Schoolsbroadband issues - filter 11

[nathan]

i have 6 schools that i were planning on migrating in October. Seriously thinking of going elsewhere now.

[nathan]

Just had an email saying filter 10 has gone down too now!

[synaesthesia]

I can't currently recommend them. They had a bad time with support a while ago which was well addressed and we'd been reasonably happy. A few niggles, we don't like the speed of Lightspeed's reporting (it'd be quicker to attach a printout of the report to a pigeon and send it from leeds to northants) but otherwise support had been generally good and reliability OK.

Last few months though things have gotten quite bad indeed, and the last couple of weeks with lightspeed issues absolutely awful. Anyone looking to sign up will be taking note of this and likely taking their business elsewhere.

 

It's certainly one reason I went for smoothwall instead of lightspeed (despite it likely being a config issue) at a non SB site I look after.

Edited May 12, 2016 by synaesthesia

[tj2419]

We have our account manager and one of the directors coming to see us to discuss the issues.

[nathan]

we are back up again

[ful56_uk]

Was told it was same issue as yesterday by there support team.

[synaesthesia]

We have our account manager and one of the directors coming to see us to discuss the issues.

 

To give them their dues, they're good at that. We as a chain had David Tindall as well as the technical manager at the time Bob Yorke etc up to discuss the problems we had originally. David was sweating profusely at the questions but sat at a table with our head of operations and 4 miffed network managers on behalf of nearly a dozen miffed schools trying to explain himself, I'm not surprised! Again though, they accepted the problems and were able to resolve them, the next meeting they were more confident in their growth, the team and their improvements. Would be a little more difficult to explain this time around for something that should never have happened in the first place.

 

I certainly don't envy them at times like these! Especially when I like the guys

Edited May 12, 2016 by synaesthesia

[Blue_Cookeh]

To give them their dues, they're good at that. We as a chain had David Tindall as well as the technical manager at the time Bob Yorke etc up to discuss the problems we had originally. David was sweating profusely at the questions but sat at a table with our head of operations and 4 miffed network managers on behalf of nearly a dozen miffed schools trying to explain himself, I'm not surprised! Again though, they accepted the problems and were able to resolve them, the next meeting they were more confident in their growth, the team and their improvements. Would be a little more difficult to explain this time around for something that should never have happened in the first place.

 

I certainly don't envy them at times like these! Especially when I like the guys

 

Don't get me wrong, they seem like a great company and great bunch of people, but when I've got people moaning at me for something out of my control they can deal with the heat too!

 

I still want to get our SIP lines through SB, but they're making it very difficult!

[clockend25]

To give them their dues, they're good at that. We as a chain had David Tindall as well as the technical manager at the time Bob Yorke etc up to discuss the problems we had originally. David was sweating profusely at the questions but sat at a table with our head of operations and 4 miffed network managers on behalf of nearly a dozen miffed schools trying to explain himself, I'm not surprised! Again though, they accepted the problems and were able to resolve them, the next meeting they were more confident in their growth, the team and their improvements. Would be a little more difficult to explain this time around for something that should never have happened in the first place.

 

I certainly don't envy them at times like these! Especially when I like the guys

 

Sounds very much like our experience when we first went with them. I think they took on a lot of business and the support side of things wasn't really there to cope with it. I also had a frustrating time after moving over to the hosted Lightspeed solution; connectivity issues which I couldn't get them to admit were a result of their new platform. After a couple of months they found and underlying issue and did the maintenance work, and it's been very good ever since both in terms of connecitivty and support.

 

We've been advised by our MAT to take another 1 year contract from SB while they sort out a trust-wide provision but I am bit worried by these continuing issues.

[Chuckster]

Beginning of the year I put out to tender for broadband companies to come in to discuss our provisions and provide a quote based on that outcome. I will admit that SchoolsBroadband did come in cheaper than the company the school is now with; however, the reason we didn't opt to go with SchoolsBroadband was due to them offering a cloud hosted solution of their firewall and content filtering system.

 

And judging by everyone's peeved off responses, I can safely say my school has had a lucky escape.

[nathan]

Beginning of the year I put out to tender for broadband companies to come in to discuss our provisions and provide a quote based on that outcome. I will admit that SchoolsBroadband did come in cheaper than the company the school is now with; however, the reason we didn't opt to go with SchoolsBroadband was due to them offering a cloud hosted solution of their firewall and content filtering system.

 

And judging by everyone's peeved off responses, I can safely say my school has had a lucky escape.

 

Not really, it's only been bad the last couple of months. Before then it was fine, they just need to sort the current issues out which it sounds like they are trying to. Of course it doesn't help us.

[SchoolsBroadband]

Hi all,

 

we are doing everything we can to sort these issues out. Please be aware the issues are we've had with filters have been out of our direct control. The issues also aren't affecting everyone and although there are a lot of complaints on here the vast majority of our customers still have had a fully functioning service for months if not years.

 

We are doing everything we possibly can to get to them bottom of this and will keep you all updated.

