topic Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping in Broadband

Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Tue, 15 Jul 2025 22:44:41 GMT

Hi,

When working from home, my connection will often drop. When I click on the Wi-Fi, my VPN will say “connecting” as if that’s what’s dropped. Occasionally my internet connection will follow.

I spoke to my IT department and they advised it was a Plusnet issue. They couldn’t find anything and the same thing didn’t happen when connected to the office Wi-Fi. I spoke to someone from Plusnet today and they also said they couldn’t find anything wrong so directed me here.

I’ve tried the classics - turning laptop on/off, resetting router. Following advice on another post, I’ve disabled the firewall in my router admin settings - is this wise? I’m yet to test if this resolved the issue.

I’ve had the following error message under the VPN connection: “the remote connection was not made because the name of the remote access server did not resolve.”

My browser will often say “your internet access is blocked. Firewall or anti-virus software may have blocked the connection.”

Using work-specific software, I’ll get the error message “your connection was interrupted - a network change was detected. ERR_NETWORK_CHANGED

I don’t know if any of that is relevant or helpful, but thought it would be worth posting.

Hope you can help!

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

LexLex2020 — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 14:35:46 GMT

Hi @stef12,

I can see you spoke to a colleague yesterday regarding this and they directed you to another post.

Did any of that manage to get the issue resolved?

My testing can't pick up any problems.

How long would you say this has been impacting you?

Thanks,

Lex

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 16:22:26 GMT

Hi Lex,

Thank you for your reply. It hasn’t been resolved yet, unfortunately. I couldn’t access the other post when I tried yesterday, which is why I created a new one. Is it worth trying the old post again?

It happened as soon as I switched to Plusnet. I didn’t have any issues with Sky before that.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 21:09:05 GMT

Hi,

Can I ask if you altered any settings please? I’ve just logged on to check my work computer before tomorrow and it won’t connect at all. Even though WiFi and VPN are connected.

I’m quite frustrated now. My IT department are saying it’s nothing to do with them as it looks like it’s my internet connection and Plus net are saying it’s not them because they don’t deal with VPNs! Plusnet support advising I post on the community, but nothing here either.

What am I supposed to do?

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Champnet — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 22:18:54 GMT

I’d arrange a set time with your IT Dept to try again. They could then monitor attempted connections and failures.

Knowing the time would also help when they look through the logs. Good luck.

Added : I see you’ve just moved from Sky, I wonder if the remote system is setup to accept your old IP address not the new Plusnet one. Unless you’ve a fixed IP the IP address will frequently change.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 23:36:20 GMT

Thank you for your reply - please can I ask how you can tell if the IP address is fixed? I’m sure the Plusnet chap told me it was “dynamic” and he couldn’t change it.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Champnet — Fri, 18 Jul 2025 05:02:33 GMT

It’s unlikely to be fixed as I don’t think Plusnet supply them now. If dynamic there are work arounds.
Your IT Dept should advise else there are probably forum members with relevant experience.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

corringham — Fri, 18 Jul 2025 18:11:21 GMT

Something I often recommend when there are VPN problems is to reduce the MTU that your computer uses - VPNs encapsulate the packets and so add a size overhead. If a packet is sent that happens to be larger than the MTU that something along the path can handle it will be split. It is relatively common for something else along the path to the VPN server to not handle the split packets correctly, leading to packet loss and general unhappiness.

Often an MTU of 1472 or less helps.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Fri, 18 Jul 2025 21:20:08 GMT

Thank you for your reply - can I ask how I’d find out if this is the issue and how to go about resolving it please?

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Fri, 18 Jul 2025 21:21:10 GMT

Thank you for replying - I don’t suppose you know how to tell if it’s dynamic or static do you please?

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

jab1 — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 05:39:10 GMT

@stef12 How long have you been with PN, and have you ever requested a static IP?

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 07:32:18 GMT

Since the middle of June.

I mentioned that there’d been discussion about static/dynamic IP addresses on this forum to the chap on the phone and he said that he couldn’t amend those settings.

Can I?

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

MisterW — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 07:41:56 GMT

Can I?

No , static IPs have not been available to new customers for some while now. As you joined in June, they certainly wont be available to you.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 08:11:36 GMT

Righty-ho!

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Dan_the_Van — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 09:24:20 GMT

@stef12

Which VPN client are you using?

I know plusnet support suggest no fault some of your opening text might suggest there might be, you reference WiFi but do you mean your broadband connection?

Have you a Part Fibre (FTTC/SoGEA) or Full Fibre connection?

Have you noticed the Hub Two light changing from Blue to Orange or Flash Orange when your VPN stops working?

If you have not factory reset the Hub recently or since the last VPN fault could you attach the Hubs event.log to a post?

Using a PC; from the Hubs home page navigate >Advanced Settings >Technical log >Event log select Export

The event log is exported to the Downloads folder as a CSV file, use the paper clip below the reply window to attach to a post.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Townman — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 22:20:19 GMT

“the remote connection was not made because the name of the remote access server did not resolve.”

That has hints of intermittent DNS resolution issues...

... ask you IT department if their remote server has a fixed IP address. If it does, adding it to the computer's host file might avoid DNS look up failures if that is what is happening here.

This is not ideal, but it is pragmatic, your IT department should be able to assist you.

However, do note that WFH is not aligned to Plusnet's T&CS for use of their services. If WFH is what your employer expects of you, then your employer ought to be providing a business grade internet connection.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Champnet — Sun, 20 Jul 2025 07:11:42 GMT

It's all too common these days to hear of IT Depts deal with remote IT problems by saying "It's not our problem".

If an employee cannot do their work because of IT issues then it is the IT Dept's problem. If a fix cannot be found then an alternative solution must be provided. If a Company allows remote workers to connect any old, unknown, equipment to their systems then they really are asking for serious problems which could result in the Company folding. Early Sunday morning rant over...................

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Townman — Sun, 20 Jul 2025 07:31:25 GMT

@Champnet

Totally agree with that sentiment. If a company expects WFH then it should provide a full end to end solution which it owns, including the internet connection.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

stef12 — Sun, 20 Jul 2025 19:27:08 GMT

Hi,

It's an Always On VPN on my work computer.

I can't seem to find an ethernet cable at home to test whether it's the connection or WiFi, but yes, I mean the connection really.

I've got a Full Fibre connection.

The lights on my router remain blue when the VPN goes down.

I can't seem to log on to the router from my work computer, it looks like it might have a restriction on it. Please see the error message below.

I don't know if this will affect anything, but a family member works in IT and they advised me to "flush the DNS". I did this immediately after the VPN dropped, restarted my computer and then retrieved this events log.

Error

The requested URL could not be retrieved

Error: Access to the web site failed

Why you are seeing this:
The web filter could not display the requested site.

Possible reasons could be:

The web site denied you access, or the web filter received no reply from the site.
Internet connectivity issues might be preventing the website from sending or receiving traffic.

If this problem persists, please ask your administrator to:

Check access to the specific site - the HTTP error code is 504: Gateway Timeout.

Re: Work VPN occasionally dropping

Townman — Sun, 20 Jul 2025 19:31:33 GMT

Typically a device running. VPN will not be able to access LAN services. Such is part of a highly secure VPN connection.