After my recent stint with Kerala Vision and my LCO, I have decided to fill in to thread. This is quite long, so please bear with me.
Long story short, I was having signal problems for the last 3 months (maybe more). I faced intermittent disconnection problem and severe packet loss all the time. But not until I decided to check the stats page of the ONU, I thought it was some common issue with Kerala Vision ISP.
So during this time, my input signal level was at -29dbm and it began to deteriorate day by day. I contacted my LCO who is all talk and no work sort of person. He blatantly lied to me over phone that signal is provided by Kerala Vision directly and he cannot do anything about it. He also said Kerala Vision is adding more and more customers without the required infrastructure and that is why there is disconnection and speed issues. When I asked him if KV is directly providing signals then what is the purpose of an OLT he told me I am totally wrong and said that an OLT has got nothing to do with signal.
He offered me a BSNL FTTH connection and assured me that he has only a few customers using BSNL so there won't be any signal problem.
Since I understood that the guy is trying to squeeze more money out of me, I refused. I told him I just want the Kerala Vision connection fixed and he said he will try to send a technician to my house to check the issue the next day.
Days passed but nobody came. After that he never picked up any of my calls. Soon signal levels dropped to -35dbm and the connection would barely work and finally it plummeted to -37dbm and ceased to work. That was when I decided to open a support ticket with KV. I talked to them over phone and the lady who answered patiently heard my problems and said she has assigned someone from the technical team to look into it and I will receive a call back. Truth be told, I was not expecting a call back, but thankfully I received the call and talked to that person from the KV technical team about the neglect and piss-poor service I receive from the LCO. He assured me he will speak directly to the LCO and sort it out. And he did speak to the LCO and two guys came to my place the next day, inspected the cables and at that time fortunately or unfortunately signal was at -27dbm, and they said its working fine and went away. From their talks I understood that they were not so happy about, me going to KV support with this signal problem and also LCO problem. And I didn't care!
Another week passed and still no resolution. Once again I took the matter with KV support and this time, they took up it up with the LCO directly. The LCO budged and did some "fixing". He did not share with me what was done. The best input signal level I could get on my ONU was -24dbm. It was and is not stable; stays mostly at -25.5dbm and deteriorates upto -28dbm. And LCO literally asked me to take it or leave it.
Anyway I was somewhat relieved because atleast there was no disconnection and it seemed to be okayish. But I was also worried because LCO is adding new customers these days as more and more people are opting for wired broadband for online classes for their kids and also for work from home purpose. LCO uses an
EPON OLT and I guess his splitting ratio is probably 1:64 now (hence the signal problem) as he is trying to make maximum out of this situation without upgrading his infrastructure.
And as more splitters get added I think the signal levels will drop once again. The users here don't know anything about ONUs, OLTs or signal level, so the LCO can easily put all the blame on Kerala Vision in case they complain about disconnection or speed loss and they would obviously believe him.
Couple of days before my download speed got reduced, but no disconnection. I am on 50Mbps plan and speed test to KV servers showed 20Mbps download speed and 50Mbps upload speed no matter how many times I checked. Results to other servers were below 10Mbps (download), but I was getting fairly good upload speed. I contacted Kerala Vision and they said there is nothing wrong at there end. I waited for a day and there was no improvement. So I opened another ticket with KV and the person said I will get a call back. But this time I didn't. The ticket shows status as "not assigned" even at the time of writing this.
So today I texted the operator and send him screenshots of the speed tests. He said he will check. And about an hour later speeds were restored just like that (not even a device restart was done) which makes me think if it was deliberately done.
I am really fed up of this LCO. I have opted for an annual plan and is now stuck with my choice. From what I have undersood, Kerala Vision has the might to nudge the operator and make the operator do his job but you have to be extremely lucky for them to take up your case. In the first instance, the lady who opened the support ticket and the guy from the technical team who followed up really helped. Without them, the arrogant operator would have done absolutely nothing and I would be left with a connection which disconnects umpteen number of times, having severe packet loss and worst speed.
The second time I was not so lucky. I could not connect to the helpful people at Kerala Vision and my requests went unnoticed.
My advice is to go with Kerala Vision only if your LCO is good, does regular maintenance to the network and most importantly picks up your calls! Else, it would be in your best interest to stay away.
At this time, I got no other option than to continue with this LCO. There is BSNL, but it is provided by the same guy, so I am not buying it. But the moment any other ISP shows up in this area, I will jump ship. Until then, I got to stick with this operator and his third class service.
On a final note, I really wish KV reigned in these operators by introducing some SOP and benchmarks with respect to the services offered, which are to be mandatorily provided to the customer.
(the above screenshot is from my first try to connect)
