SBS - POP3 Connector - Part 2 ...

Yesterday, I mentioned that we have had issues with the Phone Company in the past, and thus consider them close to incompetent.

Keep in mind that we have been battling to get one of our client's Internet connection up and running for two straight days now.

As a result, I am just a little bit more than cranky.

It turns out that someone in their great wisdom over at the Phone Company decided to start a hardware upgrade to what is being termed ADSL 2.0 which means twice the speeds. However, no warning was made to anyone. Someone just started pulling cables and rerouting static IPs in the CO by our client.

I have seen this type of behaviour on many different occasions by this particular Phone Company.

The attitude strikes me as, "I am big enough to do whatever the chicken I want, to whomever I want whenever I want. So what if we loose some customers, there is a lot more where they came from."

It is frustrating, because what alternative do we have? We have an excellent ADSL provider who has done really well by us by the name of Nucleus. However, they are at the mercy of the Phone Company too as Nucleus' equipment ties into the Phone Company's equipment.

With Shaw, the major cable ISP here, we are hit and miss. They have picked up their poop a bit in the last year or so, but they were almost unbearable at one point.

So, here we sit, our client still without an Internet connection, our primary ISP contact trying to figure out how to get things hooked up again, and the Phone Company blithely going about their bliss.

Once things settle out, we will need to reconfigure their DNS, their RWW access, ISA, and more for a new IP as it is almost guaranteed that they have lost their original one. Again, we received no warning whatsoever! :(

Can you imagine just how much time and money our client has lost on this situation? It hasn't been cheap! Can you also imagine being without your e-mail for two straight days? At least there is Webmail access outside of this neighbourhood (the whole area is without DSL right now!).

*sigh* :*Þ

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists