Kabelvision sucks: Does James do anything right?


Update 3:50pm: Andy Sumantri and his boys must be still out for lunch as Unspun‘s received no call from them as  promised. Unspun‘s guess is that they’re out for lunch permanently and take work-breaks , a bit like toilet-breaks,where they visit the office now and then. It would be interesting to see when they would ever return the call. Anyone brave enough to take bets on this?

Update 11.19am: Finally managed to reach Jola and asked her why she did not keep her promise to phone me. She said her technical people still did not know what was the cause and they were away. Could they call me after lunch?

I said not good enough. Let me speak to your supervisor. She was nice enough and put me on hold. After a long while she came back and said the supervisor was away in a meeting. Could she call me back after lunch?

I said not good enough, let me speak to your general manager. She put me on hold again and after a long while where a canned bule voice told me how great Kabelvision was and how its officer were all ready to help me, came back to say that her boss was – you guessed it – in a meeting. Could I call back or have them call me – you guessed it – after lunch?

I managed, however to extract her boss’s extension number and name in case they didn’t call back and I could not get through again. I am waiting foe the call but as a public service – in case any of you can’t get through the automated messages for customer care – the manager’s name is Andy Sumantri and he’s on extension 6503. The phone number is 55 7777 88 x 6503. Now, anyone has James’ mobile number where Unspun can make a complain to?

If your broadband internet connection goes down, just try getting Customer Care of Kabelvision and see if you do not die of frustration.

Our office internet has been down since yesterday. We called Kabelvision and after many times got through and were told that the disruption was because of server migration. If they were migrating their servers, shouldn’t they be informing customers way before of possible disruptions?

Today we tried calling Kabelvision again because the internet connection was still down. In five hours of trying I got through only once. The officer, one Jola, answered but did not know what was the cause of the disruption. She promised to call back in one hour. She never did.

At other times when you dial up customer care, the moment you press the #1 button you immediately get a “all of our customer care officers are busy…” message. This is repeated twice and then you are told to fax or e-mail them because all the officers are busy. You get the same response, or should Unspun say, non-response, both in English and Indonesian services.

If the customer care officers are so overwhelmed then shouldn’t Kabelvision do something about this? What is the excuse of such non-response.

This is another case of what’s wrong with this country. Too few players and the existing ones are those who succeed because they suck up to the powers that be rather than do a good job. Competition is distorted and the well-connected and unctuous prosper. Don’t believe Unspun? Ask yourself the question: what was the last project that James Riady undertook that was well managed and and a success?

41 responses to “Kabelvision sucks: Does James do anything right?”

  1. >This is another case of what’s wrong with this country. Too few players and the existing ones are those who succeed because they suck up to the powers that be rather than do a good job. Competition is distorted and the well-connected and unctuous prosper.

    It’s astonishing because Indon is a country of 250 millions, yet there are only a few really really great anything. What’s missing is the so-called success mindset. Don’t suck up, but do go, be good, and be the best. (Sucking up is for whiners and losers.)

    Set an example and stick with it.

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  2. Just Passing Through Avatar
    Just Passing Through

    Just wondering, who’s your ISP? If there is a break in the cable then Kabelvision would be liable, but if the problem is servers, won’t that belong to the ISP (CBN, Indosat, etc) in question?

    Unfortunately, blogging in general has little exposure in Indonesia. You’re best bet is to send a letter to Kompas and the Post along with the hundreds of other unhappy consumers out there…..

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  3. JPT: Checked with the ISP (CBN) and they say it is Kabelvision. It may or may not be true but no one at Kabelvision can tell us. So much for service.

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  4. Jeremy Wagstaff Avatar
    Jeremy Wagstaff

    I long ago gave up on them. If you can get it I would rate Giganet, a DSL service, highly. Or netZAP. As a backup use one of these HSDPA services, liked Telkom Flash, or Indosat M2 (or is it M3? I get confused.)

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  5. You’re too unkind. Don’t forget James launched that cracking hard journalism mag “Forb..”, no wait…””Fumbles”…no, that wasn’t it either…er, you know, the one with the big fat pic of a local fat cat on the cover. What on earth could you find lacking about that periodical?

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  6. Jeremy: Pardon the ignorance but what’s a DSL service?

    Achmad: You mean the award winning magazine that won awards even before they published? Yeah, I think they are Oulitzer Prize material and James should go collect it when they win…unless they run out of money before that which is Unspun’s bet.

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  7. This is my Kabelvision freaky story. Two months ago I called on a Friday to get MyNet. I asked the operator to contact me on my cell. The next day I just happened to be at the office when someone from Kabelvision called me on the landline (which is listed on my cable bill) to say “his man” was in my area and could I get home ASAP, but I needed to pay Rp 1.2 mil in cash for the installation and modem. Stupid me didn’t think (no transfers right?!).
    The satpam called up to tell me the guy was at the apartment, identifying himself from Kabelvision, he came in (no uniform, should’ve, could’ve, tall, buckteeth, calls himself Robbie), put in a modem, took the money and even gave me a receipt (but not from Kabelvision) and left, telling me I could begin usiing it Sunday. Well, needless to say, it never started. Kabelvision workers did come on Monday (as always they never actually inform you when they’re coming, or it’s 9-12, and they show up at 3) and told me I had probably been scammed by an “oknum” working with a former worker. I have reported the incident several times to several different Customer Service Officers (and I use that term loosely) but never once received any follow-up. But I do have one Made in China Motorola modem now being used as a bookstop.

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  8. It’s another classic story between kabelvision and ISP providers. Unfortunately, it is us who became the one being toss around by answering machines and unreliable customer support staff.

    When there’s a trouble with your cable internet, expect Kabelvision to blame the ISPs and vice versa. There seems no monitoring and communication control between them. So I wouldn’t be surprised if consumers are receiving please hold thingy and getting frustrated.

