Hello Readers!

It’s EOD time, this one will be short and sweet so without further ado, here’s Colin moaning about having to post the Web Teams entry

It seems to be if I refuse Andrew’s requests to edit the EOD, I get roped in to doing the team one… even if I refuse for a legitimate reason (going to the movies at 5.45).

It looks like the majority of the team have been up to testing today, but we’ll see what they say:

Gary: Wireframing and complaining about being too warm
Nick: Partner bug fixes and Community Support fun
Kelly: Trying to work out how our Failed Billing process works
Mark: I starting out working on some web site problem fixes, but soon found that I’d been volunteered for some project testing duties. I had a peek at the Wolfram Alpha website – Link and wonder if it’s the beginning of the end for maths and physics homework…
James: Testing
Jonny: Testing and having a lot of sympathy for the QA Team (Ed: Agreed – testing can be tedious but they do it day in day out!)
Sam: Working on a project
Phil: Testing as well
Andy: Conning Colin, and testing.
Duffy: Testing as well.
Colin: Being conned, having discussions with the DBAs about something, project work, avoiding testing

That looks like it for the day, so cya later.

Thanks Colin!  Finally we have James from the CSC, he sounds a bit flustered…

Due to the P1 that we had this morning we are been the busiest I have seen for a long time within the CSC.

We have been offered over 2700 calls as I write this and normally we would be offered c.1800 calls for the whole day, so with the busy Monday evening to come its been one hectic day today and we will probably end up with approx.3300 calls by the end of the day

Between 10am and 1030 this morning we got offered 273 calls however, the equivalent 30mins last week we were offered 57 calls.

So if you have called us today and had to wait a little longer than normal and heard the message on the phone sorry we couldn’t get to you as quickly as we normally would but I hope you can see that we were dealing with unprecedented levels of calls at the time that the teams on this morning did a fantastic job in handling.

So that’s pretty much it for the CSC EOD today, heres hoping for a normal day tomorrow. PLEASE!!

Thanks James.

That’s it for today, have a good evening!

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Hello, and welcome to the last EOD for this working week.

It is Friday afternoon, and I am looking forwards to my first full weekend off in a while.  Before that, lets see what has been happening today at Plusnet Towers.

First off, Barbara from HR:

“Been a while since we did an acrostic (Jen assures me this is what it’s called)…so with the big contest on tomorrow night, I know you can’t wait, here are our results from the HR jury…
Ein Numbers, work continues on getting us aligned with the BT system
Updating the Disciplinary and Grievance workshop
Reviews 360 – We’ve started to collate these, but have had to re-arrange all the organised MDLP meetings as we only received 21 out of possible 98 reviews back; and are appealing for more to come in from the MDLP members (please)
Operation review preparation, and Amanda went to BTC to present with the Leadership Team
Vacation end for Amanda; vacation start for Gemma
Invitations to interview’s organised
Sourcing external meeting venues for training programs
Induction amendments made
Online application form revamp, and soon to be released
New starter Mr Steve Woods arrived – welcome!”

Thanks Barbara! Next up is Ben in Technical Support:

“Team A have been on shift this morning with most of us kept busy answernig calls with a few lucky ones chosen to help the faults team keep their workflows to a reasonable level. Our top five issues for calls are as follows:

1. Fault updates
A lot of customers are calling us for updates on open faults. These calls often come after a voicemail or text from our faults team but there have also been customers chasing us for updates if they’ve not heard back from us.

2. Router setups
Our routers come with excellent instructions for basic setup but there are a lot of situations where our customers require help. These include removing old dial up accounts and updating proxy or DNS settings.

3= New faults
There has been no pattern to the reported faults with no MSOs and no issues on our network. There has been a typical mix of synchronisation and speed problems reported to our faults team for further investigation.

3= Email setup
As ever, customers often need to be pointed in the right direction when setting up basic email accounts or adding new mailboxes to their email account and client.

5. Billing
As with our fault reports, there has been no pattern to these calls as there are no issues evident on our system, just customers calling in to update payment details or query the content of an invoice.”

Cheers Ben! Next, lets have a Comms update. Ready Chris?

“Somehow it’s come down to me to write the Comms EOD today, not sure how that’s happened.

Anywhooooooo

On with the proceedings. As I’m sure you’re all aware it’s Friday, which means it’s the end of the working week. Fortunately Bob’s back next week to get the team back up to strength, not that we’ve missed him though.

I’ve been handling change controls, of both a Networks and Dev persuasion today. Along with compiling some internal documentation and making a couple of posts on the forums.

James has spent most of his day in the forums, along with a spot of problem management.

Matt’s been writing emails, lots of emails. I’m not going to disturb him and ask what they are as he looks ready to bite someones limbs off.

So that’s it for the day and indeed the week. Have a cracking weekend and we’ll see you on Monday.”

