Tata indicomm - extremely poor service!

brownboy66

So prior to coming to india I worked in Telecommunication for about 11 years. Have worked on high speed data networks, satellite, Internet....and mobile. Upon coming to India decided to get a cdma service as my wife needed a data card for her laptop - and cdma 1xrtt has the technical edge over GPRS (sorry - it just does). Tried Reliance but to be honest - they came across as completely disinterested - so went with Tata Indicomm instead.

The good part - phones and data card work well. The coverage is good and have had not problems using the data card while, say, travelling on the train, etc. Throughput is more than adequate for email and general browsing.

The bad part - service. So we had a robbery about 6 weeks back, but managed to get the phone back 2 weeks ago - and its still not working. What's the problem? A new sim card has been issued but its still not working on the phone. It will work in other phones but not on this one. Conclusions?

1) What has become apparently is that the people at the front desk have no idea what they are selling and how it works. This points to incredibly poor training of the sales staff (if they get any training at all).
2) Technical staff might be only slightly better understanding then the front desk staff.
3) In some cases their suggestions boarder on fraud. We asked for calls to the stolen phone to be diverted to another tata indicomm phone - the reply was that this could only be done via the hand set which......is a bare face lie! I know this as one company I worked for ran a CDMA network - and diverting a number in the network is simply a case of replacing the phone number associated with the ESN (electronic serial number)with the number you wish to divert to. Either the person suggesting this didn't know what had to be done - or was suggesting it to try and make us pay for calls twice (if you use call forwarding on the handset you pay for the incoming call - and the outgoing call to the number you have forwarded to).
4) Initially staff tried to say that a newly installed sim card was faulty (and that we would have to pay for another one as Tata is not liable for faulty sim cards that they supply). Then they tried to say the phone didn't need a sim card in the first place (it turned out they simply hadn't programmed the new sim card into their network).

so at this stage the phone is still not working so back to the tata indicomm office tomorrow. What is annoying is that having worked for a cdma operator in the past I know exactly what is involved in provisioning these services and what can be done. I've personally overseen changes to network configurations, phone upgrades, etc - where most minor changes are completed in less than 60 seconds. You can understand that front desk staff may be lacking in knowledge - but given the size of the company thats not really an excuse.

Nick-H

I don't recommend you buy a Tata car, either.

And, on the basis of all this, were I ever to find myself in the situation of managing a large project back in UK, I wouldn't employ Tata Consultancy.

Looking for steel? Might not have a choice; they seem to be cornering the world market in steel .

I hear that the Tata family is great at talking about customer satisfaction, and how every individual customer matters to them. Trouble is, I don't think they told their employees.

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shashank.aggarwal

Tata Indicom is the worst service provided I have ever encountered...I would give Sify ltd a few points more but its not much better either...

I have had horrid experiences with Tata Indicom and few times to get the problems solved we simply used to call their call center and abuse them for 30 minutes in Indian Style...

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capt_mahajan

I mentioned this elsewhere, but when I wanted to disconnect my Tata Indicom landline about four years ago, they wanted to disconnect and take away the instrument first and return my deposit later. (just 1000 at that time).

Instead, I ran up bills worth about the thousand, and told them to return my deposit and take the instrument at the same time.

The phone instrument is still at home. I didn't remind them.

Companies in India are ready to sell. After sales and customer service is not expected, at least by this customer.

The trick is to make sure the default setting is in your favour.. so never have money with them.

brownboy66

mmmmmmm.....airtel is looking better all the time!

Nick-H

Don't forget BSNL. Their help desk may be useless, but it is possible to get hold of a local engineer.

But, in general, Indian service providers still have a lot to learn, and Indian customers still have a long way to go before they demand more.

I'm having a fight with Panasonic over an AC at the moment!

rushie82

AC right now? I thought it is too cold here right now to turn on the fan. Or are u one of those ppl like me who buy things off-season to get discounts.

Nick-H

Can easily live without it; temperature around 30, although humidity makes it nice to use at night.

This is our living room ac. Kept tripping the circuit breaker. They came, and said it was an electrician's problem. The electrician came and said, nothing wrong with the wiring.

Between them, at one stage they had it feeding live current into the earth wire (I got a shock from the microwave, and yes, I know that means the house earthing is deficient) and have now left it with the polarity reversed, and apparently, according to my meagre understanding, using the 'earth' as neutral (it works if you disconnect the 'live' ). I have major doubts that it is safe to use.

Its a pigs ear, and I'm beginning to have strong sympathies for Prince Philip!

devilsmaster

I like the airtel more although it is a bit costly but its a good srvice provider and the people who need well service can use it without any tension of coverage area of network.

brownboy66

So its now 6 weeks since we tried to get our Tata Indicom phone back up and running - and its still not going. Unbelievably, numerous people in Tata Indicom offices are still not sure what the problem is.

The first tactic was to blame the manufacture of the sim card and say they were not at fault and had no responsibility for faulty sim cards they may have sold. Now they are saying the motorola phone is faulty and we have to deal directly with motorola (despite the fact they were very happy to take on money when we brought if from the tata indicom shop).

And the most annoying thing! They've charged us a full months worth of fees despite the fact the phone wasn't working! Given the name this company carries I would have thought they might have been a bit more concerned about safeguarding the brand - but obviously not. Folks - this is just our experience with Tata Indicom - so you be the judge - but I suggest you use your common sense when choosing a phone provider and remember this thread......

Periscope

I don't get mobile service from Tata Indicom but I do use their broadband and the quality is fairly awful. I am not at all surprised that their mobile offerings are equally poor. From other forums I get the sense that Tata Indicom is widely considered a poor service provider.

Airtel and BSNL generally have a better reputation. Never used the latter but I use Airtel for my mobile. While not perfect, I am reasonably satisfied with their service.

Aishah

Extremely annoying and frustrating, BB! I think you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned originally the staff in the office just don't know enough. And it's the same here with both Airtel and BSNL. Neither were much help, BSNL absolutely nil with knowledge re GPRS at the local office; Airtel finally got the correct settings in my phone after 10 days! However, now they are there no more problems. One fellow here swears by his Tata Data Card for laptop - he seems to think it is alright. Some companies are offering USB gadgets that are very fast with connections (saw this on Gadget Guru) but don't remember which ones,had a feeling Airtel was doing this.

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capt_mahajan

Thats the story of many corporations in India today. The 'staff', such as it is, concentrates on selling.

Customer satisfaction is by chance.

Dilliwala

Hey, don't say I didn't warn u months ago, BB

And here's a longer thread on this exact theme:
Tata Indicom = horrible service
(U forgot about this thread, didn't u? )

For the record, Tata and Tata Indicom are 2 separate worlds. That they have the same name and owner is purely incidental.

And Reliance are only in the business of making money, lots of it. It's all the same to them whether they sell fones or shoes.

Exactly. Which is why I stick with the govt. Same crappy service, but at lower cost. And u can usually "find" someone to help u sooner or later. In the private cos., u can't even find the same person after 30 seconds on the help-line who u were talking to for 20 mins but unluckily the line dropped out and u had to redial.

brownboy66

ok....you told me so ,but hey, you've got your "modem" thing, I've got tata indicom

We've made a decision - we are ditching tata. Hopeless staff and a couldn't care less attitude (they take for ever to get back to you when there's a fault, but their billing reminders always arrive on time). We will keep the data card for the laptop - but we are ditching the phones and moving across to Airtel.