ajft

A Telstra Bigpond technician — presumably of the second level in support — telephoned to see if my problem with their billing system has been resolved. A short answer: No, since they have not yet resolved it!

Interesting in that I was told last Tuesday they would contact me in "about four to five days", with the implication that it would be fixed by then, but the first contact is in six days and that is pretty obviously just to verify that they have to start working on the problem!

Thread: last next

Always such a tedious task, but I have to find the gems amongst the dross:

“I am MR. Gray Norman, an accountant”

Gray Norman, a gray name for a profession gray by reputation... how very appropriate.

“I am a straight forward person”

The wonders of the English language... given all the sexual innuendo in the spam, is he really meaning that he is a straight, forward person, or a straight-forward person?

Oh well, back to work...

Another trip through Canberra airport, once more I'm selected for the “random” additional security checks. I think I've worked it out though, on a Sunday evening there's so little to for the security staff to do that their “random” person selector picks every third person, and anyone who stands out in the slightest gets picked on.

At least this time they were civil about the whole deal, although I am puzzled about one aspect of the whole metal-detector thing. I walked into the airport wearing shoes, socks, jeans, underpants, a belt, tee-shirt, fleece vest, fleece jacket and a hat. For some reason I have to remove the hat and it has to go through the metal detector seperately. I guess I prefer it to be my hat to my underpants…

Ho hum, on it goes...

Three weeks, one problem, four phone calls, nine emails — today I spent 45 minutes on the phone and they reproduced the problem I first reported on the 8th, then again on the 10th, and will escalate it to a higher level of support!

The woman in support that I spoke to was very helpful, she expressed complete amazement that nothing has been done in three weeks and confirmed that the unpublished "wide-spread login problems" on a Friday afternoon two weeks ago was a typical "go away and stop bothering me" answer.

Unfortunately, all I've got to show for three quarters of an hour on the phone is a sore ear, a fault escalation, and the knowledge that my Bigpond password is now written down in the fault report (I didn't know they were allowed to ask for it, don't care, if my account is misused I can show that they are using it)

I've been told I should hear from them in "about four working days". I chose not to ask how whether four working days in Telstra corresponds to four calendar days, or four calendar weeks...

Thread: last next

A weekend away from Melbourne down along the coast, there's just so much birdlife compared with in the city. I still saw the airborne rats that are the Sparrows, Starlings and Indian mynahs, but off the top of my head I can remember: Magpie (Gymnorhina tibicen), Pied Currawong (Strepera graculina), Kookaburra (Dacelo novaeguineae), Crimson Rosella, King Parrot (Alisterus scapularis), Sulfer-crested cockatoo (Cacatua galerita), Mudlark, <taxonomy genus="Chenonetta" species="jubata">Wood duck, <taxonomy genus="Anas" species="superciliosa">Black duck</taxonomy>, Dusky Moorhen, Pied cormorant, Little black cormorant, Black cormorant, <taxonomy genus="Larus" species="novaehollandiae">Silver gull</taxonomy>, Mystery grey seabird, <taxonomy genus="Larus" species="pacificus">Pacific gull</taxonomy>, White ibis, Superb blue wren, New-holland honeyeater, Brown thornbill, Black-shouldered kite, Black hawk, Nankeen kestrel, White egret

Two new books:

The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien ASIN: 0006754023 Buy at Amazon

On Mexican Time, by Tony Cohan ASIN: 1863591303 Buy at Amazon

Normal Thursday evening social events were thrown into disarray by Jo working late, we met up for a beer or several in the GB to make up for it and ponder out next move. Such a great pub, and always a variety of interesting beers on tap.

A blackboard above the bar advertised a “Black Wattle Superior Ale” and I couldn't resist trying it, even the bar staff didn't seem to know anything about it. Very tasty, I'll have to find out where it comes from and who makes it... and maybe where I can buy some more!

[2007-Aug-27] Revisited: Aha! Barons Brewing Company is the creator of this fine beverage.

A quick check of the map today and I saw that the aerial photo of home had changed — a closer inspection has me puzzled.

Up until a few weeks ago, the Google Maps and Google Earth view of Oakleigh showed our neighbours as a vacant block — not surprising, the house was bulldozed last May. There was also a huge flash of light reflecting from a parked car's windscreen, which made it very easy to find!

