I currently live in Bangalore and I've been having a huge problem with ACT Broadband. I was introduced to your forum by a friend of mine and might I say how glad I am to find that it isn't just me who have been apparently diddled by this ISP.
On the evening of the 11th, I spoke to an ACT subscription agent, a Mr. Sajid to enquire about the connection being advertised by them for high speed internet connections. I then decided to opt for the 15 MBps plan which I then paid for 6 months advanced payment (an amount to the tune of close to INR 6700 or so) so that I can avail of a free Wi Fi router and Installation. At the time, I was told the connection would be up and running in 7 days.
On the 13th, I received a confirmation e-mail from them thanking me for my cheque which they encashed promptly. On the same day, I was visited by two representatives of their company, a Mr. Vinod and a linesman who had come to perform the installation. In the process of doing so, I discovered that they had planned to take the connection from a "Distribution Point (DP)" which was located on private property, the owners of which had gone on vacation and wouldn't be back until Friday. This Mr. Vinod then promptly responded that they would return the next day between 2:30 P.M. to 3:00 P.M. to attempt to install the connection again. I took time off my busy schedule to be home during the given time so as not to cause inconvenience, only to be inconvenienced myself - Mr.Vinod didn't bother to call until I took the initiative at approximate 3:15 P.M. to ask if they would be coming. He claimed to have visited the house to find it still locked, and that they would not be able to know for sure until Saturday evening. We were then given no further update on the situation.
Since then, attempts to reach Mr. Vinod on his cellphone have resulted with him not answering the phone. My calls to the original subscription agent, Mr. Sajid, have led to half hearted vague responses of speaking to "the office" which again, have resulted in nothing. On top of this, I have also filed two more complaints in the past 2 days to have something done ( by phone, a call handled by Agent Rupa, second complaint was handled via e-mail, which recieved a generic response e-mail with no action taken). This morning I also got to speak to fellow named Mr. Nithin (after yelling at that Sajid fellow, he finally coughed out some info on his superior) who then promised to call back. He didn't and we had to call him back - he then promised me that this Mr. Sajid would come by at 2:30 in the afternoon and the line would be installed today itself. So, I waited and as is to be expected, 2:30 came and went - called up Mr. Sajid only to be given, once again, some vague response of something been done. He then claimed that "the owner of the house where the Distribution Point was installed had returned and was refusing to let them install more connections because he didn't want any more wires coming into his house", apparently. Such are the wise infrastructure decisions of ACT Broadband in the Ulsoor Lake area.
So now, I'm stuck waiting for these people to rub their two IQ points together, hopefully start a fire with it and somehow manage to get my installation done - thankfully I didn't cancel my existing (and equally terrible) Hathway connection because my month wasn't up yet. I find it really bizarre that an organization would choose to install their DP in the bedroom of someone's house (as opposed, to say, you know, a building with security guards and whose roof can still be accessed even if everyone in the building went to Rishikesh or were dying of dysentery in their own apartments [color=rgb(34,34,34);font-family:'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;font-size:14px;]ಠ_ಠ[/color]) and on top of that, actually expect that to not be a problem in case the people living in that house go on vacation and leave up at their mercy in case our net should go down. Hell, it actually sounds more and more like a fraudulent business practice.
In any case, I suppose nothing will be done if I complain yet again because, I will, as expected, get a generic reply from ACT telling me that they are "very sorry for my inconvenience and that they will do their best to rectify this situation". Nothing ever gets done, but they're still very sorry, apparently.
I haven't even had the modem or the line even laid down and I'm running pillar to post with their customer service - two complaints lodged in 11 days, each of which were promised to be rectified in 48 hours. I suppose this is only an omen of things to come if this is the way they run.
As a public service message, might I suggest that for the benefit of those living in your building, if you do see some unscrupulous agent stick their ACT Broadband sticker in your lift/hallways, kindly remove them - if not for restoring the beauty of the wall, but atleast to prevent people from getting conned like this. Think of it as your good deed for the day and a service to the public at large.
Sincerely,
One more "customer" who got "excellent service" from "the beshtest ISP in India".
