Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Over the last 4 weeks now I'm having all sorts of bother with my Pipex connection, there used to be a time when I'd recommend them to everyone, however, things have changed:

1) It took them 3 weeks to respond to a problem I reported
2) When they did respond they sent a completely retarded message via email telling me to try the "suggestion they gave me earlier" .. bizarre as I hadn't spoken to them about it previously
3) I'm unable to play ANY online games without major ping spikes and horrific packet loss
4) Their support dept. isn't open at weekends
5) The queue times waiting for support in office hours is nowadays akin to waiting for someone at NTL

I'd never advise ANYONE to go with Pipex now, perhaps they're over subscribed what with all the referring people are doing, if you want a decent ISP, I'd recommend Zen, at least their staff give off an air of efficiency. I'll be migrating my connection over the them at the earliest opportunity.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

What Pipex service are you on m8 ?

I am thinking about going for the busisness service with them. If its the same support level than domestic customers (if thats what you are on) then I am not so sure !

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

What what what??? My Pipex modem arrived today and I'm awaiting the activation of my phoneline - this is not something I need to hear!

This is the first time I've heard anyone here say anything negative about them.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Their service has been going gradually downhill for months, they seem to have employed what seems like a bunch of ex NTL employee's, at least, they show the wit of some of the NTL "tech support" people I've spoken to. You might be lucky, it could just be a problem in my local exchange, however, I don't think Pipex would have the wit to even think that laterally so I've just signed up at Zen, I'll swallow the 5+ day's downtime and give Pipex their 58 quid connection fee .. good riddance I say, oh, and don't believe the 1 meg hype, it's great if you use a download manager but since I've had it, with a single thread I've never got more than 80kbps.

Joke - ignore
 

Don't know about you but I'm http://www.neises.com/forums/images/...behindsofa.gif before Neil gets here.;)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

:LOL:

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Seriously, they're sh*te, here's a copy of the email they sent me back like 10 day's later.

Yes, that helped no end! What instruction? When earlier? WTF?

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Pipex were taken over recently (last 3-6 months) I think? Or have I got that confused.? If not maybe this is an indication of the 'new management' - then again maybe not. It's hard to tell at this stage really.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

:cry: :cry: :cry: Nooooooo - I wanted my 2mb !!!

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

They were bought by uunet years back. Do you mean that, or is there some more recent wheelings 'n' dealings?

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

NO, UUNet (Worldcom now) used to own Pipex, but the now MD brought it off of them a number of years back. And now pipex have there own network, apart from the dial-up which is hosted at unnet, although all of Pipex servers (whether dial up or ADSL) are in house :) And yes, the MD sold Pipex to GXNet (something like that), and thats as much as i know about the take over company....although there suppose to be extremely big in the internet side of things :)

As for the business package, i believe they are run independently (different network etc) from each other, although i may be wrong.

As for help, i would contact them via phone rather email, because emails get lost in the massive backlog of emails from spammers etc (i know this because i used to work in tech support ;)) :( Also, remember that if its a line fault then its for BT to solve and all Pipex can do is send the fault off to BT and get them to solve it, although if you believe its a line fault then get pipex to do a line check and i believe they can now request them there and then (dont hold me to that though).
However, when you get on the phone they will get you to try taking all of your mircofilters out and just having your modem in etc and placing microfilter in one at a time etc They will also ask you to reboot your machine and modem and get you to ping a number of servers and get your to read them out etc Dont get ****ed at this, is something the tech HAVE to do so :)

Hope this helps in someway :) Although dont ask me about ADSL faults etc because i cant remember my training or any of the stuff now lol :pp

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

The original fault was logged by phone, they were supposed to call me back but never bothered their arse, the first contact I had was that email telling me to follow instructions they'd not actually supplied.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Bifta are you locked in a 12 Month contract?

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

You can buy yourself out of it for £58 I believe....

