[kictanet] Quality of Tech Support with Kenyan Telcos

Mon Oct 17 16:34:27 EAT 2011

Did you see a USB modem sticking on it? This DIR-412 can work like the
DIR-825 - they both can use 3G modems but fall back to an Ethernet
connection for WAN. DIR-412 has a 10/100 Ethernet port while the DIR-825 has
10/100/1000 ports (fully Gigabit).
So if there was a USB 3G modem sticking on it, it could be several things:

1. Could be a Huawei (documented and easy to find AT strings for)
2. Could be a ZTE (their techie managed to disable the virtual CDROM, but
did not share the info on what AT strings to use)
3. Could be just a dummy sitting there...

On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 15:35, S.M. Muraya <murigi.muraya at gmail.com> wrote:

> This does not answer your question, but, I noticed a D-Link DIR 412 being
> used at an Orange Kenya shop.
>
> www.dlink.com/dir-412
> On Oct 17, 2011 1:45 PM, "Odhiambo Washington" <odhiambo at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Both AT command sets return ERROR for the ZTE MF192.
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 13:25, Nicholas J Dear <
>> ndear at sundayafternoon.me.uk> wrote:
>>
>>> Have you tried AT+ZCDRUN=8 to disable, AT+ZCDRUN=9 to re-enable?****
>>>
>>> ** **
>>>
>>> That works on other ZTE modems.****
>>>
>>> ** **
>>>
>>> N.****
>>>
>>> ** **
>>>
>>> *From:* kictanet-bounces+ndear=
>>> sundayafternoon.me.uk at lists.kictanet.or.ke [mailto:
>>> kictanet-bounces+ndear=sundayafternoon.me.uk at lists.kictanet.or.ke] *On
>>> Behalf Of *Odhiambo Washington
>>> *Sent:* 17 October 2011 13:06
>>> *To:* Nicholas J Dear
>>> *Cc:* Kictanet
>>> *Subject:* [kictanet] Quality of Tech Support with Kenyan Telcos****
>>>
>>> ** **
>>>
>>> Apologies in advance for cross-posting.
>>>
>>> I'm somehow very appalled at the level of technical support we get from
>>> our Telcos. What surprises me is the fact they they have some of the best
>>> brains in the market, yet they simply cannot get these brains to address the
>>> consumer problems. A simple problem can take you ages to get solved --
>>> unless you go behind the scenes and contact these techies at a personal
>>> level.
>>> I've come to the point of thinking that either there is too much
>>> bureaucracy introduced between the people we talk to (the CSEs) and the
>>> engineers who work in the background or the escalation process simply isn't
>>> streamlined. The process of getting a solution from the engineers can take
>>> ages (to me, a week is ages!). Then again, the Customer-facing teams simply
>>> seem to be robots who don't want to try and reason out. Is thinking out of
>>> the box not acceptable for CSEs working in these Telcos??
>>>
>>> Take one such problem that I'm facing currently with one these Telcos -
>>> ORANGE: I bought their much touted 21Mbps modem. The issue at hand is that I
>>> need to share the Internet connectivity with other residents of my house via
>>> a WiFi router. My router, a D-Link DIR-825, has a USB port that supports a
>>> 3G modem. There is one obstacle that I must overcome with the ZTE modem for
>>> me to be able to use it with my D-Link router -- I must find a way to
>>> disable the virtual CDROM and card reader from the USB stick/modem. The
>>> problem is no technician at ORANGE knows how to do this. Probably there is a
>>> technician (I have a feeling Orange must have gotten ZTE to train some
>>> technicians, or in the daftest form, ZTE must have seconded some techies to
>>> Orange!) but it's not possible to reach him/her/them!
>>>
>>> My router already works with the Safaricom's Huawei E1820, because I was
>>> able to go-ogle and find the AT Command to use to disable the virtual CDROM
>>> (AT^U2DIAG=0 does the disabling; AT^U2DIAG=1 re-enables it if I need
>>> to), which then enabled my router to recognize the USB modem. Fortunately,
>>> after installing the drivers on a computer, I really do not require the
>>> virtual CDROM interface anymore.
>>> I have not been able to find an equivalent command for ZTE-MF192 USB
>>> stick and has called Orange Customer Support (Data+Internet) so many times
>>> and they simply don't have a clue as to what I am asking for. I'd have
>>> thought they are trained to know that some clients are more demanding than
>>> others and as such they are allowed to go the extra mile and reason outside
>>> the box to help such customers.
>>>
>>> I am not sure  if I am expecting too much, but because I paid money to
>>> get this modem, I'd expect Orange to help me in any way that I'd like to use
>>> the modem. They still make their money by allowing me to use it.
>>> What I don't seem to be able to wrap my head around is why there is no
>>> technician at Orange (whether native or Chinese) who can help me with this
>>> problem? Aren't we supposed to expect a better quality support from these
>>> Telcos than we are getting now??
>>>
>>> I started by generalizing on "Telcos". I have only detailed my problem
>>> with Orange, but such problems are not exclusive to Orange. I remember
>>> Robert Yawe has detailed his own tribulations with other Telcos on this very
>>> forum.
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Best regards,
>>> Odhiambo WASHINGTON,
>>> Nairobi,KE
>>> +254733744121/+254722743223
>>> _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
>>> I can't hear you -- I'm using the scrambler.
>>> Please consider the environment before printing this email. ****
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> No virus found in this message.
>>> Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
>>> Version: 2012.0.1831 / Virus Database: 2090/4556 - Release Date: 10/16/11
>>> ****
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Best regards,
>> Odhiambo WASHINGTON,
>> Nairobi,KE
>> +254733744121/+254722743223
>> _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
>> I can't hear you -- I'm using the scrambler.
>> Please consider the environment before printing this email.
>>
>>
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>

-- 
Best regards,
Odhiambo WASHINGTON,
Nairobi,KE
+254733744121/+254722743223
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
I can't hear you -- I'm using the scrambler.
Please consider the environment before printing this email.
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