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Clara.net: Where's the hell site?

Clara.net are supposedly one of the better ISPs and claim to have won Business ISP of the Year type awards. Me thinks they are resting on their past achievements.

Our office uses clara.net for the 2meg broadband, web hosting, email via a SMTP feed to our exchange server, basically anything net they get it. It's got to be worth well over a grand a year to them.

Monday morning I arrived at work to find our ADSL dead. It's been tempermental for a few weeks, but I'd put that down to me having a server setting wrong.

By lunchtime Monday, I knew for certain that our modem / router thingy wouldn't connect - no lights lit, stuck on a "idle" status. The clara.net phone "do it yourself fix" aka support wanted me to rule out the modem being faulty. Hangon, we pay for an engineer install service, so if the modem has died Clara.net should be replacing it? Out I went to buy another, which as we use fixed IP addresses ruled out the el cheapo things. £60.00 lighter I have a nice Netgear thing that won't work either and that I don't really need, but can't take back since it's been opened and used

I'm on the phone again. No mention that they will pay for the modem thingy. Eventually they agree to contact BT for diagnosis.

Meanwhile everyone is screaming because there is no email, and clients are getting upset. We can't revert to dial up because SMTP feeds for email aren't set up that way, they just throw everything at you for your own server to sort out.

I'm phoning hourly Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning. Will anyone stop reading a script from a screen Will anyone tell me what's happening. The boss is climbing all over me, and can't beleive I don't have any answers.

Eventually, Tuesday lunchtime, when we phone again, we are finally told BT have said there diagnostics show there is "synchronisation" so there isn't a problem? How come we can't connect then? What are Clara going to do now? We seem to have to make all the running.

We aren't allowed to speak to BT themselves to find out what is happening, we have to go through Clara, but they are pants.

Try to get hold of my account manager - oh he left a few months ago - that'll explain why a website hosting wasn's setup properly then Would have been nice to be told of the new chap's name

Finally Tuesday afternoon, I get a call from some bod in BT. They'll send an engineer Thursday afternoon That might not be Clara's fault, that BT don't have enough staff, but it's taken a day just to get to his point. Who knows if the engineer visit will find the fault?

Eventually by Wednesday morning someone at clara did get off their backside and has set up a dial up account and converted our SMTP email into a POP account.

Time moves on to Thursday afternoon (6th April 06). No sign of an engineer.

Once again I start the round of phone calling:
Accounts manager "no idea what's happening, will makes some calls and get back to you" hour and a half later nada.

Now I call the tech support bods. "your accounts manager was going to call you, BT will be coming on Monday"

Not surprisingly I literally hit the roof. Our business is going down the pan. I'm literally having to massage the server as it just can't handle the volume of email via dial up, meanwhile the only analogue phone line (everything else is ISDN into a PABX so there is no way of conecting an ISDN modem) is effectively permanently engaged by the server so nobody can send or receive faxes. Some software we use to update website listings of available property, receive and submit electronic reports just won't work on dial up, and in any case 15 users into 1 dial up modem just won't go so anything internet is impossible.

After putting a rocket up the tech guys line manager's backside I do get called back. "It's a BT Wholesale problem. We're raising it with their engineering management. They seem to have a problem that their database shows an engineer booked for Saturday or Monday (two conflicting records so who knows if any are correct).

Effectively Clara are just giving us the brush off and blaming everyone else. It may not be there direct fault but they fail to grasp the fact that our contract is with Clara, not BT wholesale.

I keep getting told by Clara that there is no SLA because it's ADSL. In reality it's just that Clara haven't kept up to date with their products. A quick look at the BT Business Broadband site shows that for a similar monthy fee I would have a guaranteed repair in 24 hours. At this rate with Clara it's going to be at least a week!

Simple fact. Clara.net you are an absolute shambles.
 
Hi there,

I have sent you a PM with regards to your issue, if you get a moment please reply to me
 
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By way of update, clara.net were in touch this morning. They say they were berating BT Engineering to try and get someone out today. Never happened.

My fingers are crossed they'll turn up on Monday afternoon as is now promised. Still that's a whole week later and the fault has yet to be diagnosed.

I just cannot beleive that clara has such a useless contract with BT that they have no control, effectively allowing BT to do or not do whatever BT wants.
 
Just to update this, today, at long last the BT engineer arrived at our office. Took a quick look, confirmed it was dead, and went away. Half hour later I get a call from him at the exchange.
"the port is dead, I've spoken to a helpdesk they have to send someone else out to fix it. I suggest you get an update from your ISP.
By the way I can see from the notes you've had this problem since the 3rd. Thats appalling".
So even BT's own staff acknowledge this fix is taking too long.
I still don't have a connection, and don't know when I can expect one.
While Clara.net staff do seem to be phoning me occasionally, I get the impression it's because I'm on their case, rather than because they want to get off their backsides, and give their supplier a good kick.
 
Hooray, the ADSL is back up again. Looks like someone finally got their act together once the fault location was diagnosed.

Now to sort out all the stuff we haven't been able to do over the last week.
 
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