    But what I understand, most of the problem is usually caused by Kabelvision. ISPs are simply feeding data streams to Kabelvision’s cable infrastructure, and Kabelvision relays those streams to users. In my experience, often times the problem is caused by the infrastructure. Maintenance by Kabelvision is mediocre, I would say.

    Oh, and their human resources level is mediocre to sucks too.

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  9. I haven’t checked this site in a week or so, but have had similar issues with Kabelvision et al… here’s my overly frustrated rant (note – it’s sort of R-rated, so don’t read if you don’t have the stomach for it):

    http://www.jakchat.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/57150/page/1#Post57150

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  10. This was my general rant about the Internet in Indonesia a couple of months ago:

    http://www.jakchat.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/51699/page/1#Post51699

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  11. Dearest Unspun….
    Do you mind delete my first comment for this post? I typed it quickly that I made some mistakes that may confuse anyone who read it.
    So, this is what I want to say:

    Currently I use kabelvision at home (as cable tv provider). Actually I’ve thought about using Kabelnet too, but I changed my mind then. The kabelvision service – as cable TV provider – is not good enough for me. When I saw my favorite movie from national channel, suddenly appeared an announcement that they had some ‘technical problem’ blablabla.. so I temporarily couldn’t watch any shows from that channel (it’s all about Kabelvision, not about the channel, if you are not using kabelvision, you can still watch this channel). Other time, when it was raining, I can’t watch TV, totally.
    But honestly the most common problem is the first one. Guess what the TV channel is? RCTI! I badly think that it’s about business, you know, RCTI and his MNC group have cable TV provider too… Indovision… and -in the commercial- they promised no problem with the rain, you can still enjoy TV while it’s raining.
    So, using Kabelnet service? No, thanks!

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  12. actually the trick is, write your problem about kabelvision and email them so they’ll have proof to discuss about. they even can forward to ‘pihak terkait’ or even their supervisor so they can take action. if not, you can just post it at detik’s surat pembaca. as simple as that. n that’s what i learn so far.

    calling their brainless cust service is not even helping, believe me. coz they cant write all down what you’ve said.

    golda

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  13. Golda: I realize the futility of calling Kabelvision’s customer service brainless as you cannot insult the brain dead. Still…had to churhad.

    I’ve now cancelled my subscription with kabelvision – and IT FEELS GOOD!!!

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  14. Unspun,
    That’s a brave thing to do…I tried getting Astro in Taman Rasuna, but was told that only Kabelvision is allowed in the apartment complex, or that I could try to do it, but I would have to ask permission, etc, etc …I guess they’ve got the monopoly.
    BTW, with my story about being duped by a cable installation guy, I forgot to mention that about 10 minutes after the real Kabelvision guys came to install the modem, the con man called saying he would come by and buy back the modem from me for a discounted price! Mighty kind of him, and a real coincidence.

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  15. […] vision sucks II: Analyze this, James 13 08 2007 We all know Kabelvision’s service sucks. It sucks so bad that Unspun’s office decided to pay substantially more to Uninet. They came […]

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  16. Oh, I’m SO glad I’m not the only one with this ultimately sucky experience with kabelvision!

    Here’s my story (sorry this is gonna be long):

    Where I live is so far in South Jakarta that is not covered by kabelvision (so I had to use telkomnet dialup for years!). So when kabelvision’s brother (called digital 1: http://digital1.tv) entered my housing complex early this year, I switched to it & subscribed to MyNet ISP (all from the same company: PT Broadband Multimedia). MyNet( http://mynet.co.id) offered up to 256 kbps speed for Rp. 660,000 + tax, but we couldn’t use our own cable modem. It has to be from them (so that they can control the speed limit, I think).

    It didn’t have any big problem during the first few months, only a few disconnections every once in a while & they fixed it almost instantly.

    Now the REAL problem came around April 2007. My computer was struck by lightning & the modem was also dead. I called MyNet cust service to ask for modem replacement. The number is either: 55 777 333 or 55 777 088.

    Oh, how they got me really frustrated! I almost always yelled at them whenever I called.

    1. My call never got through during office hours! Even when I called as early as 6-7 AM! The answering machine said “Sorry, all of our customer service officer is still busy. Please hold the line” twice, then I was told to fax/email or call at different times.

    2. So I started to call them around midnight and even at odd hours (3-4 AM), because it was easier to reach them. I asked for a modem replacement, then they told me to wait for their call when the modem was ready.

    3. A few days passed and they didn’t call. I called again & they said they were run out of modems, so I had to wait about a week for the modem. I asked whether I could use my own cable modem while waiting. They said OK & told me to fax the MAC ID no. I did it right away.

    4. I called again the following day, because the modem was still not active. They said the new modem had arrived & they were scheduling their technical assistant to come to my house to install the new modem.

    I got furious at this point. I felt I was thrown back & forth with their stupid cust service management. It took me a week to wait for the new modem (that means a week without the internet), and still heard nothing from them. Even when I wanted to use my own cable modem, they just ignored me like that.

    FYI, I lived in the USA for 5 years before, and I’m really used to GOOD cust service. I couldn’t tolerate this any longer. So I cancelled the subscription right away. I thought I’d be better that way, then to rage at them in the future. It would really save my health & my head. Oh, I also threatened them to put my story to Kompas, but I didn’t have the time (& energy) to do it yet..

    On the same day, I happily switched to Telkom Speedy (it’s DSL, much faster than cable), which offered an unlimited bandwidth for only Rp. 750,000 + tax. And until now I didn’t have any problem with Speedy. The Telkom cust service is very nice, they’re easy to reach, they’re very helpful. They come the next day if I report a problem today. They really brighten my days.

    I’m addicted to the internet, so a day without good internet (and good CS) is like hell to me.

