topic Re: Chat service availability in Plusnet Feedback

Chat service availability [Discussion - Locked]

EnglishMohican — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 21:22:14 GMT

Well done the SU. Brownie points allocated:)

What I do not understand is how the situation could happen. In the past, Plusnet have refused point blank to rapidly make minor typographical corrections to a clearly wrong web page because "the release schedule is rigidly controlled to allow full and proper testing of every change made". How do they make a major change (introducing chat!) without testing that the routes to access it work?

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav): Changed thread title slightly after split.

Re: Chat service availability

jelv — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 19:11:07 GMT

Was this issue identified solely by the SU group?

Re: Chat service availability

rongtw — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 22:23:03 GMT

Plusnet have a resolution to this planned for release later in the year. ?

they had a planned new billing system 8 years ago ! we still waiting

Re: Chat service availability

Townman — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 22:40:19 GMT

@EnglishMohican wrote:

How do they make a major change (introducing chat!) without testing that the routes to access it work?

There is a difference between routes not working and routes not being open ... which is where I'd prefer to leave the explanation!! What seems to have transpired is that someone forgot that one route to chat was closed when the statement that "unavailable" should not be a status seen by residential users.

Frankly from a personal perspective I am gob-smacked to learn that the route to the service dictates service availability. For the moment, the apparent service availability issue has been clarified and resolutions are in the pipe-line, which as you've indicated ... need to got through the full release process ... no matter how trivial anyone change might appear to be. In the meantime, Chat is accessible via "Contact Us".

Re: Chat service availability

Townman — Mon, 29 Jan 2018 22:52:18 GMT

Hi @jelv,

"identified solely by the SU group..." is I think difficult to answer with complete confidence.

Somewhere along the line, one of us reviewing the issues, confirmed that the "Unavailable" status was being seen by residential users. Only out of the SUs kicking the issue around, did it become apparent that users saw a different status for the service at the same time ... eventually identified to be depending on the access route. I had already exposed the same in respect of business and residential user experiences.

If Plusnet say "it works like this" and users say "it actually works like that" then the SUs have been pretty active in seeking to dig deeper and better profile the issues, rather than accept a "what issue?" status. The "residential users should never see UNAVAILABLE" claim has been roundly challenged a couple of times and some odd ball conditions were 'exposed' - for example, for a while, I personally could not access the chat service at all.

The "this needs to be looked at again" position is driving change, albeit in in small steps at a time.

I ask forum members to please not divert this topic in to matters not related to the topic title - that is Chat's availability status being apparently inconsistent.

Re: Chat service availability

jelv — Tue, 30 Jan 2018 08:16:43 GMT

@Townman

Thanks - you've pretty much confirmed what I suspected. Plusnet not taking complaints seriously enough and blaming things like pop up and advert blockers and not allocating someone to follow through and get to the bottom of what was happening - instead the SUs do what they should have done. Well done to the SUs.

At least visitors to the forums experiencing the issue will be quickly told to go to https://www.plus.net/home-broadband/contact/residential/customer-services/ and initiate chat from there - but no help to users that don't use the forums!

Re: Chat service availability

Townman — Tue, 30 Jan 2018 09:52:52 GMT

For the avoidance of doubt, advert and pop up blockers have / do contribute to the problem.

Re: Chat service availability

shutter — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 14:20:42 GMT

For the avoidance of confusion.... how about identifying the "evil" popups , and adblockers... and a way to de-activate them, for the less computer savvy customers.

It`s all very well for you lot, who know about these things, and how to deal with them, and give out a statement as @Townman has done, but that does not help those without the knowledge, who are frustrated in the situation of not being able to access "live chat".. because of these ad blockers/popups... whatever.

The statement, is as much use as a bus route, that has been discontinued, but the bus stops remain in place...

Re: Chat service availability

Townman — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 19:13:15 GMT

This is under discussion, however there are many resources out there already. Anything provided here needs to be explicitly relevant to this problem, such as a list of resources to whitelist. Your request had not been ignored, but until I have been waiting for a response before replying here - or there!

