I have been having a lot of trouble with my internet dropping out intermittently, on and off.
Bigpond did a line check for me and said there was something wrong with the line, so arranged for a Telstra Tech to come out and investigate. He had some hi tech stuff he bought with him to check the line from inside the house, and in the process he installed two of the latest inline filters to see if they made a difference, which it didn't.
The tech spent some time with my lines hooked up to his machine and a special lap top he had for the purpose. Eventually he went to his exchange to check my line and then a street junction box where he found that a wire from another connection was touching mine causing it to short out. Fixed the connection and now all 100% ok, cost to me, nothing !!
You pay your bills Duh, its part of what you pay for.
Maybe Gerty, but a hell of a relief from a frustrating problem, a lesser tech may not have located the problem.....So again, thank you Bigpond and Telstra !
And a big thank you from me to Duh, I have been having the EXACT same problem, for just on 2 weeks now, and the line has dropped off at least 15 times, for between 10 minutes to 4 hours. and once it was off for 24 hours, we now have a direct contact with a technican at telstra, so I will relate your case to him for another opinion ?? fingers crossed ??
we have had ongoing telstra and bigpond problems for some time with our home line dropping out. Every time we report it it takes a couple of days for a technician to investigate it and everytime they find the same cause - a fault in the line outside of our boundary at a junction box (seems the technicians are repeatedly crimping lines at this particular box) and it is always our line which ends up with the problem. Like problems with the water lines, My understanding is if the fault is identified to be within our boundary it is our problem and at our cost - if it is outside of this, it is the providers problem, ie. for all and every phone cable/line, it is TELSTRA. If you have continuing problems, and lodge a complaint, people have been successful in getting discounts on their phone bill or freebee's thrown in (which may be useless or not needed). Anyway, we have never been charged for the technicians who resolved our issues with the lines - however, they are now on frequent flyer points for continuing visits!
Thanks for the feedback chaslib, the tech who came out this time said he recrimped my connection and made sure it was not in contact with the others. Funny though, my landline phone calls did not seem to be affected, apparently the wire that was touching others was only reducing the signal or something to my pc. He fitted a couple of new DSL2 line filters to my landlines first to see if that resolved the problem and rang me back to see how things were going before going to the outside box. He gave me a direct contact line in case it played up again.
A previous tech who came out put a Bigpond ADSL wireless modem (for the wireless laptop we have too) on mine and removed the DLink modem I had been using, apparently it is easier for them to track problems if you are using their equipment. It worked fine for awhile until a couple of weeks ago and then this problem started. I was not charged for the modem or the filters or anything else.
I suspect that when telephone techs are connecting new lines or doing work on these street boxes they may be accidently causing the problem with adjoining connections somehow (not being careful around them) we have a lot of new homes going up in the area. Anyway all fixed now and going well....
-- Edited by Duh on Friday 28th of June 2013 11:44:25 AM
I used to have lots of problems with noisy lines. In my case these were due to corroded copper wires in Telstra's trenches. The problem used to get a lot worse during rainy periods when water got into Telstra's cabling. My most recent problem turned out to be a battery fault at the local exchange. It was strange because my phone would ring, but I couldn't get a dialtone to ring out. If you can get access to the pins in the wall plug, there should be 52 volts between pins 2 and 6 (old style socket) when the phone is on-hook.
BTW, Labor will replace our sh*tty copper with optical fibre, if the impossible happens at the next election ...
-- Edited by dorian on Friday 28th of June 2013 11:55:00 AM
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"No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full."
we have had ongoing telstra and bigpond problems for some time with our home line dropping out. Every time we report it it takes a couple of days for a technician to investigate it and everytime they find the same cause - a fault in the line outside of our boundary at a junction box (seems the technicians are repeatedly crimping lines at this particular box) and it is always our line which ends up with the problem. Like problems with the water lines, My understanding is if the fault is identified to be within our boundary it is our problem and at our cost - if it is outside of this, it is the providers problem, ie. for all and every phone cable/line, it is TELSTRA. If you have continuing problems, and lodge a complaint, people have been successful in getting discounts on their phone bill or freebee's thrown in (which may be useless or not needed). Anyway, we have never been charged for the technicians who resolved our issues with the lines - however, they are now on frequent flyer points for continuing visits!
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The Maccas ....
2013 Avida Esperance Motorhome - based in northern NSW.
And a big thank you from me to Duh, I have been having the EXACT same problem, for just on 2 weeks now, and the line has dropped off at least 15 times, for between 10 minutes to 4 hours. and once it was off for 24 hours, we now have a direct contact with a technican at telstra, so I will relate your case to him for another opinion ?? fingers crossed ??
Hope they get it sorted Dazren, I see Chaslib has had the same problem as me and the outside connection box was the problem.
Been ok ever since.
Mine didn't stay off line for long, not the usual unplug and turn off/on again problem, just left things as they were (showing not connected) and played a game of cards or something and then it came back on again, was an intermittent fault/short at their end (box).
Hope they get it sorted although I must admit I did have my suspicions that Wombat may have been behind it!
Glad your problem has been resolved Duh - at least for this occurrence. The only good thing that comes out of this type of event is there is a hint for the technicians that get the next complaint.
cheers
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The Maccas ....
2013 Avida Esperance Motorhome - based in northern NSW.
Thanks chaslib, yes the tech recorded it all on his laptop and had details of the previous call out listed there. Hopefully neither of us will need them again in a hurry!
I'm glad you are pleased with the service Duh. But I've been thinking about it, and it seems to me that we have become so used to poor or late or incomplete service, especially from Telstra, that we are surprised when it is as good as it should be.
Two weeks ago I spent several hours on the phone to Telstra, spoke to several different people, none of them in Australia, and got differing information from each of them, found it was very difficult with the various accents and quick speech of their call-centre staff.. I negotiated a new "bundling" contract to include a new mobile phone, the phone was supposed to arrive in 3 days by post, still waiting.
Perhaps I should have said that the NBN will replace our sh*tty copper telephone network. Is that apolitical enough? FWIW, I don't give a rat's about politics or the next election. In fact I despise all politicians and all political parties, independents and minor parties included. But, whatever your political persuasion, the fact remains that our copper network is cr*p. And that's a technical fact, not a political opinion. Personally, I don't need, and would probably never need, superfast broadband. Most people probably just use it to download porn and pirated multimedia content, so the benefits would be dubious. But one thing is for sure, optical fibre is a helluva lot more reliable than copper. No more "wires from another connection touching mine causing it to short out". I've had crossed lines, too, so I can understand what Duh is talking about. In my case the crossed line was the result of a wiring error by a Telstra technician. Once again, that's something that cannot possibly happen in an optical network. From my point of view, I'm at the age where I'm fed up with stuff that's always breaking down, so if I need to pay more for peace of mind, then so be it.
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"No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full."
Perhaps I should have said that the NBN will replace our sh*tty copper telephone network. Is that apolitical enough? FWIW, I don't give a rat's about politics or the next election. In fact I despise all politicians and all political parties, independents and minor parties included. But, whatever your political persuasion, the fact remains that our copper network is cr*p. And that's a technical fact, not a political opinion. Personally, I don't need, and would probably never need, superfast broadband. Most people probably just use it to download porn and pirated multimedia content, so the benefits would be dubious. But one thing is for sure, optical fibre is a helluva lot more reliable than copper. No more "wires from another connection touching mine causing it to short out". I've had crossed lines, too, so I can understand what Duh is talking about. In my case the crossed line was the result of a wiring error by a Telstra technician. Once again, that's something that cannot possibly happen in an optical network. From my point of view, I'm at the age where I'm fed up with stuff that's always breaking down, so if I need to pay more for peace of mind, then so be it.
I prefer sex with a real woman. However, it seems that Catholic priests get more of it than I do.
That said, I agree that even with a real woman, inspirational literature can often help get things going.
Then of course there is that taboo subject which I'll simply refer to as "secret men's business". Like Dirty Harry says, sometimes a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.
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"No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full."
I'm glad you are pleased with the service Duh. But I've been thinking about it, and it seems to me that we have become so used to poor or late or incomplete service, especially from Telstra, that we are surprised when it is as good as it should be.
Two weeks ago I spent several hours on the phone to Telstra, spoke to several different people, none of them in Australia, and got differing information from each of them, found it was very difficult with the various accents and quick speech of their call-centre staff.. I negotiated a new "bundling" contract to include a new mobile phone, the phone was supposed to arrive in 3 days by post, still waiting.
More a case of relief at having the problem fixed Gerty, I was getting very frustrated and when a service paid or otherwise "delivers the goods" I believe in giving credit where credit is due, in this case I probably should have said thank you to an excellent tech instead of the companies in general. Mind you I have had some excellent service and results from the overseas helpline and it was they who did the line check and arranged for the tech to come out.
I agree totally about trying to understand the accents sometimes and also the speed of the speech of some, especially not good when you are hard of hearing, but have had some excellent help from them irrespective.