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Yep thats the one

http://www.pipex.net/news/2003/12/

I recall at the time wondering if it would have any negative effect on Pipex, that generally had an above average rep (imo). Of course this thread is no evidence of a 'change' in Pipex following the buy out. Certainly before the buy out they had unhappy customers that were less than satisfied with the service. So the buy out may have made no difference at all. Then again it might have. So in summary I saying very little excpet I remebered that Pipex had been sold in the last 6 months, which appears to be a correct memory. :)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

One bad rep of Pipex does not generally make them a bad company.

Stick with it guys and sign up.

Myself customer for 14 months on their residential 512k service and it rocks believe me.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I guess that other customers complaining about pipex must be fantasizing

you dont have to look very far for other pipex bad reps example

I have always said just because someone recomends an isp it doesnt mean that they will recieve the same level of service.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Exactly, the reason I signed up was because of someone waxing about them, wish I'd gone to Zen instead, at least I've had some personal experience with them.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

more here folks

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/22/36515.html

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

It may cost a couple of hundred in ADSL activation fee's but eventually you will find a suitable ADSL isp (i'm on the move again to patures new as my 3 month contract is coming to an end) :)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Well I'm really shocked.

My Pipex connection has been rock solid since it was activated in November.

I've only had to contact them on a couple of occaisions, & each time the person I spoke to has been a polite/friendly, & more importantly-knowledgeable person (unlike some other script reading drones ;) )

My service has been exemplary, & I cannot fault it one bit.

I must say Bifta (no offence), it does sound like you may be overreacting a little-one instance of a let down, & all of a sudden Pipex are the devil incarnate? :erm:

I appreciate what happened to you was poor, but changing ISPs seems a bit extreme IMO.

I understand about your ping issues getting worse over the recent months-that is a gamers hell, but have you actively reported these issues to Pipex & given them a chance to resolve them (they're not ntl you know ;) )

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

It's not just one occasion unfortunately, the DNS fails for me on a weekly basis, it's currently still knackered (ask KingPheonix, I was moaning about not being able to get to site's hosted with him that everyone else could reach), they did nothing about it, they messed up my 1 meg upgrade last year, I'm unable to FTP in to any site's unless I renew my IP address daily (thought it was initially my router, but having since tried a new one turns out its definately Pipex's fault), my download speed using single download threads is less than 80K a second, and that's on ANY site, every single time I phone them I end up with the office ignoramus, I don't know whether that's just bad luck but I never appreciated being on hold for 15-20 minutes to end up speaking to someone who isn't interested in helping. Pipex have a record of each of the faults I've described and I'm yet to receive any resolve for them.

They're no better than NTL, everything is great until something goes wrong, then it's a whole handling trying to get it fixed.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I've had Pipex now, about 6 or 7 monthes.. Connection's never been down once, never had any problems with it at all. Had to contact CS once, when I formatted computer and lost password, got through within a few minutes, and was off the phone happy within 5.

Agreed, you've had problems bifta.. Every company's bound to have a bad case here and there, and if it suits you to change.. So be it :)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

If it was just one bad case I wouldn't be bothered, perhaps I'm just unlucky, perhaps not.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I m sure that with Pipex, as with NTL (or any ISP for that matter), you get customers that just do not get good service. I think this is blind luck as much as any problem with the company, or user.

In my experience, Pipex in the past was very good (had loads of friends who used Pipex for dialup). However, I will say that almost everyone I knew that used Pipex is now using other ISPs. I have to admit, there could me many reasons for that, not necessarily that Pipex are bad or other ISPs are good.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Best bet Bifta is to get hold of the tech support manager at Pipex mate and tell him that you have had all these proplems and want it sorted :) He's a nice fella too and doesnt take sh*t from anyone, so he'll get it sorted mate :D

Also mate, keep an eye on their status page, its alot better than NTL's one and has lots more info about current problems etc. Infact, im curious about the DNS servers to be honest, since they hardly ever go down :( eitherway, the server room is about a meter away from the techs at the building so if any fooks up then they'll sort it ASAP.