    Oh btw, this is my letter to MyNet (in Indonesian) before I cancelled the service the next day. As you guessed it right, they didn’t contact me at all.
    And guess what, they never said sorry. Ever.

    —————————————————————–

    Jakarta, 3 May 2007

    Ada beberapa concern penting.
    Mohon ditanggapi secepatnya.

    1. Susah sekali telfon ke Mynet kalau pada jam kerja. Terutama dari jam 8 pagi sampai 11 malam. Selalu sibuk, tidak pernah masuk sekalipun. Dalam sehari saya telfon berpuluh2 kali, tp ga pernah masuk. Ini masukan penting utk Mynet, tolong jalan keluarnya. Karena banyak sekali hal yg perlu dibicarakan pada saat jam kerja, akhirnya ke-pending2 terus. Baru bisa contact kalau subuh (jam 1-5 pagi). Masalah jadi tidak terselesaikan berhari2.

    2. Modem saya kena petir tgl 24 April, sejak 25 April tidak bisa connect ke internet. Mati total. Tolong tagihannya di-adjust. Terima kasih.

    3. Selagi menunggu modem baru dr Mynet dipasang di rumah saya (dan schedulenya belum tau kapan, customer service juga ga pernah contact saya & dihubungi SUSAH SEKALI), jadi mohon diaktifkan modem saya. Sudah dari kemarin saya fax MAC IDnya, dan katanya sudah masuk. Kenapa sampai skrg masih belum aktif modem saya?
    Tolong diaktifkan. Sudah seharian kemarin ini saya tunggu, tp tetap tidak bisa connect krn blm aktif. Ga susah kan, tinggal masukin MAC ID aja?

    4. Tolong customer service Mynet menghubungi saya lewat telfon, utk menentukan schedule pemasangan modem baru. Jangan seenaknya ditentukan, karena tidak setiap saat ada org di rumah. Jadi tolong KONFIRMASI dulu.

    5. Saya mulai kecewa dengan customer service Mynet, yang tidak pernah minta maaf (padahal salah), tidak pernah mengangkat telfon kalau jam kerja, dan tidak pernah telfon ke rumah untuk follow up masalah. Selain itu, kerjanya juga lambat sekali & diulur2. Padahal saya sudah lapor dari tgl 25 April, katanya “akan dihubungi mengenai pengadaan modem baru”. Tapi nyatanya, sampai detik ini (sudah lebih dari seminggu) saya BELUM PERNAH
    ditelfon dr pihak Mynet sama sekali.
    Apa memang begitu cara kerja Mynet? Hanya di bulan awal2 saja diurus, lalu setelah bbrp bulan, pelanggan mulai dicuekin? Tolong perbaiki customer service Mynet, utk kebaikan perusahaan anda sendiri.

    Saya minta customer service Mynet menghubungi saya SECEPATNYA (pada jam kerja hari Jumat ini) utk menjawab concern2 saya diatas.

    TERIMA KASIH.

    —————————————————————–

    Sorry this is so long >_<
    Just thought I could warn future kabelvision/digital 1/mynet customers.
    Thank you for reading.

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  17. I just wrote a very long comment.. does it go through?

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  18. Here’s my own experience with Broadband Multimedia (Kabelvision / Digital 1 / MyNet):

    http://lisette.livejournal.com/22027.html

    I also wrote it as a comment here, but realized that it’s too long, so maybe that’s why it didn’t go through.

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  19. Elyse: I’ve rescued your comment from Akismet.

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  20. I think we all know what the (cultural) problem is.

    Firstly, ignore the technical faults – they’ll happen anytime, anywhere.

    The answer lies within CSR – Corporate Social Responsibility – a misnomer which means kowtowing to your boss.

    Example: I’ve got a class of call centre workers in a major bank with low level English. It is assumed by everyone that they need to improve their fluency, but if they wish to properly interact with their irate English speaking callers, that could take as long as 500 classroom hours. 30 hours is nowhere near enough.

    I questioned them and they told me that they had no particular problems dealing with Indonesian customers because they used a script.

    Why not get it translated, I asked.

    Stunned silence, but not because this is an obvious solution. Nope, it’s because in pointing out how to create a more efficient service there is the implication that what is on offer is deficient. And you aren’t allowed to ‘rise above your station’ in life.

    So, as for asking someone with better English to take the call ……

    The end result is that the call centre workers and the callers get even more stressed out, the company suffers a PR loss of face, but the bosses remain benign in their ignorance.
    …………………………

    We customers might feel better for writing about our problems on blogs. Has anyone thought of dedicating a blog to a particular company? This is a tactic used elsewhere. So, given that Kabelvision has innumerable complaints, why not have a Kabelkantdo.blogspot?

    Just don’t expect any comments from Jakartass, however. I live the wrong side of the tracks, literally, so have to ‘make do’ with Indovision. The only complaint I have about them is the near-impossibility of paying the subscription!

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  21. So we’re not the only ones. From my experience, Digital1/Kabelvision always refused to send out anyone to check my connection, even after it had been down for a week. “We don’t do that,” the customer service officer told me, and refused to adjust my bill for the fact that I had no connection for a week. However, they did recommend a “freelancer” who could come for Rp 120,000 a visit; and when he came, he called up MyNet directly and got everything cleared from that end, so obviously he is more or less an employee of theirs.
    But their customer service are the worst. Never give a straight answer, never tell you when they plan to come over, never do any of the promised follow up.
    And, three months on, Digital1 has never called me to apologize about the scam with the modem, or tell me if they found “the oknum” who was feeding the con man my private info (office number, home address, the fact i had applied for a modem). I guess the real oknum is the kabelvision employee who actually does his job right.

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  22. Thank you, Mr. Ong 🙂
    You can delete my 2 comments below the long one..

