topic Plusnet tech support procedures in Plusnet Feedback

Plusnet tech support procedures

JJmcneil — Thu, 26 Mar 2020 17:05:20 GMT

Hey guys

After the last few months and multiple phone calls its fairly clear to me that the tech support procedures are somewhat lacking within plusnet.

im not here to complain about the service recieved (which has been fairly sub par) but i would like to suggest perhaps additional procedures for when the current ones fail.

The backdrop - i have been having multiple disconnection issues over more than 3 months (that i have noticed) - speeds are good when working. but would frequently have 5 or 6 or more network disconnections in a day (yesterday it was 15 or so) then periods of it working as it should. i would call plusnet tech support and be on an endless loop of a ticket being opened, no line faults found (with their tests) and no further action. still having the issue - call again - no fault found - me getting aggrivated. ask for an engineer to come out, they do, find a fault and fix it. - issue persists - call again - no fault found again - ask for another engineer.

i was told there wasnt a fault many, many times and there wasnt a way for them to request an engineer without me accepting the liability for the engineers fee. - this really isnt acceptable as there was clearly a fault. this showed in the connection logs. it appaeared to me that there isnt a way for a plusnet employee to get any further with my issue without potentially being subject to a bit of grief from whomever above them.

I have just had the second of 2 engineers this week alone to diagnose and hopefully sort the issue. after me mentioning the 1970's era cable from the pole to my house and the state of corrosion on parts of it, it was all finally replaced, and the engineer showed me the multiple areas of corrosion, bare cable, actually split cable. he was supprised it was working at all. I told at least 3 different plusnet employee's about the state of the cable leading to my house. - and there doesnt seem to be a way for them to relay this information.

i understand that the infrastructure is openreach's responsibility. and if the first enginner came did the job correctly it would not have gone this far.

once again, this isnt a complaint against any employee i have spoken too, they have all been mostly ok. but its very apparent that the scripts they follow only cover basic issues - This is me mearly pointing out that these procedures do not cover all the issues that may be faced by some customers. and perhaps additional ones should be added to cover issues like mine, when the normal ones fail. For instance if an issues continues after an openreach engineer has already attended.

its been a long 3 months. and very irritating. im happy to explain further, or if im not clear at any point let me know.

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

Townman — Fri, 27 Mar 2020 09:56:05 GMT

Hi,

A warm welcome to the forum. You post illustrates well the difficulty in diagnosing a marginal line which is not a total failure.

The line condition you describe would be very susceptible to variable behaviour as weather varies. The state of the cable you described could even right itself (for a short period) by the act of testing it. Similar and inbound call could clear the fault. Circuit test signals and ring current applied to the line can dry out iffy joints. Consequently on testing no fault is found.

Under SOP an ISP can only call out an engineer if the test systems identify a fault from the exchange test head. Therein lays one issue that some faults will only appear if tested from the user’s premises.

Whenever an engineer visit is arranged there is the warning that the user might be charged if no fault is found in BT’s infrastructure.

Even when an engineer does attend and the find and fix one fault they do not going looking for others. Though as I hint above, a cable defect might not exhibit a fault all if the time.

Hope the problem is now fully fixed for you. Did you do a quiet line test with a handset at anytime along your journey?

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

JJmcneil — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 11:50:08 GMT

@Townman wrote:

The line condition you describe would be very susceptible to variable behaviour as weather varies. The state of the cable you described could even right itself (for a short period) by the act of testing it. Similar and inbound call could clear the fault. Circuit test signals and ring current applied to the line can dry out iffy joints. Consequently on testing no fault is found.

Under SOP an ISP can only call out an engineer if the test systems identify a fault from the exchange test head. Therein lays one issue that some faults will only appear if tested from the user’s premises.

This is my point. the standard operating procedures do not cover issue faced by me. and probably by others. so they either need to be changed, or new ones put in place to cover them. hiding behind an SOP is the reason im unhappy with the service.

Whenever an engineer visit is arranged there is the warning that the user might be charged if no fault is found in BT’s infrastructure.

Even when an engineer does attend and the find and fix one fault they do not going looking for others. Though as I hint above, a cable defect might not exhibit a fault all if the time.

This is what bugs me the most. i have applied everything plusnet asked me to do. yet was still having issues. clear issues that were recorded on their system.

how can they say there is no fault, when this is happening? how is this a fault that is not exibited?

- the Openreach engineer said to me that the property should have been checked on connection of the service. and that checks should have been done every time an engineer went to look at the issue.

Yet i STILL have a connection dropping issue.

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

Townman — Mon, 30 Mar 2020 09:47:15 GMT

SOP for line faults is set by BT Openreach not Plusnet.

You've responded to most of the points I made, except the most important one - have you done (did you do) a QLT?

Broadband is not going to work well if the "phone" line is not working properly.

Please perform a quiet line test - dial 17070 select option 2 using a corded phone plugged into the test socket behind the face plate of the master socket. It should be silent. A noisy phone line (or no dial tone) will have a marked adverse impact on the performance of broadband.

If the line is noisy or there is no dial tone, then a PHONE LINE fault needs to be raised with your phone provider. If this is PlusNet, you can report a fault on line using the button below. From the Q&A list, choose the one which matches the problem, 'open' the 'section' and click the trouble-shooter link. NB: If you receive a failure message (rather than a log-in prompt) then log-in to the user portal in a different browser tab and attempt to use the trouble-shooter again.

Phone Faults

Given the faults you mentioned, one would expect a lot of audible noise on the phone line. Checking for line noise is the first line of SOP, however many users do not have telephone handsets claiming they have no use of the phone and refuse to obtain one to help diagnose the problems. Not having a handset connected also results in an inability to see if any of the faults experienced are connected to a call being placed on the line.

In certain conditions what seems like just a piece of wire can act like a complex electrical circuit of capacitors and resistors to the high frequency signals used for xDSL. Sometimes (not often) the characteristics of a circuit can look different if tested from the exchange to that tested from the premises. Similarly the effect of ring (or test) currents / voltage on a line can alter defects cause by corrosion.

I have experienced a line which tested fine from the premises but the automated exit test (from the exchange test head) still reported a fault. The BT Engineer claimed his tests were fine so the exchange test head must be faulty. Some two or three repeated visits later, a different engineer went and tested the circuit back from the exchange and found that there was indeed a fault on the line … quite close to the exchange. IIRC that ADSL line was only delivering 15Mbps just outside the exchange, where it should have been close to 24Mbps.

Network diagnosis is more art than science, for invariably for intermittent issues, they are not manifest when testing is performed, Totally broken connections are far easier to fault locate than ones which fail some of the time. Such unfortunately is a fact of life!

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

EmilyD — Tue, 31 Mar 2020 08:34:02 GMT

Hi @JJmcneil,

I'm very sorry for the inconvenience that the dropping connection fault has caused you and for the length of time that this has been ongoing. As @Townman has mentioned, diagnosing the cause of the fault can be difficult when it comes to intermittent issues but I will pass on your feedback regarding our operating procedures.

Having checked your connection today, things look to have been much more stable since the engineer visit last Thursday:

Please keep an eye on your connection. If the drops become frequent again, I would recommend that you run through a quite line test ,as per @Townman's comment, to check whether there is noise on the line. If you get back in touch on here and let us know the result of the quiet line test, we will be able to investigate this further for you.

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

Townman — Tue, 31 Mar 2020 09:00:33 GMT

@EmilyD

Thank you for the radius log plot - very helpful.

@JJmcneil

I note a very regular disconnection between 00:45 and 02:00 on most days, except last Sunday when the clocks changed. Are you aware of any electrical system in the vicinity which has an on / off event around that time? ERM from switching events can give rise to connection failures of the characteristic shown on your connection plot.

Degraded lines such as the one you have described are more susceptible to such events.