Thanks a lot Chris, and finally, lets have Tahir from Customer Services:

“Hi all.

My name is Tahir from Plusnet Customer Services here from sunny Durban. It has been a busy day here. We took almost a 1000 calls today which all of us are really proud off. Our main objective was to maintain Service levels in our call center which we happily did. Two of us where seconded to other teams that’s Roxanne and I. I personally had a break from the madness since I was seconded to Quality Team for the day. I did however I did take a few calls now and again when the call queues where high (So that you don’t wait much longer ). Most of the calls where regarding general account billing queries. Overall it has been a good day. Most of us are looking forward to the well deserved weekend. Wish everyone that reads this a good and have a restful weekend.

From your CS Analyst from sunny Durban!
Tahir”

And that is everything.  Have a good weekend, don’t get too wet!

Carl

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I had a nice chat with Maurice, David and Mike from the Plusnet Usergroup last night.  Thanks for that guys.. good feedback there.  It’s always good to catch up.  You know, I’m sure they’d be more than happy to tell you what we get up to, and how you can get involved, if you fancy it, in the forums.

It’s late, so let’s crack on and have a look at what the folks here at Plusnet Towers have said they’ve been up to today. More…

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Two entries from us today. Here we go!

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The second annual PHP TestFest is currently underway and this weekend the PHP NorthWest user group met to make their contribution with Ben, Rowan and myself representing Plusnet.  The aim is to improve the amount of PHP source code that is covered by tests thereby giving developers increased confidence that unintentional behavior changes are not made.  These tests are run frequency and the results are published on gcov.php.net.

Having used PHP for a number of years to build a career and pay the bills, it feels particularly satisfying to contribute something back to the project. Also, those people making significant contribution may apply for a $username@php.net email address which looks cool on a business card!

With the recent release of PHP5.3RC2, the main focus is on improving code coverage for the 5.3 branch.  PHP core developer Scott MacVicar started the day with an introduction on how-to compile from source as well as run the existing tests. After pizza, we got down to the business of writing tests, starting with a simple example which I’ll run through… More…

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Hello readers!

Greetings from the nice, cool air conditioned Dev floor – yes the air con is working properly so there’s nothing to moan about, woo hoo!

We have a Customer Support themed EOD for you today, first up is Lee from.. The CSC (suprisingly!)

It’s been a lovely sunny day in Sheffield (for once), and Team B have been dealing with most of your queries today. Our Top 5 issues in the CSC today are as follows:

1. Fault Updates – customers calling for updates to their faults, or providing us with further information we have requested.

2. Router setups – still a lot of people after help with setting up routers; both our own and 3rd party models being seen.

3. Username/password confirmation – customers calling to confirm usernames, passwords, and sometimes router settings

4. Email setup – customers after help with setting up their email clients (Outlook, Thunderbird etc.)

5. Webmail issues – we’ve had a problem with our webmail today which has caused a few calls today, but our networks team are well on top of it!

Many Thanks Lee!  Next it’s Mark from Business Support…

Today has been nice and quiet on the Business Team but we can always find work to do :p

Martin has been ensuring all faults are up to date, Oliver has been managing the floor today while team mangers have been in and out of meetings all day. Adam has been ensuring that all new orders have been correctly placed and any delayed orders are chased up with our suppliers. I have been finished off lots of odds and ends all day, lastly Chris(2) and Mick have been busy on calls and tickets all day.

Finally Chris and Phil have been in and out of the office all day making sure that some migrations onto the Plusnet Partner platform go smoothly (I think they have been in the beer garden all day).

And finally Comms, here’s Mand…

Happy Tuesday, or is it?

Today we’ve been enjoying the lack of anger around the desk now Bob is on holiday.

James has been in the forums.

Chris has been working on problems, service status and tweeting (or is it twittering?). He also introduced me to a cool new band via Spotify.

Matt has been Pete’s minion for the day, doing all sorts of ad-hoc work.

I’ve been working on a couple of particularly troublesome problems, attending meetings galore, and drinking copious amounts of Pepsi.

Today’s comm-ic is here.

Catch ya later

Mand

Thanks for reading, till the next time!

Andrew.

***STOP PRESS***

This was filed while I was constructing the post.  Take it away Nick!

Faults -

Hi all! Been a busy day today – having been down an agent unexpectedly, we’ve been trying to cover all the bases. This meant that as a secondee I’ve had plenty of opportunity to get my teeth into a wide variety of different faults. It’s been interesting to see the other side of the faults process, as I’m normally the one diagnosing them on the phone rather than sorting it out with our suppliers.

I’ve been working Authentication and No Sync faults today, with Brad’s expert eye and advice covering my every move, whilst Brad himself has been dealing with out logged intermittent faults. He’s been working that pool with Mike, getting as many cleared as possible.