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  23. In response to Jakartass,
    A blog is a good idea. Do you want to maintain it? 🙂

    Is it possible to send the stories above (also the ones in the comments from other very disappointed Kabelvision users) to Kompas or even to Kabelvision directly?

    Or report it to somewhere? (something like BBB = Better Business Bureau in the US. Is there one in Indonesia? :P)

    Like

  24. Its standard procedure, been waiting for three weeks for Lion Air Manager at Pandang to contact me. Despite making appointments twice to see him and travelling to his office..Guess what he was out lunch (at 3 and 4pm different days). Left phone number, sent email but these guys are more than happy to leave their staff (poorly and unfair on the staff) to handle a problem rather than do their jobs.

    Still as they say TII..

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  25. hmmm… interesting. I’m actually just about to send an e-mail to kabelvision to ask them to check my pay tv, but then I thought I wanted to go see on the net what people say about kabelvision nowadays. And I found this blog.

    I had terrible experiences with kabelvision too, especially regarding their customer service attitude and the speed of their response. About two or three years ago, the remote for the kabelvision decoder was somehow went crazy and then died. Naturally, I called kabelvision and asked for replacement. A simple asking, ain’t it? Yet, week after week, the replacement remote control never showed up. noone from kabelvision bothered to call me, their valuable customer, to explain. I had to called them again and again in effort to get that damn remote, yet zero was the ultimate result. So frustrating! I decided to write an e-mail to them. Of course, I told them the whole story chronologically and I told them that I would go to the media should the e-mail weren’t good enough to bring that remote to my house. Succeeded! The remote showed up the next day, But… after few days, I found out through scratches on the body of the remote that it was a used (repaired) one, not a new one. And, worse, it soon started malfunctioning. It drained the batteries too quickly (once for every two weeks I had to replace the batteries!). You know what? That was not the end of it…

    Few months later, the decoder died. And all I went through those frustrating process again. This time, after three months of “status quo” I decided to give back the decoder and I called off the premium channels and back to the basic package. I didn’t write any e-mail to them, after they threw an excuse saying that the decoder was an old type and hard to find replacement to it. There! It clearly showed how incapable and incompetent they were. Replacing the old decoder with the new one will be the most logical solution, right? They didn’t even bother to ask about my tv and my location compatibility to the new decoder. Damn!

    Lucky for them, I like their channels better than other pay TV.. at least, so far. I keep using their service till now. I realized that now the name Kabelvision has changed to First Media. I was hoping the change effecting the service to a better level. I guess it was a false hope, knowing that the same ignorance still exist in their way of running their business.

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  26. “If your broadband internet connection goes down, just try getting Customer Care of Kabelvision and see if you do not die of frustration ”

    I agree….

    Like

  27. Tiw,

    I agree.
    As much as I wanted to try their new offer, FastNet (from FirstMedia — apparently PT Broadband Multimedia changed it to “get rid” of their bloody past & start anew, even invested US$650million for it), I got to think all over again whether it’s worth the try.

    I mean, look at this review: http://www.forumponsel.com/forum/showflat.php?Number=2457296&page=&sb=5&fpart=all&vc=1

    FastNet looks bad even before the service starts.
    Maybe it’s fast, but with the high demands, I’m sure it will be a short while before everything slows down.

    Too many users = slower internet? We’ll see about that.
    Nevertheless, I still want to try it, maybe for a month or two.
    Without closing my Speedy connection, of course.

    Oh, with the new competition, I sure hope Speedy will lower its price & upgrade the bandwidth *crosses fingers*

    Like

  28. Hey Unspun,

    I happen to work at First Media. I realize that you claims are valid. However, it should be better now, back in July, we are going into a phase of transition. I hope that you problems have been resolved. If not, please do drop me an email, because i do not regularly post here. also, drop me your number if you would like to and I will call you asap and try help you with your problem, and I do want to help.

    However, in the mean time, when you criticize others, please show respect, not only to Mr James, but to all. Mr. James has done a lot of things, many of which you probably do not know about. I hope to talk to you soon! Have a great day! God bless!

    Sincerely,

    Henry

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  29. @Henry: Thanks for your note, the first communication from Kabelvision now aka First Media. I hope your services are better because it could not get much worse. Thank you also for your offer of seeing to my problem but as I explained in a later posting, I’ve dropped Kabelvision for another service and they are much more reliable than the Kabelvision I had.

    On James. No doubt he has done a lot of things that are perceived as beneficial to others but you and your master should also know that he has a very bad reputation out there among the business community. He’s perceived like many of his tycoon peers, on one hand being religious, good and philantrophic and on the other hand a ruthless businessman where few people who have done business with the group are happy. If you want to use the word respect, then please apply it to James’s companies as well. Where was the respect to Unspun and thousands of customers when Kabelvision was giving us the double whammy – bad connections and appalling customer service?

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  30. Dear Unspun,

    Although i would not agree dropping Kabelvision, I do see your point in dropping it. You were dissatisfied and so was many other. However, if James did not care, he would of dropped dealing with Kabelvision issues and problems, and would not even bother trying to fix it. however, i feel he is truly putting an effort in fixing Kabelvision’s “whammy” reputation. As you have said before, kabelvision really has sort of a monopoly, and therefore, it really does not need to fix anything and will continue to profit. However, the fact that they are investing millions of dollars i see is a good sign.

    By the way, i am too dissatisfied. I have actually brought it up in the meeting with almost every top member present, that i was dissatisfied. And we are committed, with the new name of first Media, to change the reputation and give you the best service. Please do know some of the restrictions we are facing.

    1. The total bandwitdh in Indonesia is about 3.9-4GB. about 50% owned by Indosat and another 50% owned by Telkomsel (or satelindo, i forgot). We are trying to get our own broadband lines with much more GBs. however, this is indonesia and the governments hand is very dominant in this area. Therefore, it is hard for us to get bandwitdh when we cant even get bandwidth. That is why we are investing alot, to get more bandwidth, for the costomers.