Edit #1 (26/06/2013) : So far, no connection, no modem, no word from ACT Broadband. It has now been 15 days since we first contacted them (11th June 2013) and 13 days since they encashed the cheque (13th June 2013). This means that they are now over their own company policy of having a connection installed by more than a week, by almost a week in itself.
Since the time that this problem of mine had been first posted on here, there have been quite a few responses from ACT Broadband, but no action has been taken.
Here are the PM's I sent and received on this forum on the matter.
Also, here was the responses I received when I spoke about my experience on another forum. Once again, no action has been taken, despite all relevant information being provided. To be fair, the user ACTBroadband was created on that forum (Reddit) with the sole reason being to respond to my experience and as such, I cannot verify with full authority on whether that was a genuine representative of ACT Broadband or it was just someone messing with me. Could an admin please ask for verification in private that the person from broadband.act is actually a representative of the service? It would seem that the only thing most of us here are getting are just copy pasted responses with no actual solutions to the problem which either buys them more time or trying to impress us with their customer outreach.
Edit #2 (26/06/2013) 10 A.M. : My father placed a call with Mr. Nithin (mentioned earlier in this wall o 'text) who then told him first that a man had already come to set up everything on the terrace and everything was ready to lay down the wire. We then pointed out that our terrace has always been under lock and key and that there couldn't have possibly been any activity on our terrace owing to the fact that the sole key has always been in our possession. In the face of what was a blatant lie, he said there must've been some mistake in communication from his field staff and then promised to send one of them, a Mr. Ashok to hook our connection up.
We then called Mr. Ashok a fair few times, the first couple of times ended with him not picking up his phone. When he finally did, however, he was quite vague when asked to give a firm answer on when we should expect him. His answer was "Sir, I will come at 9-10-11 o'clock, sir" My father, annoyed at his vagueness, responded irritably "So, we shall have you hear by 12-1-2 o'clock, then?" The silence at the other end of the line confirmed that Mr. Ashok was a bit peeved.
Edit #3 (26/06/2013) 12 P.M. : We have been graced by the presence of a celebrity - The Nodal officer, Mr. Kiran Kumar, placed a call to my father round close to noon today and wanted to find out the full details of what exactly transpired uptil now. My father, at this point being quite thoroughly ticked off at the proceedings, proceeded to give him a piece of his mind of what his experience was thus far. He then asked for some time with which to resolve the situation. Almost immediately after this, a linesman (A chap named Vijay) showed up and asked me where he could install the DP box and so forth. As I write this now, he is in the process of setting it up.
Mr. Kiran Kumar, if you happen to be reading this right now, I do apologize for my fathers irritability - as a diabetic and person suffering from hypertension, he does not suffer stress and aggravation well and constant vague responses from people who were quick to collect the money from us at the time of signing up for the service only served to get on his nerves. I would also like to thank you for expediting the matter thus far. If your juniors were as efficient at their work as you seem to be, ACT would really be going places.
And now, I shall wait to see the activation of the service and the quality of it thereafter.
Edit #4 (26/06/2013) 1:30 P.M. : Vijay has finished installing the line. He has informed me that another technician will be coming in an hours time to finalize the setting up of the router and the activation of the connection.
Edit #5 (26/06/2013) 2:30 P.M. : As Vijay had mentioned before leaving, two technicians (Ashok and a person whose name I couldn't quite catch, I think it was Muniz) came by with the modem. They had everything hooked up within a few minutes (after visiting the terrace to do something with the DU for about 15 or so minutes) and all was well with the world. After the technicians left (collected my dad's signature after verifying the speed for him via Speedtest.net), my dad again recieved a phone call from Mr. Kiran Kumar (The Nodal Officer) who wanted to make sure everything was taken care of.
So thank you, Mr. Kiran Kumar, for intervening in the matter and preventing this issue from dragging on for a few more weeks. I had made a few suggestions to you regarding your presence here on this forum - I sincerely hope you will take them into consideration in future.