Re: Chat service availability

shutter — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 20:04:22 GMT

@Townman Thank you for the cryptic response... which is not really the kind of answer one would expect.

Using the bus service and bus stop situation as an analogy... Your response..

wrote:

there are many resources out there already.

is a bit like saying.... wait at the bus stop until a taxi comes along. or someone offers you a lift...

in other words... no help whatsoever. to point to "other resources out there"... unless you give pointers to what those resources are, and how to access them.

Sorry if you think I am being "picky" about this....but perhaps you ( the SU group ) should be more careful in the wording of responses.

I appreciate the fact that you say

wrote:

This is under discussion,..................... Your request had not been ignored,

Maybe that would have been enough, with a possible suggestion that a more useful response would be forthcoming next week..

Re: Chat service availability

pjmarsh — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 20:24:39 GMT

@shutter, from my understanding of it, before anyone could give you a pointer to that, they'd need to know what ad blocker, which browser and which version of both of those.

Re: Chat service availability

shutter — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 20:34:12 GMT

@pjmarsh From what I can recall, when I had the problem, of not being able to connect to Live Chat, due to the adblocker, nobody asked me those questions, but suggested that Ghostery may be holding a couple, namely Google Adsense, and Live Person.... which, after doing some "fiddling about".. I managed to disable, and subsequently have been able to access Live Chat..

Now. if you think about it... there can`t be "that" many adblockers, available... and I am sure it would not be difficult to list them, and also for the necessary techy guys to suggest which other apps MAY be blocking access to Live Chat.. as a guide to the non techy users, so that they can check and adjust their own and disable them accordingly.

I don`t think the browser has anything to do with the blocking... apart from hosting the adblocker app itself, as I have used several different browsers since finding this info, and each one has worked the same.

Re: Chat service availability

pjmarsh — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 20:47:05 GMT

@shutter, from a quick google, I've just counted 10 different ad blockers and Ghostery wasn't one of them. I think I could have probably found quite a few more as well if I'd have wanted to.

Please note, I'm not saying that Plusnet can't or shouldn't do something around this. This is merely about your response that Townman should have given you a possible suggestion as a more helpful response. My point is that with a bit more info someone could give you more details about how to with your particular setup. Re-reading your post though I may have misunderstood your suggestion anyway, so sorry for that if I did.

Re: Chat service availability

shutter — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 20:54:49 GMT

I think the point I am trying to make is ... that not everyone knows what an adblocker is, ( which is a "generic" term for a type of application)... whereas, if you listed those 10 (specific named varieties). you have found, and the "usual suspects" of the one`s that are causing the trouble, with a mention to "disable the following" I think that would be better information to the non geeky/non techy ( I know how to switch my laptop on and get emails and search on google for ebay items ). type of users. rather than " there are resources out there".. type of responses.

The 10 specific named varieties would probably be the most popular, and easily recognisable to many users.

Re: Chat service availability

Townman — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 22:29:27 GMT

As I feared this topic has been hijacked with meaningless analogies. It has been pointed out that blockers pose a problem. If they get in the way and you don’t know how to configure them correctly ... then don’t use them.

There are dozens of things in use out there which interfer with the normal functionality of many things, not just Plusnet chat. Plusnet have been asked about what advice might be offered ... without creating the burden of reproducing all that is already in the public domain and then having to maintain it.

Re: Chat service availability

Mav — Wed, 07 Feb 2018 01:29:08 GMT

Just to add to the discussion; I was recently having some problems with various websites informing me that some items could not be viewed due to an adblocker within Firefox (56). I could find no trace of any such app and I knew that I had never installed one. After a fair bit of digging it turned out to be a new option within Windscribe (VPN) that was automatically turned on.

As there are many adblockers out there from many sources it would be a difficult job to cover them all. Does it take that much to search on Google for further help and advice?

