Jan 12, 2012 06:11 PM
18738 Views
(Updated Jan 13, 2012 07:17 PM)
Get speed get time - that's precisely what they advertise, but surprisingly it isn't true.
So I got this connection on my wife's name, who works in a large Indian MNC and Tata photon guys had opened up a kiosk over there, with good discount package on the monthly rental. We just moved in from Hyderabad and required a BROADBAND connection, so picked it. The rental plan offered was customtakeoutised for the Company, to get more customtakeouters. The plan is upto 5 gb @ 5 mbps and thereafter 256 kbps, unlimited usage' with a discount of Re 200 on a monthly rental of Re 950. Sounds cool to you, yes it did sound cool to me atleast for the first 6 months.
Connection Reliability - This is the major benifit you will get on this product. The connection did not'flop' for even once in all these 11 months. I've not used other wireless broadband connections so cant compare. It always connects in full capacity(read all bars) and and one go.
Speed - As mentioned for the first 6 months this was good and I didn't bother to test the speed as well. I certainly dont expect a 5 mbps connection to deliver @ 100% efficiency, however anything around 1 mbps is more than enough for me. I sit for 3-4hrs on internet(daily) and download a lot, so higher speed actually translates into time for me. As expected, since these are corporate packages, the vendors(in this case Tata Photon) tend overcommit and lure the customtakeouters with thier offerings, which are typchandru021y short term and after the discount period is over it translates into a nightmare for the customtakeouter. Since three months I have been getting a speed of 100-300 kbps during the full speed usage time(less than 5gb @ 5 mbps) and after that 12-21 kbps once the 5 gb quota is over. YES you heard it right a broadband connection @ 12-21 kbps. I guess the worst gprs connections gives better speeds than this one. I can understand that the speed can vary depending on the time of the day, but hey.I use internet only after 12 midnight.is that the time when everyone logs in? Certainly not. Also it seems the daily consumption is bumpped up(you can check on their portal) by a slight margin and you exhaust the high speed limit of 5gb @ 5 mbps in just weeks. There is no detailed break-up available so you really cant claim anything. The situation is such pathetic that even the speed test site does not open most of the time. Tatas dont even have sufficient servers and collaborate with other vendors for IP services.
So in short I have to keep my downloads on auto run and shut off the computer once they are done. Normally for a 150 mb download it takes a short sleep of mine and electricity for that period. BTW these days rate of electricity is fairly high once you cross 70 units (7000w usage, cumulative). So that can be added to the pain of a slow internet.
Service & Support - This is the best part.
A networking technical helpdesk guy is not aware that kbps stands for kilo byte per second and not kbps per minute:-).
All the customtakeouter care executives know how to say'I'm really sorry for the inconvenience caused to you, Sir' but stammer when you ask a'off the track' question. "I'm so sorry Sir, I will forward your query to my Senior".
You can raise a complaint ticket but will never be able to figure out what is the status on it. There is no other contact point other than technical / general help desk. And strangely these two contact points do have information once the tickets are raised and passed on to other departments.
I had raised a complaint ticket on 21st Dec and till date I have made 8 calls to their help desk, just to get a different timeline to sort out the issue.
It is not uncommon that most Indian brands(Tata, Reliance, Bajaj, Mahindra) commit too much to sell their products and at times deliver for a period of time, but beyond that they intentionally deteriorate their service to make money out of it. Later, I will attach screen shots of speed tests done at different time of a day for reference.