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

JJmcneil — Tue, 31 Mar 2020 17:43:11 GMT

thanks for the replies folks. i will check as soon as a phone arrives from ebay (dont even own a home phone anymore)

I note a very regular disconnection between 00:45 and 02:00 on most days, except last Sunday when the clocks changed. Are you aware of any electrical system in the vicinity which has an on / off event around that time? ERM from switching events can give rise to connection failures of the characteristic shown on your connection plot.

Degraded lines such as the one you have described are more susceptible to such events.

thanks for pointing that out. i hadnt noticed. i have a ton of radio recieving gear in a cuboard that i could maybe have a look with (no transmit and also not powered up so its not that) thanks for that point.

It does seem better. but has still dropped. im leaving it for a while to see if there is a proper improvement, as this is the faults M.O. - i shall report back if i find anything.

Re: Plusnet tech support procedures

JJmcneil — Wed, 08 Apr 2020 11:04:51 GMT

right.

im still having the same issue. after 3 1/2 months (at least). 3 engineers visits. multiple calls to plusnet support. i have done everything i have been asked to do. - im not a telecoms engineer. you guys have them.

i have added a reply to the email i recieved yesterday. im trying to stay level headed about this, but this is a massive failure from plusnet, and im not happy with the overall service i have recieved so far.

the email states that the engineer visited and the problem should be solved (more than a week after the visit) - but if anyone had looked at the line data - or the original problem i was having, they would have seen that it is NOT sorted.

I dont care that openreach look after the network. i know that. but i have no recourse with them. only with plusnet. i also dont care that its an intemittant fault. Plusnet is a telecoms company, and along with openreach (Both BT subsidiaries) should have the qualified staff and equipment to be able to handle an issue like this after many years or operating.

how many attempts does it take the average customer to sort a problem out? well, a quick google search of this forum would indicate quite a few, if the problem is similar to mine. - surely Plusnet would/could have learned from this? - it does not appear that way to me.

Disconnection issues/service level

JJmcneil — Thu, 09 Apr 2020 22:47:07 GMT

Hello guys,

I posted a reply to a technical issues i have been having, also, as part of the technical issue i posted about the level of service i have recieved from plusnet over the last few months. i posted this in this feedback section of the forum.

Original post https://community.plus.net/t5/Plusnet-Feedback/Plusnet-tech-support-procedures/m-p/1724300#M86078

I posted there as a reply to previous request, and after 48 hrs have received no reply from a plusnet staff member. - fine, i guess they cant trawl this forum day and night waiting for replies.

However, i also replied to a support ticket on my account more than 48hrs ago and have received no reply there either.

is it normal to take this long? i know that staffing is an issue at the moment, from a previous phone call to the support team. but the issue im having has dragged on since january without resolution.

Is there any specific procedures or hoops that i have to jump through in order to start a complaint?

Disconnection issues

JJmcneil — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 00:00:39 GMT

With regard to my Loooong ongoing disconnection issues, does anyone have any idea what

"PPP LCP Send termination request (user request)" is?

Every time my router disconnects the router log shows that message, then the follow up reconnection until the next disconnection.

I googled it, as im not a telecoms engineer. the only results i found on the first 4 pages of google were with regard to Plusnet and BT, and customers using the Plusnet hub one, and the BT HH5 (both identical hardware, with a different skin and cosmetic firmware tweaks)

From what i gather, the router is reqesting the line to be dropped as a certain number of echo packets have not been recieved. - i did read the entire document, but it start to go above my head at a point. most of the info and more experienced folks seem to point to a fault in the copper network possibly combined with a firmware/hardware issue with the router. - again, im not a telecoms engineer.

i kept reading some of them, and i could have sworn that i had written some of those posts, as they sounded identical to the issues im facing. along with the very same calls to help desks, engineers visits and support tickets being opened and closed, line tests showing nothing - all without resolution of the fault.

a lot of people have had this mysterious fault resolved with a new router. but was wondering if anyone else had any experience of this?

I have multiple calls to plusnet and engineers visits since january. and am currently waiting for them to replt to messages sent 2 days ago.