For the record, it has taken us a total of 15 days to have our connection set up from initial contact to final installation and verification. Perhaps in future, this time can be amended for future subscribers of the service.
On the evening of the 11th, I spoke to an ACT subscription agent, a Mr. Sajid to enquire about the connection being advertised by them for high speed internet connections. I then decided to opt for the 15 MBps plan which I then paid for 6 months advanced payment (an amount to the tune of close to INR 6700 or so) so that I can avail of a free Wi Fi router and Installation. At the time, I was told the connection would be up and running in 7 days.
On the 13th, I received a confirmation e-mail from them thanking me for my cheque which they encashed promptly. On the same day, I was visited by two representatives of their company, a Mr. Vinod and a linesman who had come to perform the installation. In the process of doing so, I discovered that they had planned to take the connection from a "Distribution Point (DP)" which was located on private property, the owners of which had gone on vacation and wouldn't be back until Friday. This Mr. Vinod then promptly responded that they would return the next day between 2:30 P.M. to 3:00 P.M. to attempt to install the connection again. I took time off my busy schedule to be home during the given time so as not to cause inconvenience, only to be inconvenienced myself - Mr.Vinod didn't bother to call until I took the initiative at approximate 3:15 P.M. to ask if they would be coming. He claimed to have visited the house to find it still locked, and that they would not be able to know for sure until Saturday evening. We were then given no further update on the situation.
Since then, attempts to reach Mr. Vinod on his cellphone have resulted with him not answering the phone. My calls to the original subscription agent, Mr. Sajid, have led to half hearted vague responses of speaking to "the office" which again, have resulted in nothing. On top of this, I have also filed two more complaints in the past 2 days to have something done ( by phone, a call handled by Agent Rupa, second complaint was handled via e-mail, which recieved a generic response e-mail with no action taken). This morning I also got to speak to fellow named Mr. Nithin (after yelling at that Sajid fellow, he finally coughed out some info on his superior) who then promised to call back. He didn't and we had to call him back - he then promised me that this Mr. Sajid would come by at 2:30 in the afternoon and the line would be installed today itself. So, I waited and as is to be expected, 2:30 came and went - called up Mr. Sajid only to be given, once again, some vague response of something been done. He then claimed that "the owner of the house where the Distribution Point was installed had returned and was refusing to let them install more connections because he didn't want any more wires coming into his house", apparently. Such are the wise infrastructure decisions of ACT Broadband in the Ulsoor Lake area.
So now, I'm stuck waiting for these people to rub their two IQ points together, hopefully start a fire with it and somehow manage to get my installation done - thankfully I didn't cancel my existing (and equally terrible) Hathway connection because my month wasn't up yet. I find it really bizarre that an organization would choose to install their DP in the bedroom of someone's house (as opposed, to say, you know, a building with security guards and whose roof can still be accessed even if everyone in the building went to Rishikesh or were dying of dysentery in their own apartments [color=rgb(34,34,34);font-family:'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;font-size:14px;]ಠ_ಠ[/color]) and on top of that, actually expect that to not be a problem in case the people living in that house go on vacation and leave up at their mercy in case our net should go down. Hell, it actually sounds more and more like a fraudulent business practice.
In any case, I suppose nothing will be done if I complain yet again because, I will, as expected, get a generic reply from ACT telling me that they are "very sorry for my inconvenience and that they will do their best to rectify this situation". Nothing ever gets done, but they're still very sorry, apparently.
I haven't even had the modem or the line even laid down and I'm running pillar to post with their customer service - two complaints lodged in 11 days, each of which were promised to be rectified in 48 hours. I suppose this is only an omen of things to come if this is the way they run.
As a public service message, might I suggest that for the benefit of those living in your building, if you do see some unscrupulous agent stick their ACT Broadband sticker in your lift/hallways, kindly remove them - if not for restoring the beauty of the wall, but atleast to prevent people from getting conned like this. Think of it as your good deed for the day and a service to the public at large.
Sincerely,
One more "customer" who got "excellent service" from "the beshtest ISP in India".
