virgin Mobile immediately responded via an automated system, saying “Thank you for contacting Virgin Mobile SA Technical Support Team. We are eager to assist you and will be calling you in the next 4 hours.”
There was unfortunately no feedback from Virgin Mobile within the promised 4 hours, and by the time of publication the company still had not responded to the online support request.

Neotel (website was down and therefore no online support was available)
During the time of testing the Neotel website was down. It was therefore not possible to test Neotel’s online support.

*Please note that MyBroadband only tracked e-mail responses (we asked specifically to be contacted via e-mail), and there may have been calls directed at the numbers provided in the emails.

Email support test
Company	Auto responder	Official response	Time to resolve issue
Telkom	Yes	Yes	40 minutes
Vodacom	Yes	Yes	3 hours 29 minutes
Cell C	Yes	No	Not solved
Virgin Mobile	Yes	No	Not solved
MTN	No	No	Not solved
Neotel	Website down	Website down	Website down

Bandwidth conundrum in South Africa « Broadband « MyBroadband Tech and IT News

Rudolph Muller

July 29, 2011

3 comments

National bandwidth costs are currently undoing the benefits of cheaper international bandwidth in South Africa

South Africans rejoiced in July 2009 when SEACOM arrived in South Africa, breaking Telkom’s SAT-3/SAFE monopoly in the international bandwidth market.

Savings were slow to filter down to consumers, but towards the end of 2009 ADSL data prices started to plummet. SEACOM also made it possible for MWEB to launch affordable uncapped ADSL packages for the first time in SA.

In July 2010, a year after SEACOM arrived in South Africa, EASSy launched commercial operations in the country. The impact of EASSy was far less significant than SEACOM, but the additional bandwidth and added redundancy is of great value to the country.

With the 5Tbps WACS cable set to become operational in the first half of 2012, South Africa will become awash with international bandwidth. However, another bottleneck is now a stumbling block to further bandwidth and broadband price cuts.

National bandwidth remains expensive and this was one of the reasons why MWEB decided to stop paying for local transit in October 2010.

The problem with national bandwidth costs are clearly illustrated when considering the price of carrying bandwidth to Johannesburg from the SAT-3 landing station.

Internet Solutions’ Derek Wilcocks explains that it currently costs them more to carry bandwidth from the landing station in Melkbosstrand (near Cape Town) to Johannesburg, than from London to the landing station.
The high cost of national bandwidth is clearly undoing much of the benefit of lower international bandwidth rates, but the good news is that there are numerous projects under way to change this situation.

Vodacom, MTN and Neotel have joined forces in rolling out a national fibre project; Broadband Infraco still has plans to fulfill their mandate to bring down national bandwidth costs; and FibreCo is set to start building their planned national fibre network soon.

SEACOM also announced recently that they have invested R100 million in additional South African infrastructure to meet the continuous high growth in demand for broadband services and applications.

The investment includes the purchase of physical optical fibre links from Dark Fibre Africa (DFA) as well as installing the equipment required for SEACOM to manage the network linking KwaZulu Natal’s coast (where the SEACOM marine cable lands) to two redundant Points of Presence (PoPs) in Gauteng.

Initially, 100 Gigabit per second (Gbps) of the fibre will be lit (using current 10Gbps technology) and a further 20 waves are expected to be lit within the next 12 months.

All of these projects should results in far lower national bandwidth rates and far better redundancy – similar to what South Africa experienced over the last two years in terms of international bandwidth.

Africa undersea cables projection - 2013 - Image courtesy Many Possibilities

Neotel ups consumer ante with new phone | TechCentral

— Staff reporter, TechCentral

Neotel is stepping up its focus on the retail consumer market with the launch on Monday of a new handset that, at first glance, looks remarkably like a mobile phone.

The R399 device, made by China’s ZTE, uses Neotel’s “fixed-wireless” code division multiple access (CDMA) network. Though it resembles a cellphone, it offers only limited mobility.

“Unlike other home phones, Neotel’s cordless phone is not restricted by residential parameters and can be used wherever coverage exists within the same geographical calling area,” the company says.

Neotel, controlled by Indian’s Tata Communications, has struggled to make headway in the retail consumer space, signing up just 50 000 subscribers. New CEO Sunil Joshi has promised the company will increase its focus on this segment, predicting it will increase its customer base by 50% in the current financial year, which ends in March 2012.

Neotel is continuing to invest its CDMA network to “deepen and extend” its coverage, according to Joshi. He recently indicated the company would roll out new products “in the near future, both in terms of capacity, throughput and end-user devices”.

The operator has budgeted about R500m for capital expenditure this financial year, some of which will be directed to its consumer offerings.

Neotel’s new, battery-powered phone is available on its NeoConnect Lite voice contracts (either R99/month or R199/month) and its NeoConnect Lite prepaid packages. It offers free off-peak Neotel-to-Neotel calls and rates to other networks that the company claims are the lowest in the industry.

