K7AAY
join:2006-12-16
Portland, OR
| Down since Thursday, no explanation
Been using Avvanta since they were Blarg.
On 12-14, their service went down, and have not come back up. No web site, no e-mail, other customers several hundred miles away from me report the same.
Not even an explanatory web page, which could easily be hosted elsewhere.
Their phones don't work, either.
I expect an ISP to be able to tell its customers when it's down for an extended time, and why. Redundancy and multi-homed connections is such a basic precept of the Internet that's it's a shock when an ISP fails to provide even basic service to its customers so dramatically. |
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jdmt
Premium
join:2002-05-06
Seattle, WA
1 edit | I agree that it's unusual for an ISP to go down hard with no word at all, but given their long history of great service (I've been with them since 2000), I suspect there is something bigger going on.
The eastside suffered extensive damage in the storm and there are still hundreds of thousands subscribers without power. The fact that their support phone line says "all circuits are busy" is alarming and points to some major issue in their offices.
I'm not discounting the possibility that the owners/employees suffered some kind of personal loss in the storm and so am willing to give them some time to figure things out before jumping ship.
Does anyone have any additional info? |
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karenrif
join:2006-12-17
Bellevue, WA
| reply to K7AAY
Found out from Qwest yesterday that Avvanta's phone number (425) 818-6500 is under the auspices of Broadwing Corp. Called Broadwing various times and was told various things. Have not been able to obtain status, other than confirmation that Avvanta is a customer of Broadwing's. Frustrating - no email for 3 days now and no way to get status updates. Am using hotmail as a backup in the meantime, but no way to see if I've missed anything important in the last 3 days on my main email address. |
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K7AAY
join:2006-12-16
Portland, OR
| reply to jdmt
Things always break... and professional comm facilities have multiple links with multiple facilities as a result.
That they don't have a backup out of area, even so little as to redirect their phone number to another provider with a recorded message, and don't redirect their domain and put up a web page giving status, tells me they don't care enough what their customers think.
This is the Internet after all, designed to allow redundancy and backup sites out of area. How much would it have cost them to have a reciprocal agreement with an out-of-area ISP?
Heck, redirecting avvanta.com to a blog page would cost nothing. |
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aack
join:2002-12-29
Seattle, WA
| reply to K7AAY
Customer since 2000.
Add me to the shocked and dismayed list. With exception of this short forum post, no other information is avaialble.
I've got an entire family jonesing for their link, or at least acknowledment that it will magically reappear.
»www.justbroadband.org/reviews/698 |
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longtimeblargger
@comcast.net
| I am also dismayed but, to be fair, the almost the entire city of Bellevue has been without power for the last few days.
»www.ci.bellevue.wa.us/bellevue_w···news.htm
Amazingly, Bellevue downtown was without power until yesterday.
PSE says that 300k customers are still without power.
»www.pse.com/InsidePSE/serviceAlert.aspx
I assume that is the reason for this prolonged Avvanta/Blarg outage.
Even so, I agree that it is unacceptable that Blarg is unavailable by phone and has not redirected their website to provide information for their customers. Even under these extraordinary circumstances, for Blarg to go completely quiet and dead is disturbing. |
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K7AAY
join:2006-12-16
Portland, OR | reply to K7AAY
»groups.google.com/group/alt.inte···bf0aa0c6 over on USENET has more info. |
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Geff
@blarg.net | reply to K7AAY
My dsl line is back! Just waiting for email & my domain now. |
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K7AAY
join:2006-12-16
Portland, OR
| From avvanta.com's home page, a response, FINALLY:
> Having a venue to address these concerns is good, I'd like to thank
> BroadbandReports and everyone posting in this thread.
> We do have contingency plans and they have been more than sufficient in
> the past. These fail safes were insufficient, to put it mildly, for a
> state of emergency. Now that we have all faced this level of pure
> destruction in our hometowns and communities our approach to the 'what
> if's' will be much more encompassing.
> The office where our network is housed suffered heavily with downed
> trees and pieces of equipment housed on the roof were brought offline
> by flying debris.
> It's impossible to plan for every potential calamity that may befall a
> singular piece of equipment, as the recent crane falling in downtown
> Bellevue can illustrate.
But, windstorms happen, several times in recent memory.
Five weeks after the Skagit River floods, there's a
clear lapse in redundancy shown once more.
> One of the future improvements to our network is a second NOC at a
> geographically different location for additional redundancy. This plan
> was put into effect months ago. Due to how long it takes for decent
> pipes to be installed installation was delayed until Friday the 15th.
Will those pipes reply on Qwest-provided infrastructure
at all?
> Additionally, our VOIP phone system, will be supplemented with a
> regular land line that will be available to all customers wishing a
> status report.
Will that landline be at your primary location, or
will it be geographically separate for the sake of
redundancy?
> Open communication has always been at the heart of our philosophy as a
> business and as individuals. As we recover from this destruction and
> unroll the new services we've been preparing updates will be made to
> the main web site. If you have concerns please contact us via email
> (supp...@avvanta.com) or call (425.818.6500). Call volume will be heavy
> for the first 24 to 48 hours.
> Marc Lewis
> President
> Avvanta Communications |
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