Tony’s been on logged authentication faults as well as hammering the logged speed issues, while Al’s been getting the speed issues early in the CSC pool. According to Brad, Keith has been ‘Loving the WBC and CSC faults pools’ too.

That’s it from today. Looking forward to getting stuck in again tomorrow. Good to get so much resolved today.

Thanks Nick!

That really is all this time… ta ta!

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It’s Monday the 11th of May so for some reason it’s my turn to the End of Day… Usually I would think of something witty to see here, but my brain isn’t quite working so we’ll just go straight in to the updates.

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OK, OK, it’s technically now 9th May but I have a good excuse for being late with the end of day. Today was Rich’s last day and we’ve been out in Sheffield to see him off in true Plusnet style… so if there are typos in this post please forgive me you have been warned… But good luck Rich and take care, I’m sure we’ll see you again soon.

But now, let’s get on with the posts before I have to go to bed… First from the Community Moderators is Barry:

Lots of hot topics on the forums this week. The 21CN ADSL2+ trial has been producing some good feedback and the community are coming together with some very useful tips on how to maximise your connection once you are upgraded. As usual, the main culprit is internal wiring but it does seem like the new kit that powers 21CN is much more responsive than vanilla ADSL. That’s good news for people on slightly more unstable lines than normal.

There are also some ‘interesting’ topics on some of the recent worldwide issues like the Swine Flu outbreak and the next Release Candidate (RC) of Windows 7.

Plenty of fun to be had in the Chit Chat forums – the most popular topic at the moment seems to be ASBO’s addiction to Wireshark! It’s amazing exactly which threads draw attention

Last but not least, I shall leave you with a beg and a grovel. Help me raise money for the Teenage Cancer Trust by sponsoring me on the Dumball Rally. It’s a great cause and very worthwhile. It also means that you will manage to get rid of me for a week or so as of next Friday, so surely a bit of peace and quiet is worth a few quid?

Enjoy the weekend, till next time.

Barry.

Next is happy Spurs fan James from the Comms Team:

It’s been an interesting day today, with both Matt and Bob off on holiday, and Mand working from home. (of course, Bob is supposed to be on holiday but seems to be glued to the forums anyway. You can take the forums out of the boy and all that…)

So a quick roundup of what the rest of us have been doing:

Chris has been researching Caffeine over IP, with a view to being emailed his morning allowance. In between, he’s been mulling over exactly where belly-button fluff comes from. (Does anyone have any thoughts on that??)

James has been working on his management skills, the first and foremost of those skills being delegation. So far, he’s managed to delegate out his entire days work to a team of trained monkeys running the latest IMPS software although there do seem to be a couple of bugs in the latest revision. As I write this, he is currently sat with his feet up, monitoring his elite Simian team.

As for me, I’ve been doing the usual – flame, death and destruction with a side order of mechanical chopping and munching. Have a good weekend!

BAGGER 288

Over now to Kriben from the Provisioning Team:

Good evening to one and all, I will like to introduce myself, My name is Kriben from the provisioning department. The team worked really hard this week, however we experienced a few technical problems and system downtime today. We plan to keep all our provisioning pools under control and within SLA. We also want to say a big thank you, to Rohan Singh who continuously motivates the team and provides his expertise.

And last today is Laura from HR:

Hello, this is the week in HR from just two of us.

Gem

Reviewed all employees with 5 or more episodes of sickness in the last 12 months and had conversations with line managers where needed.

Chased outstanding performance reviews.

Created an EIN plan of remaining actions so all employees have EIN numbers.

All three of us helped Finalised Steve Woods induction programme and book flights to SA

Employee relations issues.

Finalised some recruitment activity and supported interviews.

Rich Smolenski’s Exit interview.

Me!

This week I have had a somewhat strange looking, noisy air-con unit to keep me company (Ed: it looks a bit like a Dalek). I have been organising possible venues for forthcoming MDLPs, chasing people who still have outstanding important tasks open, sorting out various travel arrangements and attempting to regulate a normal temperature in the reception. Oh and how can I not mention how exciting it was when the ice cream van showed up!

And that’s it for today… tomorrow should see James becoming sad James as Spurs get beat by Everton… I shall be there and texting him whenever we score

Take care everyone and catch you all again next week….

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Yesterday we relaunched our popular referrals offer giving you increased discounts for recommending Plusnet to your friends and family.

We’ll give you 4 times the normal monthly referral discount for 6 months for every person that joins us on your recommendation between May 7th and June 18th. You’ll also get an extra £2 discount per month if they take one of our Home Phone products too!

So rather than getting 50p off each month for recommending someone to Plusnet Unlimited we’ll give you £2 off for 6 months.

There’s no limit to how many people you can recommend or how big your discount can be. If enough people join on your recommendation then we’ll even start paying you!
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It’s Thursday, we’re in Sheffield and the sun is shining.  Here’s the End of Day.
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