Sky problem - Open Reach visit

pimento

I moved from o2 to Sky on March 6 this year and from that very date my phone and broadband has been pants. It's up and down and I can watch my wifi connect and disconnect every few mins. I've also had an intermittent phone problem where I can dial out but people who call me get a ringing tone but my phone doesn't ring.

I made several calls to Sky who told me it was probably a wifi problem and to move the router from the spare room (where my o2 router worked 100% for several years) to a much more inconvenient place that happened to be where the main phone socket was and meant that nobody could get a wifi signal upstairs.

After the 4th or 5th call, I plugged my laptop into the router with a network cable and left it on for 24 hours so that Sky could see what was happening. Ten mins later, the connection dropped on my wired connection showing Sky that it wasn't a wifi problem (like I had tried to tell them all along) and they ran a line test, This showed a fault that they said would be passed to Open Reach.

Anyway, I had a call tonight from Sky saying that Open Reach couldn't find a fault at the exchange so need to come into the house to see if they can work it out BUT I can't be here when they can come so have asked my dad to let them in.

Sky were unable to tell me where in the house they would like to go and what they would be looking for, so my question is (congratulations if you've made it this far) what are they likely to want to do?

penrhyn

They will check out your master socket, if thats OK and you still have problems then they will investigate but if its your internal wiring you may be charged.
If the master socket has problems they will repalce it FOC.
If there is a line fault they will connect a TDR test set and look for the fault down the line.

pimento

Thanks penrhyn. It's very co-incidental that my broadband problems started on the very day that Sky took over from o2. None of my wiring has been touched and the only thing that has changed is that I unplugged my o2 router and plugged in the one that Sky had sent me.

I hope what they want to do isn't too invasive.

espresso

pimento wrote: »

Thanks penrhyn. It's very co-incidental that my broadband problems started on the very day that Sky took over from o2. None of my wiring has been touched and the only thing that has changed is that I unplugged my o2 router and plugged in the one that Sky had sent me.

I hope what they want to do isn't too invasive.

So unplug the Sky router and use your old O2 router again exactly as before. You may have a faulty Sky router and the O2 one will still work with Sky.

pimento

I specifically asked Sky if I could do that (on about the third call to their CS team) and was told that my o2 router would not 'speak to the Sky servers'. They said I would need a special user name and password that was hard coded into their proprietary routers and they couldn't tell me what it was as it was so secret even they didn't know what it was. Honest.

Were they telling me porky pies?

espresso

pimento wrote: »

I specifically asked Sky if I could do that (on about the third call to their CS team) and was told that my o2 router would not 'speak to the Sky servers'.

Were they telling me porky pies?

Yes, an update was rolled out to O2 routers prior to any changeover so that they would work on Sky. Not everyone was supplied with a Sky router and they still use the old O2 router. Most ISP customer support monkeys are not technical and simply read from a script.

pimento

Right then, I'll be plugging it back in tonight then. Thank you!

pimento

Thought I would update this.

The Open Reach guy was very helpful. He changed my main socket to a more modern version that doesn't require a splitter and checked my wiring. He said he couldn't find a fault so told me exactly what I should ask Sky to check for if the problem persists (test wise).

Fingers crossed I have no more problems although he did say that the router would no longer work if I put it back upstairs so I might have to find a way of moving it into the hallway.

Onwards and upwards!

penrhyn

The reason for the remark about extensions, is that they now have the broadband signal filtered out by the master socket.I guess they have fitted a VSDL interstitial plate.


I've always found the BT OR engineers helpful and polite.

pimento

The engineer said that any more problems with my broadband signal dropping pointed towards a faulty router.

If you can all bear the excitement, I'll keep you posted.