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Xtra/Telecom billing from Usenet news

Path: kcbbs!waikato!news.hn.netlink.co.nz!wolfman.xtra.co.nz!xtra
From: brendono@usa.net (Brendon O'Connor)
Newsgroups: nz.comp
Subject: Re: XTRA charges extra?
Date: Fri, 29 Nov 1996 04:11:58 GMT
Organization: Customer of Telecom Internet Services
Lines: 55
Message-ID: <57lk6i$qfe1@wolfman.xtra.co.nz>
References: <01bbdd83$6e1450a0$630a10ac@jjarvie.deloitte.co.nz>
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I was over billed by over $100.00 on my first account from Xtra.
Xtra were very unhelpful in finding out if there was in fact a billing
error. It was only my perserverance that saw me getting a credit for
this overbilling. According to a conversation I had with Jim
McFarlane, Billing Co-ordinator with Xtra the problem of overbilling
was "widespread". 

I tried to get the media and the ISPANZ to bring this problem to the
attention of the affected customers. I had no luck. The only news
article loosly refering to this was in the National Business review.
I even contacted the Serious Fraud Office and the Commerce Commision
and the then Minister of Communication, Maurice Williamson. However I
am not aware that anyone else who was overbilled was even advised or
given a credit. 

I have summised that the reason for the lack of publicity is due to
the power of Telecom. The possibility of the advertising revenue being
pulled is enough for all of the media to shy away from this story.

During October Xtra had problems with their billing system which is
still not rectified. The problem is that there is no way of proving
that the amount you have been billed for is what you owe. 
If you disagree with this amount you can refuse to pay it and have
your phone disconected and never be able to get a phone connected ever
again. Even after Xtra admitted there was a problem and that I was due
a credit Telecom advised me that I had to pay the acount or have my
phone disconected.

In the end I spent over $100.00 in phone calls and faxes to get this
problem rectified. Of course the revenue for these phone calls and
faxes all go to Telecom so Telecom are laughing at me and are happily
pocketing all the revenue (possibly over $100,000.00) that they have
over billed Xtra customers.

If anyone wants to email to me my email is brendono@usa.net

"John Jarvie"  wrote:

>I have been looking upp the on-line billing enquiry for my Xtra account.

>For the period shown this gives a total of 2hour 6 minutes, which is fine. 
>This should result in $5.25 from the local number I have been using.

>The billing enquiry actually reports $10.43 which by my calculation exceeds
>even the 0800 rate of $4.95.

>Is anyone else being overbilled?

>Is the amount on the billing enquiry what they actually bill?

>I tried the 0800 support number - guess what?  Its busy.

Domain Name Company High Court decision 29 Sept 96

The Auckland High Court has accepted the injunction application by Sanyo, Cadbury and Fuji-Xerox.
An 'interlocutory' injunction and a mandatory injunction requiring the Domain Name Company to immediately return the Internet addresses to their rightful owners has been issued.

Cadbury to sue Domain Name Company 10 Sept 96

Reported in today's Herald that Cadburys the chocolate people are to take the Domain Name Company (DNC) to the High Court because the Internet Society of NZ (ISOCNZ) allowed DNC to register the domain name cadbury.co.nz and now IRC tried to sell the name to Cadbury for $10,000.
A silly situation brought about by ISOCNZ.
What happened to the common sense we used to see applied by Rex Croft when Waikato University mananged the .nz dns? Seems to have totally disappeared and now we have ISOCNZ whose only concern seem to be to cover their ass legally as quickly as possible. IMHO they are getting some piss-poor advice regarding the allocation of dns names from a legal viewpoint.
Their total inability to take responsibility and apply a reasonable dose of common sense to the whole dns management issue has now led to a high court case where lots of $ will be wasted fighting a needless legal battle. Its a pity Cadbury are suing the DNC as the people who are ultimatly responsible are ISCONZ who allocated the names in the first place to the DNC.

Glad I didn't buy an Ascend box - 4 Sep 96

What a kerfuffle this Primary rate ISDN is causing. Telecom stuffs up again major time with their NEC NEAX61E primary rate ISDN switches. No stepping properly to next PRI when using a Ascend ISDN modem server. It crashes. Ihug getting annoyed and Xtra finding problems too.
Now I'm real glad I have two PRI into a Cisco AS5200 and not a problem to be seen :-)