cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Why I have left Plusnet

dvorak
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 29,473
Thanks: 6,623
Fixes: 1,482
Registered: ‎11-01-2008

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

@mssystems - there is a thread on jelv's issue here https://community.plus.net/t5/Everything-else/Strange-routing-issue-unable-to-access-main-Plusnet-se... seems there was some odd activity that lead to a block and is under investigation.

nothing to do with this thread Wink
Customer / Moderator
If it helped click the thumb
If it fixed it click 'This fixed my problem'
tstaddon
Rising Star
Posts: 182
Thanks: 27
Registered: ‎01-08-2007

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

Sad to hear that jelv. I'm not on the forums often but have seen your contributions over many years.

PN would do well to read and reflect on what you've said, but also consider the feedback they're getting is constructive criticism from people who want PN to be as good as it used to be.

I came over from Metronet back in the day when you could ping its techies on MSN and I've worked in IT support roles at all levels for several decades. With every situation ranging from 1 hour "first response" SLAs on web tickets to 4 hour onsite. With point solutions for small local customers, and very complex solutions for global multinational customers.

You can make the customer service great in ANY IT services company if you have: good people with all-round knowledge, a fully traceable SLA-aware ticketing (with efficient team triage, escalation and reporting/metrics available to customers as well as to staff), CALLBACKS - customer doesn't have to chase you for updates, you should be contacting them (ideally in a personal response by phone / instant messaging but ticket updates are fine), and community engagement (with staff, customers and partners encouraged to interact e.g. through community forums).

Anyone who works in IT services and has a basic understanding of such things as ITIL should see a ticketing system and the processes around it as central to the success of it all.

The thing waving a massive red flag for me for PN's future ability to get back to being good at customer service, is the utterly bonkers claim that (any) ticketing system makes their lives difficult - if that argument is being derived from their management position, they've got the wrong management.

198kHz
Seasoned Hero
Posts: 5,730
Thanks: 2,773
Fixes: 41
Registered: ‎30-07-2008

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

Nicely summed up @tstaddon   <applause>

Murphy was an optimist
Zen FTTC 40/10 + Digital Voice   FRITZ!Box 7530
BT technician (Retired)
Eserim
Rising Star
Posts: 388
Thanks: 17
Registered: ‎01-08-2007

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

Anyone who works in IT services and has a basic understanding of such things as ITIL should see a ticketing system and the processes around it as central to the success of it all.

 

Indeed, anyone who has spent any time on a help desk will see how Plus Net's recent changes are doomed.  By lumping ALL calls into the same bucket and going via the same channel, they are just adding more work for themselves.  

 

They need to distinguish clearly between INCIDENTS - things that are stopping their customers accessing their service.  PROBLEMS - which are those things, like poor speed, email niggles, stuff that isn't broken.  And REQUESTS - Such as changes to service, domain changes.

 

Only Incidents should be directed to the live 1 on 1 call channel.  Everything else should be online.

 

At my work we've spent shed loads of time and money channel shifted our customers this way, and they've done the same for their customers - for the end customers I think the figures are up to 50% online communication, freeing the agents to deal with the urgent cases.

 

A link for Plus Net to read  - once you have grasped the concept of Failure Demand things get better, you do everything you can to stop people calling you.  A classic example was earlier this year - there was a massive outage in the early hours, that went past the time allocated for some scheduled work.  But nothing was posted to the service status to very late morning, several hours when people who checked the service status page, saw nothing, then tried to call Plus Net.  Result - loads of extra calls when they were preventable by a simple message.  Real calls for other issues got lost.

 

Not difficult - just best practice.

Townman
Superuser
Superuser
Posts: 22,922
Thanks: 9,538
Fixes: 158
Registered: ‎22-08-2007

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

@PlusnetLiam - the above has strong  echoes of the sentiments I've sought to raise recently on the other thread you responded to.  The different contact channels have their own value and should be run in parrellel to live contact.  The primary drive for improvement should be via negating the need to make live contact.

Superusers are not staff, but they do have a direct line of communication into the business in order to raise issues, concerns and feedback from the community.

MauriceC
Resting Legend
Posts: 4,085
Thanks: 929
Fixes: 17
Registered: ‎10-04-2007

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

I echo the sentiments in the last two posts. Based on experience over many years it's just common sense Crazy2

The root cause appears to be the accounting practice of reducing the COST of doing something whilst ignoring the hidden costs of doing nothing.

In many decision making processes COST and VALUE become confused leading to bad decisions!

M

Superusers are not staff, but they do have a direct line of communication into the business in order to raise issues, concerns and feedback from the community.

rongtw
Seasoned Hero
Posts: 6,973
Thanks: 1,541
Fixes: 12
Registered: ‎01-12-2010

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

i would say the present PN problems are all down to higher management poor decisions !

they have just concentrated on increase the customers numbers , at the expense of support OR lack of it Embarrassed

i believe that they have gone down so far it will take miracle to get PN back where they used to be Sad

The next 12 month will be sink or swim time  

Asus ROG Hero Vii Z97 , Intel i5 4690k ,ROG Asus Strix 1070,
samsung 850evo 250gig , WD black 2 TB . Asus Phoebus sound ,
16 gig Avexir ram 2400 , water cooling Corsair H100i gtx ,
Corsair 750HXI Psu , Phanteks Enthoo pro case .
St3
Aspiring Champion
Posts: 2,614
Thanks: 502
Fixes: 5
Registered: ‎13-07-2012

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

@jelv

How has your internet been doing with your new provider ?

jelv
Seasoned Hero
Posts: 26,785
Thanks: 971
Fixes: 10
Registered: ‎10-04-2007

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

As it should - just use it and it works. I've tried speed tests at various times and it's never anything other than full speed:

My Broadband Speed Test

Click the image for the graph.

Note that's using IPv6!

jelv (a.k.a Spoon Whittler)
   Why I have left Plusnet (warning: long post!)   
Broadband: Andrews & Arnold Home::1 (FTTC 80/20)
Line rental: Pulse 8 Home Line Rental (£14.40/month)
Mobile: iD mobile (£4/month)
chenks76
All Star
Posts: 3,274
Thanks: 338
Fixes: 12
Registered: ‎24-10-2013

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

you'll be paying quite a bit more per month though if you're on AAISP?
rongtw
Seasoned Hero
Posts: 6,973
Thanks: 1,541
Fixes: 12
Registered: ‎01-12-2010

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

@chenks76 you get what you pay for !!

Asus ROG Hero Vii Z97 , Intel i5 4690k ,ROG Asus Strix 1070,
samsung 850evo 250gig , WD black 2 TB . Asus Phoebus sound ,
16 gig Avexir ram 2400 , water cooling Corsair H100i gtx ,
Corsair 750HXI Psu , Phanteks Enthoo pro case .
jelv
Seasoned Hero
Posts: 26,785
Thanks: 971
Fixes: 10
Registered: ‎10-04-2007

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

As I've posted before I regard the extra cost as being akin to an insurance premium. I know that if I have an issue with my connection I'll first be talking to people who are experts and if it's something that needs fixing by an ISP network expert it will be done straight away. If it has to be reported to BTw or OpenReach I'll probably have the appointment arranged during the initial phone call.

I have had need to call their accounts department a couple of times because of the non-standard way I migrated across. On one occasion the person answering apologised because the phone rang three of four times before he answered as he wasn't actually sat at his desk. It's that kind of service that you pay the extra for!

Compare that with the ongoing issue I have with Plusnet:

Before Christmas I reported an issue accessing Plusnet sites located in Sheffield which turned out to be due to a block being put on my IP. Chris said he'd get the block lifted - I'm still waiting.

jelv (a.k.a Spoon Whittler)
   Why I have left Plusnet (warning: long post!)   
Broadband: Andrews & Arnold Home::1 (FTTC 80/20)
Line rental: Pulse 8 Home Line Rental (£14.40/month)
Mobile: iD mobile (£4/month)
chenks76
All Star
Posts: 3,274
Thanks: 338
Fixes: 12
Registered: ‎24-10-2013

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

just wondered how much more you are paying just to get the better service.
as i looked at their prices and they are, quite frankly, astronomical.
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

I’m going to be blunt here and say that I for one would not pay extra just to have the phone answered with an apology! However, I would pay extra to have a priority resolution service, when BTOR are involved and since no one can offer this well is the extra money really worth it. I’ve no doubt @jelv your happy with the service as provided, but the true test will be when (or if) you need services outside of their control.

When you moved I contacted A&A myself as I too gave thought to moving but as I’ve got dual lines they weren’t willing to allow me to use my own hardware, and they insisted on having two new lines installed!

I also notice at the time of writing their web site is unavailable, assuming this is the correct URL, well for me at least.

 Edit:- To add this image

A &amp; A

30FTTC06
Pro
Posts: 2,286
Thanks: 108
Fixes: 4
Registered: ‎18-02-2013

Re: Why I have left Plusnet

https://aastatus.net/2338

At least they are on it!