Re: Chat service availability

shutter — Wed, 07 Feb 2018 15:56:07 GMT

@Mav wrote:

As there are many adblockers out there from many sources it would be a difficult job to cover them all. Does it take that much to search on Google for further help and advice?

Yes, there are many adblockers "out there"... and I am not suggesting that an exahustive list of them should be promulgated, with step by step instructions on how to deal with each one... what I am trying to suggest is that when any information is put on the Live Chat access pages, about adblockers,... then perhaps a link to another "plusnet help page" would be a good idea, to give the less computer savvy a place to try and make a start on solving the problem themselves.

@Townman Sorry if you think I have hijacked this thread, "with meaningless analogies"....

If you did not want to have people airing their views, and (hopefully) adding something to the discussion of how to solve the problem of Live Chat being unavailable to less computer savvy people than yourself,, you should have asked the mods to make it a locked sticky.

YOU may think the analogies I have used were meaningless, because you have superior knowledge of how adblockers work, as does @Mav by what he has said. ( quoted above)..

in response to that... YES, it does take "that much" to search on google, when you are frustrated by the inadequacies of the live chat "help" saying nothing about what to search for, nor how to effect a solution. your primary concern is to contact PlusNet through the Live Chat, because you want an answer to some query...

@Townman states....

Plusnet have been asked about what advice might be offered ... without creating the burden of reproducing all that is already in the public domain and then having to maintain it.

My postings are trying to suggest things that could be discussed by the SU group, reagrding "..... what advice might be offered .... " and to how that "advice" can be disseminated to the less fortunate (than yourselves) rather than a useless statement saying "try later" and my analogies are put into the postings to point out the failings of the wording of the information so far given by yourself as in this statement of the obvious ( to you .....but not everyone else... ) " advert and pop up blockers have / do contribute to the problem." and "there are many resources out there already"

As previously mentioned... a short list of the more popular adblockers could be given, and what to look for in those adblockers, would be much more use than "go and google it ".....

Re: Chat service availability

jelv — Thu, 08 Feb 2018 15:54:20 GMT

wrote:

I think the point I am trying to make is ... that not everyone knows what an adblocker is, ( which is a "generic" term for a type of application)...

If they don't know what an ad-blocker is why would it be on their PC? If they installed it themselves they should know what it is, if they don't know what it is it's their own stupid fault for installing software they don't understand. If someone else installed it for them they should get support from whoever installed it.

Plusnet flagging up that ad-blockers can cause issues is totally sufficient by pointing them in the direction that needs investigation!

Re: Chat service availability

shutter — Fri, 09 Feb 2018 21:08:56 GMT

@Townman

@jelv wrote:

Plusnet flagging up that ad-blockers can cause issues is totally sufficient by pointing them in the direction that needs investigation!

Actually, your comments are not completely correct ... as previously mentioned, I installed Ghostrey as a tracking blocker... . so , i did not know, ( at that time ) that it WAS/IS an adblocker...

Regarding your statement quoted above,... again, not entirely correct...

New install of firefox... no addons... but it shows this pic...

If I go to "Help".. it says "Restart with all ADDONS disabled"... and then "Restart in safe mode"... Live Chat works.

On the reverse of that... I added some addons... ( see pic )

Tried again, . got the first pic again...

The advice given is to disable all addons, and then activate them one by one, until the problem is identified

so followed that, and then "disabled" them from the Tools > Addons and again, get the result that is shown in the first pic.

It would seem to me... a non-geeky computer nerd,.... that there is something else that is blocking Live Chat... rather than the addons...

I have been using Firefox for the last 8 years, at least..and apart from a previous occasion,( already described in a very old thread - where Ghostery and Google Tag Manager, and Live Person were found to be the culprits ) have had no problems using Live Chat.with all my addons,( including Ghostery suitably adjusted. )

Re: Chat service availability

jelv — Fri, 09 Feb 2018 21:33:39 GMT

OK - the statement needs to be amended to not just say "ad-blockers" but "ad or tracking blockers".

Job done!