Edit #1 (26/06/2013) : So far, no connection, no modem, no word from ACT Broadband. It has now been 15 days since we first contacted them (11th June 2013) and 13 days since they encashed the cheque (13th June 2013). This means that they are now over their own company policy of having a connection installed by more than a week, by almost a week in itself.
Since the time that this problem of mine had been first posted on here, there have been quite a few responses from ACT Broadband, but no action has been taken.
Here are the PM's I sent and received on this forum on the matter.
Also, here was the responses I received when I spoke about my experience on another forum. Once again, no action has been taken, despite all relevant information being provided. To be fair, the user ACTBroadband was created on that forum (Reddit) with the sole reason being to respond to my experience and as such, I cannot verify with full authority on whether that was a genuine representative of ACT Broadband or it was just someone messing with me. Could an admin please ask for verification in private that the person from broadband.act is actually a representative of the service? It would seem that the only thing most of us here are getting are just copy pasted responses with no actual solutions to the problem which either buys them more time or trying to impress us with their customer outreach.
Edit #2 (26/06/2013) 10 A.M. : My father placed a call with Mr. Nithin (mentioned earlier in this wall o 'text) who then told him first that a man had already come to set up everything on the terrace and everything was ready to lay down the wire. We then pointed out that our terrace has always been under lock and key and that there couldn't have possibly been any activity on our terrace owing to the fact that the sole key has always been in our possession. In the face of what was a blatant lie, he said there must've been some mistake in communication from his field staff and then promised to send one of them, a Mr. Ashok to hook our connection up.
We then called Mr. Ashok a fair few times, the first couple of times ended with him not picking up his phone. When he finally did, however, he was quite vague when asked to give a firm answer on when we should expect him. His answer was "Sir, I will come at 9-10-11 o'clock, sir" My father, annoyed at his vagueness, responded irritably "So, we shall have you hear by 12-1-2 o'clock, then?" The silence at the other end of the line confirmed that Mr. Ashok was a bit peeved.
Edit #3 (26/06/2013) 12 P.M. : We have been graced by the presence of a celebrity - The Nodal officer, Mr. Kiran Kumar, placed a call to my father round close to noon today and wanted to find out the full details of what exactly transpired uptil now. My father, at this point being quite thoroughly ticked off at the proceedings, proceeded to give him a piece of his mind of what his experience was thus far. He then asked for some time with which to resolve the situation. Almost immediately after this, a linesman (A chap named Vijay) showed up and asked me where he could install the DP box and so forth. As I write this now, he is in the process of setting it up.
Mr. Kiran Kumar, if you happen to be reading this right now, I do apologize for my fathers irritability - as a diabetic and person suffering from hypertension, he does not suffer stress and aggravation well and constant vague responses from people who were quick to collect the money from us at the time of signing up for the service only served to get on his nerves. I would also like to thank you for expediting the matter thus far. If your juniors were as efficient at their work as you seem to be, ACT would really be going places.
And now, I shall wait to see the activation of the service and the quality of it thereafter.
Edit #4 (26/06/2013) 1:30 P.M. : Vijay has finished installing the line. He has informed me that another technician will be coming in an hours time to finalize the setting up of the router and the activation of the connection.
Edit #5 (26/06/2013) 2:30 P.M. : As Vijay had mentioned before leaving, two technicians (Ashok and a person whose name I couldn't quite catch, I think it was Muniz) came by with the modem. They had everything hooked up within a few minutes (after visiting the terrace to do something with the DU for about 15 or so minutes) and all was well with the world. After the technicians left (collected my dad's signature after verifying the speed for him via Speedtest.net), my dad again recieved a phone call from Mr. Kiran Kumar (The Nodal Officer) who wanted to make sure everything was taken care of.
So thank you, Mr. Kiran Kumar, for intervening in the matter and preventing this issue from dragging on for a few more weeks. I had made a few suggestions to you regarding your presence here on this forum - I sincerely hope you will take them into consideration in future.
For the record, it has taken us a total of 15 days to have our connection set up from initial contact to final installation and verification. Perhaps in future, this time can be amended for future subscribers of the service.