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

JJmcneil — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 00:01:33 GMT

My apologies, please can this be moved into Feedback, or the appropriate heading. as i misplaced it

Thanks!

John

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

dvorak — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 08:31:17 GMT

Moderators Note

Several topics from same poster merged to keep all info in one place and to help staff

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

Townman — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 08:48:27 GMT

Right now things are tough everywhere. Plusnet support is stretched with staff needing to self isolate, call centre hours have been restricted - see the banner. There you will also find that BT Openreach have restrictions on the engineering services they can provide.

As advised before intermittent issues are hard to find. There is every possibly that your particular issue might not be a line fault but one caused by external interference.

You might have a journey to follow to bottom this out ... though you’ve not yet reported in the first step of doing a quiet line test. In the past I’ve had the experience of having 18+ engineer visits over 8 months to improve a line from 2.4 Mbps to 5 Mbps ... which in the end still dropped when certain West Coast trains passed nearby.

That journey included elimination of RFI caused by a CCTV system, fixing Star wired internal extensions and multiple changes to the d-side circuit you eliminate problematic (aluminium) cable segments. Add to that the performance was better in dry weather than wet weather it was rather hard to fix.

Like it or not, all ISPs are in the dead hand of BT Openreach, who tend to go fix the symptom identified by the ISP and nothing more.

So what is the result of the QLT please?

You mention the you have a lot of radio receiving equipment - such would be useful for detecting REIN. IIRC the critical band is 600kHz

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

JJmcneil — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 10:37:24 GMT

i was told by the latest openreach engineer that the line sounded fine. so i didnt buy a phone to test it. i dont own one.

I know things are tough, tough for a large amount of people. but like i said, this has dragged on since january.

The REIN thing you mentioned, i do indeed have radio gear that would pick that up, and i have looked, at the times of the disconnection it doesnt show anything out of the ordinary, certainly no burst events, but then i havent walked down to the cabinet and tried there - i tried unpluging everything else in the house, to the great annoyance of my partner, execpt the PC that runs a web server, and its frequent disconnection that is getting me so annoyed with this. even with the faily sizeable antenna sat right next to it it doesnt show any spurious RF (the benefit of buying quality parts) - also the street lights turning on and off dont correspond with any disconnection. or visable interferance.

You might have a journey to follow to bottom this out ...

I already have had a journey. and i dont want this journey to continue any longer. i want plusnet to stop quoting me the SOP, investigate the issue, and sort it. i have said it before, im not a telecoms engineer - they are an internet service provider, with telecoms engineers. - and i also know that Openreach are responsible for the network, but i cant contact them, i MUST go through my supplier.

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

JJmcneil — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 10:37:43 GMT

Edited for duplication.

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

WillF — Sun, 12 Apr 2020 10:54:39 GMT

Hi @JJmcneil

I have attached the latest test results from our radius logs showing the past 7 days of your connection.

Bar the odd drop during the day, there does not look to be any prolonged periods of disconnection and those drops we can see have reconnected fairly quickly. For reference, we would treat an intermittent fault as having 3 or more drops within 24 hours, or 6 or more within 72 hours. As @Townman has said, finding the source of intermittent faults is extremely difficult to pinpoint, especially when we're seeing very minimal, random drops in connection as the latest testing shows.

As the latest results show it is entirely possible that we wouldn't be able to get the line anymore stable than it currently is. As I have mentioned, we are not seeing drops in a quantity which would warrant an intermittent fault at present. Therefore, If we were to investigate this further this would involve another engineer visit and given the current situation at the moment, this will lead to some delay. We are just not able to prioritise intermittent or speed faults over customers who are vulnerable or without service completely.

I understand it is frustrating to not have a concrete resolution to this, but I wanted to make our position clear on this. I will be following up on the account ticket that is currently open as well.

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

JJmcneil — Sun, 12 Apr 2020 12:51:10 GMT

Hello @WillF

I have replied via the support question. but if you look at the radius log, you'll see the 3 disconnects in one day that you now apparently need, and i indeed mentioned.

i know you guys are under pressure. but you really need to read either case history or do a proper investigation, instead of a quicky line test and declaring everything to be correct, i lost count of how many times i have heard that.

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

Townman — Sun, 12 Apr 2020 13:33:18 GMT

@JJmcneil wrote:

i was told by the latest openreach engineer that the line sounded fine. so i didnt buy a phone to test it. i dont own one.

That in itself is a real issue. At the time the engineer checked your line, it was quiet. At the time the circuit drops, it is probably not quiet. Such is the nature of intermittent disconnections. Therefore a telephone handset can be an essential diagnostic tool.

The recent radius log is far better than the previous ones. The few drops you are encountering out not to be of significant impact. I would suspect that they are of a different cause to the clusters you were experiencing.

At this juncture, detailed examination of the router stats might be helpful and if the router behaves nicely with stats plotting tools, graphing the stats can prove very useful. Which router do you have?

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

JJmcneil — Sun, 12 Apr 2020 14:16:18 GMT

@Townman

Its not the router. i have tried that and replaced it with another (something else im annoyed about - as i shouldnt have to spend my money on diagnosing a service im paying for) - non plusnet supplied/branded, with no improvement. i also cant be sat next to the phone waiting to test it at all hours just in case. in this instance i will refer to the OR engineer who tested it at the property, and has far better diagnostic equipment than I. it also reconnects almost immediately, so i doubt this test would show me any different.

The recent radius log is far better than the previous ones. The few drops you are encountering out not to be of significant impact. I would suspect that they are of a different cause to the clusters you were experiencing.

I appreciate your suggestions Townman, i do. but i run web servers - so ANY disconnection is a problem. being "far better" is still not "fixed" - it is also not far better, a slight improvement overall, maybe. - i also have to work from home like may people. and the disconnections are a problem. they are also a fault - as told to me by 4 seperate OR engineers. and they need to be corrected. something i cannot contact OR about directly. the problem is not caused by any of my equipment, i have gone to great lenghts and cost to assure that. and the entire drop line on my property to the router has been replaced also including new master socket 5c. - i would have no issue with a drop once, maybe twice a month. stuff like that happens all the time. ( the apparent norm with broadband connections - my last isp using VDSL, according to my old router log had a line uptime of 92 days at its longest and maybe 10 disconnections over 2 years. this one with Plusnet has managed 5 days at its longest. )

- i have done this for years, run small servers for years, and run small networks for years, and while i have had issues with connections in the past with other isp's at other properties, i have never had this issue. the other ISP's also responded to it in a timely manner at the outset. and most of the problems i have ever had have been sorted within 5 working days and not taken nearly 4 months. (im not counting the last few weeks due to the obvious -and please do understand, that i know the pressures that people are under at the moment, im one of them.)

Re: Disconnection issues/service level

Townman — Thu, 16 Apr 2020 08:51:05 GMT

No one suggested it is the router - router stats tell a great deal of what is happening on the line.

You want this fixed, testing shows no faults ... so it will inevitably will be down to you finding the evidence to profile the problem. As I noted before, in my case it was certain Virgin trains running past a join in the over head wires. The analysis (plots) even indicated the direction of travel. Once identified, the issue was mitigated by raising the SNRM (a stat which can be seen in the router's stats) at the expense of some speed.

The opportunities remain in your hands. If you run websites, you'll not find doing this rocket science.

A line drop has ZERO to do with which ISP you use - loss of sync is entirely down to BTOR infrastructure ... or noise in the environment.

Working from home - is this a business service?

Note if this service is so important for your work, then it should not be a residential service - not only is it not allowed under the T&Cs, residential services have a 72 hour (typical) repair time from BTOR.

https://www.plus.net/help/legal/terms/ [Plusnet Standard Terms]

2.1.3. use the services for personal use in the UK (so don't use the services to run your own business, but a couple of work emails or occasional home working are okay) and in accordance with our Acceptable Use Policy;