Anyways mate, hope you get it sorted soon :)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Although I have had ( basically sound ) 600kBB from Ntl for over 2 years, I have had a Zen dial up account for over 8 years and still retain it as an ultra reliable back up. Their technical knowledge and back up via phone or e-mail is unsurpassed and very fast and efficient. Oh forgot to mention, they are a local N/West company ;) :)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Update: Pipex are still crap, over 2 weeks now and they have done nothing to sort my connection out, I still go for long periods with horrible lag to all game servers, I still go for long periods with absolutely no connection and I'm still waiting for these useless b*stards to do the absolute minimum and actually contact me back.....Do yourself a favour, if you're tempted by Pipex "Extreme Crap" ADSL, think twice and pick a decent provider like Zen.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

The only problem I've had with them is sometimes I get the 'there was no dial tone' message and have to try to log in 7 or 8 times but I always do get on, never once have I been completely unable to connect.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Tonight I'm getting approx. 10 mins on and 5 minutes off, the only response from pipex in the last 2-3 weeks was to use a pipex web cache .. mmhmm cos that'll really help with online gaming, and it'll be even more useful considering I can't ping pipex (or any other site) let alone use them for a proxy server.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Whoo, I got a reply from Pipex (at last), which asked me if I'd rebooted my PC, and further went on to say that anything over 300k on a 512k connection is "good", they also seem to think that altering my MTU will prevent a complete loss of connection and mentioned that occasional losses are "not worth investigating". Yeah .. they're a GREAT ISP eh?

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Perhaps they've got the YTS boy in on this? Wow, I hope this isn't indicative of the support I'll get if ever I need it :erm:

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I genuinely believe it isn't Russ.

Bifta's case is absolutley lame, but it's not the same Pipex I have. :Yikes:

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Definitely not, I have PIPEX and it been brill since day one. (Touch wood)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

The other good one was when I had a complete loss of connection the week before last, tried pinging the IP address of some servers I have elsewhere and got nothing, Pipex blamed my DNS settings (which were set correctly for the network connection and set to automatically retrieve them on the router), clearly the difference between an IP and a resolved domain name isn't comprehensible to them. It's all standard format replies, ok, so you'd expect that initially when you report the fault, but for this 'tards to be rolling them out 3 weeks on indicates to me that there is absolutely no level of technical competence with their so called "tech support" people anymore.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Plenty of people also had NTL connections which never went wrong, that didn't stop a wealth of protest site's springing up. If you for one minute think that I'm in the minority being unhappy with Pipex, search the ADSLguide forums.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I've just tried to discuss the problem with Pipex again, got absolutely nowhere. Spoke to a very helpful chap from Nildram after doing a spot of research on ADSLguide where they appear to be very highly rated and organised a migration to them, admittedly they have a 150 gig cap per month, but I'll never exceed that.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

More congratulations to Pipex, today my download speed from any site (including Pipex's own speed test) is less than 200kps, yes, they're so great.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

update, oooh, here's a classic, after queuing for 15 minutes to report the problem, Pipex won't do a thing about it unless I run their speedtest every hour for 24 hours ... useless c**ts.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Keep the updates coming in - I'm sorry you're having such bad service, but god, you're funny! :LOL:

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I've just sent them pings and tracerts to "www.pipex.com"

average packet loss = 50%, average response time = >400ms ... I'm not putting up with a fault for 24 hours just because the mongoloid on the end of the phone couldn't be ar*ed to deal with it, jesus, I'd get a better result from NTL.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I have NTL broadband and that been reasonably great too and I know each ISP has good customers and bad. My pipex in my eyes have been great.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