    2. The projected needed amount of bandwidth based on a report (i forgot when it was released) was about 75GB. Indonesia has 4GB. Do the math.

    3. The CIA world fact book states that there are about 16million internet users. Kabelvision has about maximum a few million. Where are the few million people get their internet from? I dont know, go figure. Possibly illegally?

    Apart from that Issue. Mr James has worked with many people, millions in fact has been linked to his work in one way or another.

    1. he could not of gotten to where he is if, as you said, all of them are mismanaged and fulfilling.

    2. do you agree that even the greatest leaders such as Jesus and even Mohammad have people who like and dislike them for various reason.

    3. Unfortunately, I believe you are making a hasty generalization. Many people have been satisfied when they get their shopping cheap in Matahari or Hypermart. Many people have been satisfied when they recieve quality education in Universitas Pelita Harapan, Sekolah Pelita Harapan, Dian Harapan, Lentera Harapan (which accounts to about a few dozen schools). Many people in the rural areas have been fulfilled when they are given education as affordable as possible. Many people in Aceh and Meluaboh have been blessed by his efforts to send doctors and aid supplies. Many people have been healed and saved through the 60odd Siloam Hospitals. Thousands of people have been given the opportunity for work in wither Matahari, Hypermart, Lippo Karawaci, Lippo Cikarang including Kabelvision. And furthermore, many more people will be given a new opportunity for many things when the one and only cancer research hospital is completed, when siloam gleneagles in sudirman is completed, when many more schools in the far corners are completed.

    5. Who are the tycoon peers that is similar to him in terms of vision and dedication to Indonesia?

    6. Ruthless? Give me an example of ruthless.

    7. James is not perfect. but I believe he is trying hard to work on it.

    Unsup, really I do not think you have grounds to say such things. honestly speaking. Please email me ur number Unsup, so that I may call you. I do not wish to get mad or anything, i just hope to clarify some things. And if you descide to posses your presuppositions, than thats fine with me. But I do not think one should create a perspective if one’s presuppositions are incorrect.

    Please, give me a chance to explain. Email me your number to henryriady@mac.com. Give me 5 mins.

    Thank you Unsup for your time. Have a great day! God bless you!

    I hope to be able to talk to you soon!

    Sincerely,

    Henry

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  31. @Henry: On Kbelvision – Ah well, that’s the problem with brands and trust. Once you lose it, very difficult if nigh impossible to recover it.

    I can tell by your posting that you’re probably relatively young, perhaps idealistic and someone who cares. My guess is that you’re religious as well. This are all great qualities and I wish you well in trying to change things at Kabelvision, er First Media. I’d like to hear from you six months or a year from now to see if you’ve achieved pushing the envelope or you’ve become disillusioned.

    On bandwidth as an excuse for bad service: Agree Kabelvision can’t quite help the limited bandwidth in this country. But it could have not been greedy in connecting too many people to one node and it could have invested in its customer service – if you can’t be good, at least be nice.

    On James: Like I say, perception-wise there seems to be two irreconcilable sides. The angel who does good works, is into education, religion and everything good and wholesome and there is the perception that he burns businesses who get into bed with him. This is the perception that you get from talking to businesses who have worked with him. the truth of the matter is another matter, we are talking perception here.

    James may be the person that you portray him to be. But there is this perception of him that is very real if you talk to people who have worked with the group. Maybe he isn’t even aware of the existence of such negative perceptions and therefore not in a position to change them. His is the problem faced by the rich and famous everywhere – who do you trust as courtiers tend to flatter and tend to present a distorted picture of the world to their master.

    Keep trying though Henry. I like your spirit and your intellectual honesty in facing unpleasant facts about Kabelvision. I’ll e-mail you.

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  32. We’ve been using Kabelvision Indosat for sometime (2 or 3 years I guess) and in the past 3 months the connection starts to drop daily at around 1630 hrs. Drops totally (no connection at all) at around 1830 hrs. It goes back to normal after 0100 hrs. Amazingly, the connection is normal during the day (working hours). Called Firstmedia on this many times, still the same, as if no action. Just yesterday evening, called Indosat, and the friendly Indosat guys began to monitor the problem. And also they did call me back yesterday (evening) after they told me to reset the modem. Still no connection after resetting the modem. I asked if I should call Firstmedia, they said no, “we’ll handle that”. This morning another Indosat customer care called me and she said, “yes, strange, the connection goes to normal during the working hours, we will keep on monitoring this”. I am still waiting now. As I said, the connection is normal during working hours. Correct me if I am wrong, but I get this feeling that Firstmedia on purpose starts to decrease my bandwidth in the evenings to allow Fastnet customers to get a better connection (once they get home from work), since this thing happened after they (Firstmedia) started with Fastnet for residential customers. Need your comment on this Unspun. By the way, what ISP do you use now ? Thank you for this blog, feels like somebody out there is listening to my problem.

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  33. @Tanto: You’re welcome. One of the Riadys, Henry, has dropped in here before and maybe he’ll listen and do some thing about it. he sounds young and idealistic enough to want to do something. At least he told me that they are trying real heard at First media to be better.

    I hope he’s right but somehow First media will go the way of many of the Riady enterprises – lots of flash and bang and then quickly go out of steam, while customers suffer. I’d change providers if I were you since past experience is any guide.

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  34. Here is what I have done in the past two weeks
    .
    Called customer services at Indosat and Kabelvision (Firstmedia, I’ll refer here as KV). I forgot how many times, must be 10 times or more, and followed their standard operating procedure, namely, unplug the power to modem, unplug the coaxial cable, plug them back, and wait. Sometimes the connection comes up, very slow, most of the times got RTO (request timed out). Simple efficient test, just pinged the Indosat DNS 202.155.0.15 –t. No need for any other clever intelligent test or proof. This method is fool proof, even fools can do it.

    Friday last week the connection was really bad. Called Indosat and KV. Saturday mostly dead. Called them back again. Monday still no improvement. Again, dialed Indosat and KV. At last, Monday evening before Christmas an Indosat techinician came in with the intention to check the modem (because I told them to check it, perhaps, who knows), but since the connection was dead, he simply couldn’t. He had a spare modem with him, anyway couldn’t do much with a dead connection.

    Well, at least the Indosat guys are more professional. They paid attention to my complains. Sometimes they call me back, e-mailed back, and at the end sent a technician. At least I know there is somebody out there at the other end of my modem who cares about my problem.

    Christmas day, not much of a connection, got RTO many times. Wednesday, got some connection in the morning, but still the same, RTO after an hour or so. Sometimes the connection comes up for a few seconds, then dead again. Thursday, today, still no improvement.

    Called KV and told the cs girl to fix my problem. I told her not to fool around with my bandwidth. I asked her when the KV technican are coming, because they promised me several days ago, they will send a technician after Christmas, on the 26th or 27th. She said, there is no such schedule. What ? Really pissed me off. I told her, look, I am not angry at you, I am mad at KV and go tell the guys at KV Gatot Soebroto not to disconnect or mess around with my connection. I told her this all mess started since KV changed to Firstmedia and started to sell Fastnet.

    I told her, I am not going to argue anymore and I am really tired of all this nonsense, just tell the Gatot Sobroto guys to fix my problem. Give me back my connection. The normal one. I told her I know they are fooling around with my bandwidth. Tell your supervisor “I know you guys are cutting off my bandwidth”. And she said, “OK I’ll do that, and I’ll tell the tech guys at Gatot Soebroto to call you back”. That was in the morning. It’s 15:31 and no one from KV called me back. I am waiting for a glimp of a few seconds connection so I could post this long story to this blog. Yes, I am still staring at my ping with minus t.

    To make a story shorter, here is my conclusion:

    – KV is doing this on purpose, so that those like us using Indosat, would switch to Fastnet. There are rumors that the day Fastnet was released, more than 300 Indosat customers got disconnected. Well, that sounds very hostile !!!

    – KV equipments are obsolete. Perhaps they are using second class equipment, or used / refurbished ones. There is also such a rumor spreading. Those guys selling refurbished equipments say, just wait, you’ll see one day they will have to charge you more for the internet connection, or otherwise they will degrade your connection.

    – KV is too greedy selling Fastnet. Too much and too many at one time, at the same time, meanwhile their equipment and bandwidth simply not sufficient. And who knows, at this very moment my Indosat bandwidth is being shared with other Fastnet customers. What a horror !!!

    – KV technicians are not capable of solving the problem. I doubt it. I believe they are good, just the bosses are too greedy. Most technical guys (IT guys) I met working at ISPs are very brilliant guys with highly technical skill.

    – KV shouldn’t jump into the internet business. They were good before this. Really, I mean it. I even recommended friends to subscribe to KV (TV) and get the internet at the same time. I was convinced the KV ADSL connection was very stable. I knew it was stable. I have used many types of last-mile connections in the past. Radio connections, leased line Lintasarta (DOV), leased line Telkom, you name it, and the KV ADSL to me seems very stable, and relatively cheap. Sad, those greedy guys destroyed this image !!!

    – On Sunday I went to a friend’s house who subscribed to Fastnet, where on that day the connection at my place was dead. And to my surprise, same dead internet connection at his house, yeah this time Fastnet. Then I guessed it was longweekend, holiday, before Christmas, where people stayed at home and use internet extensively, and the KV equipment was overloaded.

    Last but not least. The cs of KV or Firstmedia keeps telling us, you, not to share your internet connection. In other words, don’t use router. What ? Why ? How come ?

    Hallo ! As long I get a stable and a normal connection and bandwidth according to SLA, meaning my modem talks to KV modem normally, that would be fine.

    The rest, behind the router is my problem. We are not cheating and not stealing anything (bandwidth) by having 1, 5, or even 100 workstations behind the router. Or am I wrong ?

    And to the best of my knowledge, nobody gets hurt. It’s our own risk and we know the consequences. The connection would be slow. Our internal LAN connection would be slow when accessing the internet. You guys at KV are not educating your own people, the Indonesian people I mean !!! Sorry to say, this is what I call the “Proses Pembodohan”.

    The more people use internet, the more they get educated and get wider perspective. This is not the era of Mr. Harmoko where everything is according to Bapak Presiden. What you’ve got to lose, hey KV ? Educate your people ! Our own people. Are you guys at KV not Indonesians ?

    I don’t know if its true. I heard that KV/Fistmedia in some cases cut-off connection to those using router behind modem. I can understand if someone hacks the modem and modifies the bandwidth parameter in it. But to tell not to use a router behind a modem ??? This one must be a joke right. You guys don’t mean it.

    Stop !!! Don’t tell us not to use a router. Just tell us that the connection would be slow. That’s enough. Yes, and I have had enough !!!

    “Sucks” sounds cruel for us, softspoken Indonesians. But after all this, I couldn’t find a better word for it.

    Oh ya, nearly forgot. You guys at KV must be thinking that I am / was taking sides, with Indosat I mean. Wrong !

    I was many times disappointed with Indosat too in the past. And when they sell, they sell high. You never get anything cheap from Indosat. But they have and always have some explanation. And they are quick to respond. And they never let you down…

    Anyone from KV got some reasonable explanation ? Call me at 08159798022.

    18:00, still no connection, RTO.
    18:16, still no connection, RTO.
    18:18, there is something…this is the time to click Submit…
    Failed
    18:45 another submit

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  35. Tanto with a happy face Avatar
    Tanto with a happy face

    Yesterday (28/12/07) I scolded the KV cs and told her to fix my connection. Yeah, give it a last try. I was burning mad, the connection was stiff dead.

    Wrote a letter (fax) both to Kabelvision / Firstmedia and Indosat, telling them how very very disappointed I was and asked them for a discount of monthly internet fee they would normally charge.

    Yes, this is the first fax after so many days and nights of talking to KV and Indosat cs on the phone. I told them in the fax, the service they gave me is far below the Service Level Agreement.

    Waited. No response.

    In the afternoon called Indosat again, talked to cs, just told him to fix my connection. Without further explanation. Just fix it, I said. Maybe there is still some hope….yes I was hoping all the time…..have faith so they say…

    And………..

    Voila !!! A little after 20:00 hrs, there was something on my ping. The connection was fast like hell !!! Below 100 ms, even got 9 ms !!! Yes, nine milliseconds !!! NINE MILLISECONDS !!!

    Never ever happened in my entire life. Believe me Unspun, Henry, James, or whoever in KV and Indosat……….the internet connection was below 100 ms. Almost like private LAN !!!

    I think I’ll have to wait until tomorrow (that is today) and see if it’s still the same. Woke up and still the same……the same fast and furious connection below 100 ms !!!

    10 minutes ago, I called Indosat and KV and asked them what happened all this time ? I told them there are two things I want to say:

    One, I want to inform you the connection is OK and I want to say thank you to all of you cs and tech guys back there and I want to apologize for being rude and harsh to you / them. Two, I want to know what happened. I want an explanation.

    KV said they fixed the tap. Which tap ? The one on the street not far from my place. Is that on your log ? I was curious. Yes, it says you got bad signal (weak) and once the tap was fixed, the connection was OK.

    Indosat said, I got bad signal all this time (and that’s what they have been telling me all this time), and according to our log here, they (KV) “rebalanced” the connection. Well I don’t know about rebalancing the tap, but whatever it is, it surely worked.

    So, the conclusion is, all this time I got a weak/bad signal and it took almost 2 weeks to fix it. Althou they suspected it from the beginning. Well…..at least they fixed it. Meaning I, in fact, can get a good solid connection, if everything is OK. So should other customers too. They deserve a good connection for the price they pay.

    To KV, Henry, James :

    If I was wrong, and said bad things about you guys, I apologize for my hostile prejudice. But, considering the condition and situation I was in, the thought and whispering came just like that. All the bad thought came out of nowhere and accumulated day by day in my head. Two weeks !!! And I could swear, I felt the connection dropped since you guys began selling Fastnet. And got even worse during weekends. Worst in the past 2 weeks. The same cycle. Drop in the afternoon. Dead in the evening. And up again after 01:00 hrs in the night. The same cycle for two weeks.

    I’ll wait and see what happens in the next couple of days and keep my eye fixed on my ping result from now on.

    Next time the same thing happens, if it takes two weeks to fix the tap……I’ll climb the pole myself and change the tap…..

    Unspun, thank you for your wonderful blog and I sometimes look into your photo collection in Flickr. They are very good. Downloaded a couple of pictures for my website if you don’t mind. It’s about Bali.

    Ok guys, I wish you all have a Prosperous Happy New Year, and may 2008 brings no more trouble in our internet connection !!!

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  36. Around 2 days ago there was a home-cable system migration from analog to the digital ones in my complex area. I was rather impressed actually knowing that the cabling system we’re using now are truly “digitals” with hopes of ‘TiVo’ likes coming to Indonesia.

    Indeed, I must admit that the channels quality and stereo sounds are slightly better. However, the part that annoys me is few important channels have been putted of from the standard package, alongside with the rising of premium subscription fees (the premiums up to Rp. 458.000 from Rp. 350.000,) The CS people argues they had to do it to increase the signals quality.

    I’m not a big fan of the tv medias instead i much prefers reading the economists or , however as a law student (who stills relying to my parents to accommodate me until i graduated) and who is putting interests in political craps and world issues, I’m much relying in the availableness of non-bias tv news, this means I socially wouldn’t engaged with people who could stands for Fox News or Metro TV.

    Well this is the problem; few news channels are not around in the basic package anymore after the system migration i.e BBC and “the different world perspectives” of Al Jazeera… the CS lady who I contacted told me I need to added the ‘news’ and ‘entertainment’ package deals which later concludes we have to pay extra thousands of Rupiah.

    Yes, as a family-type customer, a loyal Kabelvision customer dated from 1995 i was totally disappointed and outrageous. In increasing the channels quality standards doesn’t mean First Media have to ripped-offs its customers. Every year I always get the same picture that cable-tv medias in Indonesia are disillusioning customers who trapped in their monopolistic ways.

    Well, once more, it still doesn’t ends. I happens to be an undergraduate in Mr.Riyadi’s highly prestigious Universitas Pelita Harapan. The rising fuel prices err.. i mean college fees irritates me a lot. Due to my personal experiences, I’m fully believe Mr. Riyadi’s handling of his education system has imitates his business practices. All the evangelical rhetoric about how a good businessman can be a good education leader seems total BS. Well, the rhetoric might work on new fresh students who just comes up from their own “literally literate” world and ready for the mighty doctrines given by Mr. James. however, this would not work on some part of us, probably because the reality pills we had earlier after seeing the cheap affordable restaurants in and around campus were being eradicated by the campus management and replace it with the newly high-priced food junctions.

    So, please don’t tell me UPH is ‘better than Harvard’ dear sir Mr. Riyadi. For you gentlemen and ladies who mind to know ‘the better than Harvard’ doctrine thing please download it at http://www.uph.edu/data/file/campusasia01.zip . And please don’t make me starts with “global” magazines article. The 100 richest Indonesian businessman article was one of the silliest thing i’ve ever read. Should change the title to “100 most tax evasive richest Indonesian businessmen instead”. so much for the glamours. so much for fortunes and forbes magazines.

