My Disastrous Experience with Airtel's Support

  • Thread starter Thread starter Deleted member 83050
  • Start date Start date
  • Replies Replies 62
  • Views Views 6,481
This is going to a long post than usual: Read till the end.

I have been trying to get static IP activated since last 15 days but the engineer getting assigned is not picking up calls nor responding. Today I called up their "dedicated relationship team" and after a lost of pestering, they spoke to the assigned engineer. He visited my house today at 2:30 pm.

My ONT was in bridge mode(WiFi disabled) so I asked him to first make changes in the ONT to which he was clueless. I connected a Lan cable to my windows laptop to the ONT and logged in. Now here's something to note, my personal router and ONT are placed in a cramped space in the lobby so that range is good throughout the house. Since the yellow patch cord(which is directly spliced to the white cable coming from the duct) from the white face plate was short, I asked him to take the ONT off the router stand which is mounted on the wall and place it on the table. I logged into the ONT and created a new WAN profile and asked him for the IP, subnet and gateway. As expected, internet didn't work in the first place, I asked him to check if the details are correct.

After doing basic troubleshooting, I was pretty sure that there's something wrong with the IP details because internet didn't work. He insisted on resetting the ONT once to which I was a little hesitant because it made no sense. He proceeded to hard reset it then. Now here's where the actual problem begins.
After resetting the ONT, it rolled back to a previous firmware and we simply couldn't edit any WAN profile details(all options were greyed out). I tried the inspect element thing and tried to delete the disabled="disabled" tag but it didn't work.

Then the engineer guy called up his Tech Lead and explained the issue. After a lot of unnecessary arguments, he somehow called the DSL NOC guy and asked him to configure the ONT remotely. It was almost 5 pm by this time and I was exhausted, anyways.

The IP details given by the engineer were different from the IP details given by the DSL NOC guy, not even the same IP pool. Since the router was now "locked" because of firmware degradation, I asked the engineer to inform NOC guy to set up LAN4 into bridge mode. At this point, even PPPoE link was down, basically internet completely stopped working. After an hour of troubleshooting from the NOC, internet didn't work. Then the engineer asked NOC if he should replace the ONT with another one, to which he said that there's nothing wrong with the ONT. He asked the engineer to hard reset the router once. As expected, it didn't work. It was almost 6 pm at this point and I started to lose patience because it was almost 4 hours since the engineer arrived.

The engineer was pushing on replacing the ONT to which the NOC agreed in the end because he was unable to configure the router remotely and engineer was completely clueless about these things. At this point I was just praying that internet should at least work otherwise I'd lose my mind.
Now here comes the main part of the story. When the engineer was trying to replace the ONT with a new one, he accidentally broke the fiber cable from the splice inside the white face plate. I was like WTF!!!

He called up his manager and informed about the issue. Soon after that he left saying that he will come back shortly with the splicing machine. I had no other option but to trust him. I kept waiting for 1 hour, then I tried to call him, surprise surprise, he didn't pick any of my calls. It was 8 pm at this point. I gave up because I was super exhausted.
So now my connection is down with a broken fiber cable and that stupid ONT lying on my table.

Accha khasa chalta hua internet bhi band karke chala gaya engineer.

To be honest I feel helpless and cheated at this point. Airtel's support and customer care is into shambles now. So much drama for configuring a simple static IP, which was not even that complicated in the first place.

I felt no point in complaining and talking to their lame and stupid customer care at 121. I just gave up completely because I had no energy left.

It would take another 2-3 days to fix this broken patch of cable according to my speculation based on past experiences.
There's no point in trying to escalate this issue with their nodal office or appellate because all they do is ignore my emails.

I'd look out for another ISP now and go for a disconnection after this incident. Yes it may seem a bit bone headed decision but I simply don't want to deal with all these things, I have too much going on at work and personal life. I don't care about those complimentary OTT subscriptions or vfm black services. It's not about money anymore.

This is totally unacceptable but there's nothing I can do apart from waiting for the fiber cable to get patched.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
@Zuke Ping remains stable, it's just higher than usual at times. I maybe wrong though. I used to get around 9-12ms ping on valorant mumbai server on TPF(CG-NAT) and 4-6ms on Airtel(Public IPv4).

@Lolita_Magnum Idk if Gazon One Giga Fiber and One Broadband are the same company. LCO guy is offering 200 Mbps for 900pm. More discount on Long term plans with free installation as well. I don't care about OTT bundle at this point, most of them are just gimmicks.
 
Update:
The same engineer came today and spliced the yellow cable. PPPoE and Static IP both are not working. I asked the engineer guy to call backend and configure the ONT to which he said it will be done "automatically" and I laughed.Upon pestering him, he let me speak to his TL and that stupid MF said it's not our job to configure the router. I said why did you even bother sending the engineer to fix the cable then to which he said that he is only responsible for fault resolution and not for Static IP or router configuration, it will be done by the backend team automatically.
I asked the engineer to leave after all this.
The ONT doesn't allow me to make any changes because it is fu**ing locked. Even the inspect element thing doesn't work. Bridge Mode WAN profile is also gone now because of all the hard resetting engineer did. 😡

I am done with this sh*t now, already raised a disconnection request. There's more to come, fighting for bill and static IP charge adjustment which was not even activated for a single second.
 
@Rhishav most probably TPF or Jio. TPF could offer me some discount for reconnection I guess because I have been using it for 1.5 years before switching to Airtel. Jio has just started their service in my society so I am not sure but still under consideration, maybe as a backup ISP.

@Lolita_Magnum I will ask the engineer once, although I don't expect any support from them. Is there a way to unlock the sercomm router?
 
@rajat_ I feel sorry for you. Better switch to another ISP ASAP and forget about this bad experience.
I have no hope for Airtel support. They close my SRs without any resolution. At least my internet is working.
 
So something strange happened today. I got a call from their retention team asking why I want to disconnect, I explained them everything. They told me that it will be fixed within an hour and ofc I didn't believe them.
Just after 15 minutes of speaking to them, my connection is up again, both PPPoE and Static IP are working. Even the bridge mode WAN profile is back. I was able to dial up static IP from my Archer AX10 as well.
Although I am relieved that internet is working now, I won't be able to trust Airtel again. I will move to another ISP after this billing cycle(26th) because arguing with them for bill clarification is another headache which I don't want.
I have also asked the retention team to remove any static IP charges incurred for this month to which they said I need to contact CC once the bill is generated i.e. 27th September.

Note to IBF members:

Don't opt for Airtel Black, it is just to trap customers. If anyone is going for Airtel broadband, always opt for a prepaid connection so that you have more control over your it.Don't fall for the lucrative OTT plans, most of them are just gimmicks in the name of OTT and you will never use them. Never mess with their lame and stupid CC or expect any immediate support, even if your connection is down. Either one needs to have a lot of patience or a decent backup ISP if Airtel goes down. If better options are available in your area, don't get Airtel in the first place.
For those who get FOMO that Airtel doesn't serve your area/society yet, trust me guys, you're lucky and not missing out on anything special. While their internet works super fine, if it goes down for any reason, you're doomed.
Nobody deserves to go through all this BS.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
@rajat_ not sure where you reside in Pune, but I think it depends on the area infra and the support team assigned to it. Several people in my housing colony are using Airtel and we are all happy. It gives very little problems to be honest. Yes but one thing..if you have tech issues be patient and take a pill to cure the headache because you will get it when you deal with their call centres etc.
 
Back