 

I can't thank you all enough for the patience you've showed.

 

Dave

[SchoolsBroadband]

Filter 9 at one of my schools. Down yesterday and down again today. Only been with SchoolsBroadband for just over 6 weeks. Not a good start!

 

 

Hi @fiza,

 

filter 9 has actually been fine today it was the same issue with filter 10 that we'd seen on 11 and 9 in the past.

 

We're about to go onto a conf call with the lead tech @ Lightspeed who is in Austin to further get to the bottom of things. Lightspeed too are taking this very seriously and we can't escalate any higher with them. We will get to the bottom of this.

 

Thanks

 

Dave

[fiza]

Hi @fiza,

 

filter 9 has actually been fine today it was the same issue with filter 10 that we'd seen on 11 and 9 in the past.

 

We're about to go onto a conf call with the lead tech @ Lightspeed who is in Austin to further get to the bottom of things. Lightspeed too are taking this very seriously and we can't escalate any higher with them. We will get to the bottom of this.

 

Thanks

 

Dave

 

Dave - Well something knocked out the internet and phones for about an hour this morning.

[SchoolsBroadband]

Thanks @synaesthesia,

 

unlike some of our competitors we are always upfront about things and tell the truth about the issues we have rather than try to do cover ups. Things do go wrong and in our opinion it's how you respond to them so we keep people as updated as informed as we can.

 

I and other directors will also personally be seeing affected schools to go over whats happened, why, what we've done about it and what can be done going forward. There's a lot to explain as there's been a lot of different things happening which unfortunately have compounded themselves at the same time.

 

Be rest assured I hate giving what we and our customers think is bad service. it really does tear me up inside that some of our customers are unhappy. We can't flick a switch to immediately make you happy again as that comes over time and we will do everything we can for those who have been affected to get us to gain back their trust.

 

We will get there and soon.

 

Dave

 

To give them their dues, they're good at that. We as a chain had David Tindall as well as the technical manager at the time Bob Yorke etc up to discuss the problems we had originally. David was sweating profusely at the questions but sat at a table with our head of operations and 4 miffed network managers on behalf of nearly a dozen miffed schools trying to explain himself, I'm not surprised! Again though, they accepted the problems and were able to resolve them, the next meeting they were more confident in their growth, the team and their improvements. Would be a little more difficult to explain this time around for something that should never have happened in the first place.

 

I certainly don't envy them at times like these! Especially when I like the guys

[nathan]

Dave - Well something knocked out the internet and phones for about an hour this morning.

 

We have a school on 9 that was knocked offline for the same amount of time

[fiza]

 

we keep people as updated as informed as we can.

 

 

Dave

 

I didn't receive any updates yesterday or today. As the school rely on SB for both internet and phones it makes communication with the outside world difficult. I am not based in the school so had to rely on someone at the school to ring me using their mobile. Would have been nice if I had received some notification from SB as soon as problems hit.

[nathan]

I didn't receive any updates yesterday or today. As the school rely on SB for both internet and phones it makes communication with the outside world difficult. I am not based in the school so had to rely on someone at the school to ring me using their mobile. Would have been nice if I had received some notification from SB as soon as problems hit.

 

Are you not on the portal? you can configure sms/email alerts.

 

portal.talk-straight.com

[Chuckster]

Not really, it's only been bad the last couple of months. Before then it was fine, they just need to sort the current issues out which it sounds like they are trying to. Of course it doesn't help us.

 

I forgot to mention that the school's LA supplied broadband was migrated over to the new broadband service in the Easter hols, so as you can imagine if I had chosen SchoolsBroadband I'd have been hanged, drawn and quartered by the staff and pupils by now!

[Homer3334]

Maybe we should be helping schools broadband out, we are collection of it experts afterall

 

For instance, have they tried turning filter 11 off and on again?

[whs1000]

Dave - Well something knocked out the internet and phones for about an hour this morning.

 

Do you have SIP lines with Schools Broadband or with another company as we are currently looking at moving to SIP, we have asked Schools Broadband and some other companies for prices.

[fiza]

Are you not on the portal? you can configure sms/email alerts.

 

portal.talk-straight.com

 

No I am not. I wasn't aware of it. Going to register now.

[SchoolsBroadband]

I didn't receive any updates yesterday or today. As the school rely on SB for both internet and phones it makes communication with the outside world difficult. I am not based in the school so had to rely on someone at the school to ring me using their mobile. Would have been nice if I had received some notification from SB as soon as problems hit.

 

Hi @fiza,

 

I suspect it's because your own school isn't using us yet. If you email [email protected] then she'll get you added to the notification lists.

 

Thanks

 

Dave

[nathan]

No I am not. I wasn't aware of it. Going to register now.

 

Shows you traffic usage too.

[fiza]

Do you have SIP lines with Schools Broadband or with another company as we are currently looking at moving to SIP, we have asked Schools Broadband and some other companies for prices.

 

The school have phones and broadband through SB