Telkom and Neotel do battle over local loop

By Candice Jones, TechCentral

Neotel has filed a complaint against Telkom at Icasa

Neotel has fired the first salvo in what could quickly become a ferocious battle over access to Telkom’s copper cable network. TechCentral can reveal exclusively that Neotel has filed a complaint with the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) against its rival, asking the authority to give it access to the fixed-line incumbent’s local loop.

In a submission to Icasa, dated 23 March, and which includes copies of full correspondence between the two operators, Neotel has set out the reasons it believes it should be given immediate access to Telkom’s “last-mile” infrastructure of copper cables into businesses and residential homes.

A lot is riding on the outcome of Neotel’s submission because it could mean the difference between local-loop unbundling taking place in 2011 and a lengthy, drawn-out process that could take years.

The telecommunications industry has been awaiting Neotel’s complaint to Icasa with bated breath as it represents a litmus test for using facilities-leasing regulations as a way of achieving local-loop unbundling. It’s believed Icasa will use the complaint to force unbundling to happen in the short term, instead of having first to go through a process of developing detailed regulations to manage the process.

Icasa dropped a bombshell on the industry last year when it said Telkom’s copper infrastructure represented an “essential facility”, meaning its competitors could request access, using regulations that were published in 2010.

Essential facilities include any telecoms infrastructure that is required to provide services to customers. Undersea cables and the local loop are specifically mentioned in the Electronic Communications Act, which governs the sector.

In many markets, incumbent operators like Telkom have used their control of this infrastructure to squeeze out competition by charging high prices for access.

Icasa’s facilities-leasing regulations are meant to prevent abuse by dominant players.

Communications minister Roy Padayachie wants the local loop unbundled by November, and if Neotel’s complaint is upheld by Icasa, the process can begin in earnest.

Neotel was always the most likely candidate to test Icasa’s facilities-leasing theory, and it first made a request to Telkom to access the local loop in November 2010.

Telkom's Andrew Barendse has rejected Neotel's request

According to Neotel’s complaint, it has requested that Telkom give it access to two telephone exchanges, one in Benmore Gardens in Sandton and the other in Rosebank, Johannesburg. Within these exchanges, Neotel has requested that certain aspects of the local loop be made available to it, including termination equipment, the main and handover distribution frames, and tie circuits.

It has also requested that Telkom make space in the exchanges for Neotel’s own equipment racks, either in cages or in a separate room. It wants to connect to its own fibre infrastructure located outside the exchanges.

Neotel made the request in terms of processes stipulated in the facilities-leasing regulations.

Telkom, however, appears to be steeling itself for a fight. It has clearly stated that it does not agree that facilities leasing is a means for other companies to gain access to the local loop and has declined Neotel’s request.

In a letter signed by Telkom’s wholesale account manager, Johan Botha, the operator argues that local-loop unbundling is “still enjoying the attention of the regulator, but is some way from being finalised”. He adds that Neotel is acting prematurely in requesting access to the infrastructure.

Neotel made a second and third request to Telkom in December and January, pointing out that the facilities-leasing regulations cover the local loop and that fuller local-loop unbundling regulations are not required.

However, Telkom isn’t relenting. In correspondence to Neotel, it insists that the access its rival is requesting falls under local-loop unbundling, not under facilities leasing.

“The entire purported request for the lease of copper last-mile facilities is a frivolous attempt on the part of Neotel to impress upon Telkom a convoluted interpretation of the facilities-leasing regulations in a manner that gives credence to the erroneous belief that facilities-leasing regulations contemplate the instigation of a regulatory process culminating in the unbundling of the local loop.”

Telkom has long argued with Icasa about the classification of the local loop as an essential facility and pushed the same argument in its responses to Neotel. Its understanding of the legal definition of an essential facility is a facility that “cannot feasibly be substituted”. However, Telkom maintains that the mobile operators have created a substitute, which it calls the “wireless local loop”.

The operator has also slammed Neotel for “persisting in formulating speculative requests which are clearly beyond the contemplation of the applicable regulatory dispensation”.

Icasa has previously indicated to TechCentral that it will apply its mind to Telkom’s argument that the local loop is not an essential telecoms facility.

In a last ditch attempt to get Telkom to reconsider, Neotel sent a letter to Telkom’s group executive for regulatory affairs, Andrew Barendse, on 2 March. “Having exhausted all available means to resolve this request amicably, Neotel offers Telkom one final opportunity to respond favourably to our facilities lease request within the next five working days, failing which Neotel will have no alternative but to refer the matter to the regulator.”

Barendse declined the request two days later, prompting Neotel to file its complaint late last month. An Icasa spokesman was not immediately available for comment. However, it is likely the authority’s complaints and compliance committee will hear the case.