do you feel like you' re living in a third world country?
Discussion
Hi All, need to have a rant - it seems in order to support staff to work from home TFL use some arachaic system on their telephone lines ....it causes really bad delays in the call when you are trying to talk to their staff . I've experienced this when calling other businesses in the UK , just feel increasingly like I am living in a third world country......
Twentyfour7 said:
Hi All, need to have a rant - it seems in order to support staff to work from home TFL use some arachaic system on their telephone lines ....it causes really bad delays in the call when you are trying to talk to their staff . I've experienced this when calling other businesses in the UK , just feel increasingly like I am living in a third world country......
Id bet not archaic. Voice over IP. It’s flexible. It’s (very) cheap. All of your trunk calling has been VOIP for about 25 years. But, can be configured very badly indeed and only as good as the network carrying it. Which if folk are WFH on contended cellular will potentially be s
tty. 
Twentyfour7 said:
Hi All, need to have a rant - it seems in order to support staff to work from home TFL use some arachaic system on their telephone lines ....it causes really bad delays in the call when you are trying to talk to their staff . I've experienced this when calling other businesses in the UK , just feel increasingly like I am living in a third world country......
It's a not third world country problem.It's people using the minimum viable solution (VOIP), as cheaply as possible, because the savings help bolster their margins, so they can trouser the difference between that and an actual good customer experience.
This is a first world country problem.
(The same thing would likely happen in second world countries, but the mechanism would be good, honest corruption)
InitialDave said:
It's a not third world country problem.
It's people using the minimum viable solution (VOIP), as cheaply as possible, because the savings help bolster their margins, so they can trouser the difference between that and an actual good customer experience.
This is a first world country problem.
(The same thing would likely happen in second world countries, but the mechanism would be good, honest corruption)
Indeed. This sort of thing is part of my job (B2B) and the conversations I have had over it beggars belief.It's people using the minimum viable solution (VOIP), as cheaply as possible, because the savings help bolster their margins, so they can trouser the difference between that and an actual good customer experience.
This is a first world country problem.
(The same thing would likely happen in second world countries, but the mechanism would be good, honest corruption)
- Yes using a provider with infrastructure half way round the world is much cheaper, but your staff are in the UK and there's physical distance to deal with...every packet travels half way round the world and back.
- Yes your staff working from home (often in "interesting" countries) with poor, cheap internet connections may run into poor call quality. No it doesn't make any difference that they can "load the BBC website fine".
- Yes if your VPN doesn't allow traffic via the required ports it won't work.
- Yes we did warn you that establishing the VoiP call via a mobile phone wouldn't be as effective as WebRTC, a technology you rejected because you didn't understand it.
etc etc etc
Odysseus01 said:
In the last few months I've spent a lot of time in both Thailand and Spain. I am happy to argue with anyone that both now have better infrastructures, public services, etc, etc, than we do.
Neither Spain or Thailand are third world countries. Compare a small town in rural Thailand to a small town in rural England and there is a massive difference in quality of life. Gassing Station | The Lounge | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff