If we get a hospital bill, we should send it to astro. It's been frustration all the way since we signed up for astro beyond. We now call it astro beyond means beyond the control of the voice that we are speaking to, whether it is the technician that installed the setop box or the technical assistance we call.
Here's what happened... astro sends a very young team of technician to install the setop box. That was 2 days ago. They also adjusted the existing satellite dish. Whilst the technician is here, the viewing is interrupted constantly with the message...'invalid smart card..' every few minutes. My son tells them it's the setop box and the smartcard. They are faulty and need to be replaced. The technician insists it will normalise automatically. He says leave it on and it will normalise. An he left. With our old setop box for regular astro. 48 hours later the problem is still there. In the meantime we call the technician, he says it is beyond his control, call astro.
So we call astro, wait for a long long time. That was last night. No one picks up the phone. Then we call astro again, wait for a long time again. We got to speak to technical assistance. The technician says they'll do a diagnostics from their side this morning. Then they find it can't be resolved. They'll send someone to pick up the setop box within the next 48 hours to take it for diagnostics. But. They can't give us a replacement setop box. So it must mean we won't be able to watch astro at all. The voice says it is beyond his control...
I guess in our kind of big is better and where there is no competition, this is what we have to put up with. We become sitting ducks for bad service. As if it is a free service. The system has no sense.
If you sign up for beyond and you get a faulty box, bad luck. You are stuck with that box until that box gets fixed, even if it was faulty from day one. That we think is the most ridiculous system. I guess with a low income society like Malaysia coupled with monopoly, any bad system no matter how ridiculous, still sells. What is a few disgruntled customers amongst millions, right?
We are talking about an enhanced service from normal satellite tv to high definition tv and yet the service level is pretty much third world. And the way customers are treated clearly needs to be taken up a notch higher. We may be a low income society but that does not mean that the country is filled with senseless non thinking idiots. Give the customers some sense of dignity.
3 comments:
i oso faced it today, n sinced im the child of my parent, n i'm the one make arrangement wif astro for the astro beyond, i got scolded badly from my dad, n the technician said i need to talk to astro's hq.
When my dad call, the ask do tis n tat. still nothing. then the technician come back after got scolded, n he say tat we shuld take the decoder n samrtcard by ourself n change it at astro hq. Nice huh?
He want to terminate astro, but it's say in the agreement we can't in 1 year. wth?
Dear Anonymous,
Thanks for reading my blog and for sharing your experience. I am sorry you went through the same bad experience we did. I hope by now your problem has been resolved, one way or another. Our problem was eventually resolved although we are now faced with some minor problems over the use of the remote control. I'm not sure if astro will ever come back to us to resolve that but our expectation of astro is now so low, we may not do anything until we feel we have the energy to deal with astro again.
I understand your reaction in wanting to cancel astro beyond. At one point, that was exactly how I felt. But I understand that would not have been possible as the old satellite dish had been taken down for the upgraded one to be put up and the upgraded one nly works for astro beyond. So in technical terms that option is out.
Contractually, there should be a cooling off period to allow for consumers to cancel their subscription if they change their minds within a reasonable period even if astro beyond was working properly. I think you ought to be able to invoke the cooling off period, if there is a cooling off period provision. If there isn't one, I would like to know why there isn't one.
There should be an avenue for terminating the contract. There is clearly a defect in the product resulting in astro not being able to provide the services that it has contracted to provide.
It's awful that the technician just says, take the decoder and smartcard and change it at astro. That is most unacceptable especially if the product is faulty right from the start.
If I may offer a suggestion to astro. astro should have a customer care that calls its subscribers as soon as it receives a report from the technician that the decoder has been set up. Check that astro beyond is actually working properly. On the ground, the technician should ensure that the transmission is working smoothly. If it is not, report to astro customer care immediately to receive authorisation for a replacement of the defective decoder or smartcard.
It is unsatisfactory right now the way astro is handling the setting up of such a high end product as astro beyond. A lot more needs to be done to meet the high expectation of the subscribers.
Every decoder set ought to be tested at the warehouse before it is released to the technician for installation at subscriber's premises. That must surely be more efficient and cost effective.
I'm sure Anonymous and I hope the government department overseeing the licensing of astro and the ministry of domestic trade and consumers would look into this, if astro wouldn't.
if there's a new provider, i want to race with thousands (could be millions?) to leave astro..
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