Bloody Telstra! (And the same goes for our Federal Opposition.)

Our wireless modem connection suddenly and without warning cuts out late on 4th January. I phone Technical Support. The technician can’t solve it and says he will alert the senior technicians and it will take ‘two days maximum’ to fix the problem. A senior technician phones me next day and says they are still investigating and please keep the phone lines open so they can let me know the outcome. On the 8th (three days later) I have still heard nothing, so I phone to see what’s happening. I’m told it is still under investigation and they have to send technicians to the region; five days maximum and please keep the lines open. I phone back on the 14th, i.e. six days later. Then I am told that the problem was resolved on the 8th; they found that it was not a fault in the network so I must have a faulty modem. Nice of them to let me know! The guy I’m talking to does some checks and finds that my modem is indeed faulty. They will replace it within three business days, i.e. by the 19th. Had we been informed on the 8th, we could have had the new modem by now.

I’m annoyed that, in a time of disastrous flooding nearby, when family and friends interstate and overseas wanted reassurance of our safety, we were left off the internet longer than necessary and asked to keep phone lines clear (so when people did phone, we were short with them).

Furthermore, this is the second faulty modem we’ve had within 12 months. What sort of crap are they supplying?

Unfortunately we are locked into a contract for another 12 months and it would cost too much to get out of it now. I was under the impression we had a very limited choice of servers here as we can’t get ADSL and must opt for wireless/ Telstra offered the best deal of those I investigated. This best is not very good in practice — the signal strength is so weak that our connection is sometimes as slow as dial-up. I have since learnt the choice is not so limited as I’d thought, but I won’t be able to take advantage of that for some time yet.

Of course, I wouldn’t have been in this pickle if we had cable. Will the Opposition PLEASE get out of the way and stop obstructing the roll-out of the National Broadband Network to rural areas?!