Come tomorrow, and i’ll have spent one month with the ’’Volkswagen’’ of broadband.

Yes its cheap, at $7.95 a month for 400 MB of data transfer. But BSNL have a long long way to go in areas of customer service and attitude.

As of now their attitude is still ’’We are doing you a favour’’ (even though they are being paid). And its just impossible to associate the word ’’service’’ with their ’’Customer service’’. The phone is never answered if it rings, or its allways busy. If you do get someone on line, its allways someone whos totally unprofessional and tense, overworked and underpaid. Answers like ’’What am I supposed to do?’’ and ’’Its not my fault’’ in loud aggressive voices are quite common.

This isnt something that wont ever fail. Fail it will and did almost thrice in this month. 2 days ago it just would not connect for almost 18 hours. Knowing its no use calling customer service, i didnt. Things stabalized later, but with a noticable drop in performance.

Obviously this is just the beginning and BSNL has only a few customers. That should explain the 30kbps speeds. I’d love to see that happen a few months from now.

In all barring the BSNL personnel its been good going.

I recommend BSNL for its performance, but for anything else look elsewhere.

One word of advice: if you find your speeds too slow, pick up your phone reciever and check if you have some crackling noise. Get the line men to sort that out. That’s the biggest culprit and can make a huge difference in performance.

Over all:
Application procedure: ok not much of a fuss
Installation: Pathetic. Could not install on Win2000 and made me format and install XP
Performance : At the beginning 30 Kbps, a month later 19 Kbps
Unavailibility of service: Thrice. The last time for 18 hrs.
Customer Service: Read above.
Called sutomer service: 4 to five times.

<------------------------------- Previous Review --------------------------------------------->
After using Airtel broadband for almost a year at work, I decided to get a broad band connection for home use after I received a phone bill for INR 1100 using dial up.

Since airtel doesnt serve our area, I had no choice but to go with BSNL. All the other Broadband providers are yet to enter the market where I live.

Application procedure was the typical GOI routine - hand the application at one desk and then run from floor to floor to see where it ended up.

Anyway, I handed my application for Dataone on 16th Sep 2005. I filled in the application in the BSNL office and handed it to the ’’Internet Madam’’. ’’Internet Madam’’ passed it to her subordinate, who in turn passed it to someone else. I was asked to be seated since the application had to come back to ’’Internet Madam’’ who had to sign it and hand it to me so I could go pay the security deposit

After nearly 45 minutes... no trace of my application. I was advised to go check in the processing office. No trace of it there too. So I got back to ’’Internet Madam’’ who voiced a few strong words to her subordinates, and hey Presto there comes my file with all handwritten stuff.

I am handed a demand note and go pay my 500 INR. Thats the end of the application procedure.

3 days later I get a call verifying my address and phone number and someone tells me ’’We’ll come on Tuesday’’. On Tuesday no sign of anyone. So I call the HO and ask if anyone can be sent. Finally two did turn up on Wednesday.

This is where the fun all begins.

Obviously BSNL will not recruit new personnel to do installation work, since they have so many old hands around.

My installation crew is an old man and another middle aged guy. Both obviously know nothing about computers and read from a big book whatevers been told to them. Eg: Go to file, then new, then settings etc etc. And thats read by one man and the other does it after repeating it.

After turning on my pc, they are shocked to find its Windows 2000. ’’So far we have not installed on this saar’’. ’’You must have windows 98 or XP, it is easy to install on that’’. Since I cant go format just for this, I ask them to try to install it on Win 2000.
No knowing a thing they try to put in IP addresses and other stuff, making a virtual mess.

Then come the phone calls. Almost 10 people called in 1 hour. And that too from my line where I have no free calls. WOW.

An Hour later still no luck. Finally I’m told the AE lives near my house and that hes on his way to lunch and will stop here.

AE came saw fiddled and went. Sometimes switching off my PC without shutting it down when it had to be restarted.

Not wanting to do any damage to the PC, I suggest I’ll install XP and ask them to leave.

Friday, XP is installed and all is done. A call to the Exchange brings the same people here + one new face.

This time its a breeze. Put in the IP addresses, get your short cut on the desktop and you’re ready to go. That’s the end of sarkari stuff. The rest, in terms of performance etc. is comparable to global standards for 256 Kbps DSL service.

The speed is fantastic. I’ve clocked 30 KBps for file downloads, and web pages load almost instantly.

I havent rec any bills untill now. My next bill comes in November. I opted for home 250 and already used more than allocated. I put up the bills when they arrive.

You can check your usage online or Install a bandwidth monitor on you PC.

So far performance has been excellent with no need to call BSNL.

I submitted a letter to upgrade me to Home 500. That will give me 1gb of data transfer. Les see how it goes.

If you need a good and cheap broad band service this is highly recommended.
You may not face problems like i did.

I had win2000 only for development work. You might have winxp or 98 or better yet - personnel who can set up connections in win2000.

Go apply for yours today.