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  37. yup same here…I know this post is old but still I just want to add my story…just to let you know how bad kabelvision is (which of course you already know by now)…

    The internet at my place went down around 2 months before “lebaran”.
    I tried calling technical support but got “all of our customer care officers are busy…” message instead.
    Tried that for almost a MONTH…can you imagine a whole month?
    When I finally got throught I was pissed and complained about the line being busy for a month a instead the guy said I should have tried more often (giggling) wtf was he kidding me? he actually thought it was funny? giggling?
    I can’t even count how many times I called each day.
    Then he apoligized and said the line was busy blablabla…

    I knew screaming at the guy wouldn’t solve any problems so I tried to calmed down and told him about the my internet connection problems…
    He said that from his computer he didn’t see anything wrong
    with the connection he said it was probably just my computer…s
    o he told me to do this and that and I told I already tried every single trick in the manual book(cd) and it problem continues so it’s not my computer, but this f***in guy insisted…
    so I followed what he told me (which I already did prior to calling him, since I had a MONTH to try to figure out for myself), and after like 2 hours the guy said “ohh wait my mistake the problem was not in your computer, yes I see the problem now”
    I felt like I wanted to kill this guy, cus that’s what I said in the very beginning…he should have just listen to me and check thoroughly!
    So the guy said that he’ll be sending a technical team to my house to fix the problem NEXT WEEK and he’ll CALL ME tommorow in the morning about the problem.
    I was pissed…I’ve been trying to call for a month and now I have to wait for a week?
    Be he promised to call me in the morning and maybe they’ll be able to speed up the process so that I wouldn’t have to wait for a week. That calmed me down a bit.
    So the next morning I waited for the call. And guess what?
    Yup the bastard didn’t call back. Of course I tried calling
    but hey…last time it took me a month and true I tried calling all day and it was always busy…
    I kept calling them and it took me 4 days to finally get through (man is this line busy or do they just have 1 operator on standby?)
    So I asked them about the appointment that I made 5 days ago and wanted to confirm it…and the woman said there weren’t any appointment…I explained about 5 days ago but the woman said there was nothing in there records (man it was just getting better and better).
    So the woman told me that their technical team will come to my house… and I had to wait for….yes another week.
    So that day finally came. It was Saturday I had a lot of plans
    but had to cancel it cause the technical team was coming.
    I tried calling from the morning but of course couldn’t contact them cus they are ALWAYS busy.
    They promised to come at 12:00 in the afternoon but I waited until 4:00 and they didn’t came so I left cause I had some stuff to do.
    It was kinda like a nightmare, because I couldn’t do anything…I mean just trying to call kabelvision is tiring.
    So I tried calling them again and in about a week I finally the line wasn’t busy and I asked them about last week.
    And the person said that the technical team couldn’t come.
    I was really pissed. I asked them why didn’t they call me? I had plans that saturday and instead I waited 4 hours for them.
    So I asked them to just fix it.
    But guess what? She said next week they’ll all be in vacation and so I had to wait after that?
    OMG I was pissed…
    long story short I had to wait for another 3 weeks
    so it’s:
    around 1 month (cause I can’t call since they’re so busy)
    5 days (cause some stupid guy lied to me)
    1 Week (cause can’t call them again since they’re so busy)

    and now another around 3 weeks…..

    Ok long story short the D Day finally arrived
    They promised again at 12 o’clock and again Saturday!
    I had plans at 3 o’clock but thought I would probably quick so it’ll be no problem.

    So I waited and waited
    guess what time they came?

    8:00 at night
    You had no idea how pissed I was…they gave me alot of excuses of why they were late
    And I wasn’t having any of it.
    And then they said they didn’t knew I was waiting for them.
    I told them I live alone. Who else would be waiting for them?
    And they said that usually they have the house maid wait for them so it wouldn’t matter what time they came in the day.
    I was really pissed when I heard that…’cus it just shows you the kind of work ethic most people have here…
    Yeah ‘cus probably not alot of people live in a house without a maid (unless you don’t afford it).
    So that’s why the slack off in things like this…ah they think it wouldn’t matter what time they came the house maid won’t complain when they came, it’s not like the house maid is going anywhere…F***!
    That kind of mindset is just wrong…maid or no maid…do your f***in job and do it on time!!!!

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  38. […] could  make a sewage  factory smell sweet by  changing the signboard into Perfume Factor (see here and here for past […]

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  39. just read this blog, and oh how it made me reminisce of my days back in jkt.

    i had similar experience, and how that experience traumatize me to be paranoid of all cust support… ><
    isp in indon really had sunk that low.. even at one point i really2 pissed and said to the manager “if you guys cant do anything, just gimme access and i will fix it for you”.. in indo of course

    jez…
    i so feel you guys…
    kabelvision is so sucks that i really wanna kill all the staffs there.. but there really no other providers, rite? =(

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  40. My experience with James’ enterprise was a landed house at Bukit Sentul. I bought a unit on one of their many clusters at Bukit Sentul huge residential area. They promised to hand me the key to my brand new house 2 years after that day. So I paid…. (stupidly me)…in full!

    Oh yes, you guessed it right. Not only did I got bleached whenever I asked them about this one year later, when I finally came to the place, there were NOTHING BUILT at all!! Not even a road to get there by normal, 4 wheeled SUV.

    I finally got confirmation about my house from a new management called Sentul City. I don’t know and I could not care less of who they were, I just wanted my house to stand firmly on the ground where my family and I can spend lovely weekends.

    Guess some apple fall far away from its tree..?!

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  41. Aww at least it’s better than Speedy 😉 IMO.

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