Today I noticed that the flash of light has gone, the photo has been updated and we've got a neighbour again... or have we? Something odd seems to be afoot since I could swear that the photo shows the old single house rather than the two new town-houses, and that all of the bulldozed garden is back.

Yep, definitely! The building sites on Warrigal road have gone away and been replaced by vacant land. I wonder what prompts Google to do this?

Customer support my ass!

Second round of the Bigpond battle. Between lunch time and now I've exchanged six emails with the Bigpond help staff and gone over the same ground — I can login to http://my.bigpond.com/, I can see my bill, but I cannot email my bill to myself. Once again the email query has reached an impasse and I have to telephone 13xxxxxx whatever and play the interactive menu games.

Once again I have to identify myself and give a full verbal description of the problem and then the technical staff tell me that it is a billing problem and that they can't help me.

Once again I'm transferred to the billing people and have to again identify myself and again describe the problem, then they tell me that its a technical problem and that they can't help me!

I explain that I've been around this loop before and it isn't fixing the problem — this time I get both a technical and a billing person on the line at the same time and once again tell them the story.

They start trying to talk me through the procedure in Mickey-mouse words for flushing the Internet Explorer cache and clearing the cookies and I explain — again — that the problem can be reproduced on any one of six different computers, over four days at two locations, three operating systems, three web-browsers, any computer of any OS or browser that I walk up to.

Then I'm told that there is a current problem with the Bigpond website that has been going on for a few days that some people can't even login and to wait a couple of days and try again... I pointed out that it would be nice if this service outage was listed on their service outages page!

I'm almost suspicious of these mystery unpublished service outages, I get the feeling that they're quite handy for fobbing off customers who have odd technical problems — especially on a Friday afternoon.

Thread: last next

Yay Telstra (again). Since their account management system is incapable of handling my work address, I have to have my bills emailed to me. Due to "security reasons" they have to be emailed to my Bigpond account and I cannot have them emailed to any other address. (Note, I can have the physical bill mailed to any address). However I can have my Bigpond email forwarded to another account, so I send it to my normal work account.

The Bigpond bill for the 1st of August didn't turn up, it might have vanished with the spam, but that's unlikely, since I review the contents of my spam folder before deleting it all.

No problem — I thought — simply log onto the http://my.bigpond.com/ website and email myself a copy of the bill. Haha, not so fast.... Every time I try I am presented with the following:

  Technical Failure

  An error has occurred while trying to provide the page you
  requested. This may be due to a problem with your browser or may be
  as a result of a current system outage. You can check for outages
  using the Service Status page. If there are no outages reported on
  the Service Status page you may be able to fix the problem by
  closing all of your browser windows and reopening them.

Over the course of four days, three computers, two operating systems and two web-browsers I've tried to email myself a copy of the bill — with the same results every time.

Two days ago I lodged a query with Bigpond support asking for it to be fixed — a query that they said would be answered within 24 hours. The 24 hours came and went and I received another email telling me that my query would take longer than 24 hours. The second 24 hours came and went and I received a second email telling me that:

  We will need to attempt to replicate this error on our test
  machines. Please contact Help Desk by phone on 133 933 (Selecting
  Option 1, Option 1, Option 1) quoting your ADSL username. Once we
  have verified the account holder, we will be able to assist you
  further and forward the issue to our Server Complex department if
  necessary. Due to security and privacy procedures, we are unable to
  assist further via email correspondence.

I called and played the voicemail games, then I got to a person. The technical assistance was uninterested in "replicating the error" and told me it was a billing problem and that they couldn't help me with and transferred me to the billing staff. The billing staff then asked for name, account and date of birth again, since they can't have these transferred with the call from the technical assistance!

The billing staff can't help me with the website not sending me emails — that's a technical problem and I'll have to contact technical support! I explained that technical support were unable to help and had transferred me to billing support and that I wanted two things; a copy of my missing bill and the my.bigpond site fixed so I can send myself other bills. The billing support staff are unable to email me a copy of my bill, apparently because I am unable to send myself one!

There is a copy of my latest bill in the post being sent to my home address, and as for fixing the website so I can email myself other bills... “Other people are able to use it so there can't be a problem with the website”.

I guess I wait for the first of September and see what happens with the next bill....

Thread: last next