Anyone called Belkin Support

When I called them years ago they were great.

When I called this morning I got through instantly but felt like throwing
the phone through the window in frustration. First attempt I could hardly
hear the guy, couldn't understand his accent and was then cut off after
giving all my details. Second attempt I kept connection, had to give all my
details again, couldn't understand the accent and he had never heard of how
my system is set up using homeplugs. He kept asking me to connect direct
from router to PC and I kept telling him the homeplug is the same as having
the cabling he was asking me to do.

He seemed determined to go through a scripted process, kept putting me on
hold and in the end said he was not able to help but a senior technician
would call back in a while - that was 6 hours ago and no one called yet.

I was trying to find out if, what my Zen support guy had told me, that
routers can go past their best and need replacing.

Anyone shed any light on my last sentence and forgive my moaning in the rest
of the post.

Ken

In article <47c826d8$0$8425$(E-Mail Removed)>,
Ken <Reply to NG only> wrote:

>I was trying to find out if, what my Zen support guy had told me, that
>routers can go past their best and need replacing.

Electronics can. Especially ones with electrolytic capacitors in them,
or ones mass-produced with maybe some marginal solder joints that got
through the QA process, etc... Then a few years of powered up in a
household, and one day it decided to just stop working.

I've had a few cheap bits of "consumer" kit die on my in recent years.
They certinaly shouldn't "wear out", but maybe that's a sign of cheap,
bulk manufacture... I've also had a rather expensive DLink rack
mount switch die on me - power supply failure (those electrolytic caps
again - probably)

Then again, I have an old "transistor" radio that must be 30 years old.
Maybe they just don't make them like they used to!

Gordon

"Ken" <Reply to NG only> wrote in message
news:47c826d8$0$8425$(E-Mail Removed)...
> When I called them years ago they were great.
>

>
> I was trying to find out if, what my Zen support guy had told me, that
> routers can go past their best and need replacing.
>
> Anyone shed any light on my last sentence and forgive my moaning in the
> rest of the post.
>
> Ken
>

Can you connect to the router from your PC? If you can then don't tell the
Belkin man that you are using a homeplug! However if you can't then you
really need to take the homeplug out of the equation before you contact
Belkin by either moving your PC or using a long ethernet cable (I've got a
couple of 20m cables for just this scenario), it could be a router fault or
a homeplug failure, both can and do fail and it's not unreasonable for
Belkin support to try and get you to connect directly, they are not
responsible for fault finding your network connections.

Peter

"Peter Andrews" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:1tXxj.214396$(E-Mail Removed) .uk...
>
> "Ken" <Reply to NG only> wrote in message
> news:47c826d8$0$8425$(E-Mail Removed)...
>> When I called them years ago they were great.
>>
>
>>
>> I was trying to find out if, what my Zen support guy had told me, that
>> routers can go past their best and need replacing.
>>
>> Anyone shed any light on my last sentence and forgive my moaning in the
>> rest of the post.
>>
>> Ken
>>
>
> Can you connect to the router from your PC? If you can then don't tell
> the Belkin man that you are using a homeplug! However if you can't then
> you really need to take the homeplug out of the equation before you
> contact Belkin by either moving your PC or using a long ethernet cable
> (I've got a couple of 20m cables for just this scenario), it could be a
> router fault or a homeplug failure, both can and do fail and it's not
> unreasonable for Belkin support to try and get you to connect directly,
> they are not responsible for fault finding your network connections.
>
> Peter

Had a total of 3 chats with Belkin and the senior technician called after my
OP. When he asked if had a wired or wireless connection I said wired.
Easier!!! The upshot was he said he felt the problem was not the router and
I offered to borrow a friends, almost new spare router, and run for a week
to see how it fared. He said if the new router worked better he would
arrange a brand new replacement router for my current one which is under a
Lifetime Guarantee. He said if the borrowed router was the same as my
existing one he felt the ISP should sort out.

Ken

"Ken" <Reply to NG only> wrote in message
news:47c85a66$0$8421$(E-Mail Removed)...
> Had a total of 3 chats with Belkin and the senior technician called after
> my OP. When he asked if had a wired or wireless connection I said wired.
> Easier!!! The upshot was he said he felt the problem was not the router
> and I offered to borrow a friends, almost new spare router, and run for a
> week to see how it fared. He said if the new router worked better he would
> arrange a brand new replacement router for my current one which is under a
> Lifetime Guarantee. He said if the borrowed router was the same as my
> existing one he felt the ISP should sort out.
>
> Ken


My experience of Belkin is very good as well. They are the only offshored
tech support I have found to be really good.

Ken <Reply to NG only> wrote:
> my system is set up using homeplugs. He kept asking me to connect direct
> from router to PC and I kept telling him the homeplug is the same as having
> the cabling he was asking me to do.

Bzzt, wrong answer. When working with someone who has a script, always
make sure you give the expected answer that moves you on to the next
stage. Repeat after me... "You don't have homeplug, you have a direct
connection. You can see the flashing lights when you plug in the cable
from the router and PC, both of which are next to you.

:-(

Chris

"Chris Davies" <chris-(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> Ken <Reply to NG only> wrote:
>> my system is set up using homeplugs. He kept asking me to connect direct
>> from router to PC and I kept telling him the homeplug is the same as
>> having
>> the cabling he was asking me to do.
>
> Bzzt, wrong answer. When working with someone who has a script, always
> make sure you give the expected answer that moves you on to the next
> stage. Repeat after me... "You don't have homeplug, you have a direct
> connection. You can see the flashing lights when you plug in the cable
> from the router and PC, both of which are next to you.
>
> :-(
>
> Chris

Sounds like the time VM refused to support me until I had connected the PC
directly to the cable modem. Told them I wasn't prepared to run the
security risk. They would only refer me to their PC support line at
squillions of pounds per sec...

My experience of Belkin is very good as well. They are the only offshored
> tech support I have found to be really good.
>

Agreed, I've phoned a couple of times and always been very impressed.

"Steve Olive" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:47cc8120$0$32048$(E-Mail Removed)...
>
> My experience of Belkin is very good as well. They are the only offshored
>> tech support I have found to be really good.
>
> Agreed, I've phoned a couple of times and always been very impressed.

Must get the name of the person you spoke to as I was most unimpressed. I
feel it is bloody annoying to have to ask the person to repeat themselves
time and time again as I just can't understand their accents. Equally bloody
annoying to be asked to repeat myself to them time and time again. Each of
the three people I spoke to on the same day were all similarly unable to
express themselves clearly.

Sorry but not impressed at all.

Ken