After the recent sale of Pipex to whoeverthehelltheyare I suspect customer service and technical support are the two things taking a downturn. When I first had Pipex installed it was fantastic, as were the staff I spoke to, it's only in the last 3 or so months that they've become an absolute abomination.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Start mentioning ofcom to them :)

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I suspect that of late, it'll be a bit like someone mentioning Trading Standards to Ebuyer, they just won't give a sh*te. If I get no joy tomorrow I'll won't mention it to them at all, I'll just contact Ofcom, this has been going on for over a month now and Pipex have done nothing whatsoever about it. They've now had trace routes showing packet loss, pings showing packet loss and high latency, several speed tests showing speeds of less than 256k a second and they still won't escalate it to BT.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

So today I try to call Pipex up as I have the results of a day's worth of speed tests .. but "due to exceptionally high call volumes we cannot take your call" ..... quaint ......

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I call the good old "We're too busy to speak to you" routine the "laxative effect" because it irritates the crap out of me.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Had Pipex for approx 12 months. No probs.

Only ever notice it being slow every now and again. Never been down and no problems.

I would recommend them, but I understand that people get different service.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Was about to join Bifta this morning in attacking Pipex as I was getting very poor speeds - until I realised my machine was downloading a Windows update and I remembered I was currently downloading 602office :spin:

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

2 and a half hours later and I still can't get through to them :(

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

In what way m8?

I just rang Tech Support, & was speaking to someone 3 minutes & 45 seconds after dialling their number. :confused:

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I was getting "due to exceptional blah blah blah" perhaps they've had a little forsight and decided to put people on the phones now.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Finally got through to someone at Pipex yesterday, after an hour of titting about I was told "there is a fault, we don't know what it is, we don't know when it'll be fixed" ... Thank christ I'm leaving them, I'm pleased to say my activation date for the migration to Nildram is in 9 days time :D Welcome letter came this morning.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

My migration to Nildram was completed this morning, my download speed has now gone back to what it should be i.e. >110kbps, I get NO packet loss while gaming, I don't have to reboot my router every time I connect to an FTP server ... it just works .. perfectly, and don't forget, Nildram offer 24x7 tech support as opposed to p*ss poor support offered by Pipex in office hours only.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Did you have to pay to leave Pipex?

I have looked at Nildram & its a costly activation fee (and they done even include the modem for that!) so it looks pricey to me.
All that money for an extra 50mb of webspace not to use..

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

By the way, whats the number to call Pipex support?

I cannot find it on thier website & fancy calling the odd time to check it out.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Yeah but in Bifta's case I think it's not just an extra bit of space, it's about having a service which is equal to what he's paying.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Nildram offered me a free migration, but yes, I'll have to pay 58 quid or so to Pipex for the pleasure of leaving them, I'm however angling for a partial refund as I've had less than a 256k service for around 2 months, if I don't get anywhere with that I'll get trading standards to sort them out.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I would try to state that you have given them ample opportunity to resolve the issues, and they elected not to do so. They agreed there was a problem, they did not fix it - simple breach of contract. You have given them notice to cancel, and in my opinion you should not have to pay to exit the service.

Put it all in writing to the MD or Director of Cust Servs.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

I might well do that, I'll wait and see if they even bother replying to my email.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Let us know..

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

By the way, this thread is a far cry from this reccomendation from Bifta :D :D :D

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

It is indeed, if Pipex had managed to continue to offer the same service I'd started with, I'd have stayed with them, they however chose to ignore a severely degradated service for over 2 months, no-one in their right mind would stay with an ISP that doesn't give a f*ck about their customers or the service they provide.

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

*LOL* I just got a reply from "Customer Care" (obviously the word care is not one they understand) at Pipex, telling me I should

If we do this on a ratio basis, they claim they'll respond to technical support requests within 48 hours, however, in my experience it's been at times over 6 days, so, 28 day's by my reckoning would probably equate to over 3 months :D

Re: Pipex have turned completely crap
 

Perhaps they should chance that to 'coming soon'? :disturbd: