Current Affairs
Mobile phones
16 June 2009Telecom's XT network
It’s just over a week since Telecom’s new network went live. We’ve got a BlackBerry Bold in the office at the moment, and we’re going to put it through its paces to see how XT shapes up. Hamish in particular is keen to see if he’ll get any reception on his remote farm …
Apparently there were around 25,000 sales in the first five days. Rebecca Earl from Telecom told me that they “represented sales 20 percent ahead of our target for the month of June across Gen-I and Retail. To put this figure in context, our average day sales since launch are about 140 percent higher that what we would sell on the busiest pre-Christmas shopping day.”
There are some key things we want to find out in the coming weeks and months. Reception quality is one – the long-standing assumption is that Telecom’s CDMA network has greater rural coverage than Vodafone’s network, but this might change with XT. Reliability is another. I’d like to see if any niggling issues crop up while the network is still young – you can only find out so much from controlled tests.
It will be interesting to see how quickly people make the network switch over the next few months. In particular I’d like to know if Telecom can attract many Vodafone customers, or whether these numbers are primarily ex-CDMA customers.
Has anyone made the switch? Did you come from Vodafone or were you already with Telecom? What are your thoughts on the network so far?
Tristan Clark - Technical Writer
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Comments
Look forward to your assesment of the XT, as i work in remote areas, especially overseas, i.e PNG and when i am here in N.Z, like in the Te Urewera National Park area.
I upgraded to XT prepaid,but the handset was faulty.All Telecom shops and agents work separately and only the 0800 number would effect an exchange.It took two weeks to sort out.Surely any Telecom agent should be able to deal with this problem?
@ Hombre
My farm is not exactly remote, as 027 phones work there. We've not found an XT phone that does - and when we asked Telecom they said XT would not.
Is anyone happy with XT? I have changed to XT (telecom would not allow the renewal of the previous network I requested) and i have had nothing but problems, ie drop call, echo, not ringing and going stright to voice mail, unable to send tex, contacts deleted, muliple contacts appearing etc. As i talk to people i am finding this to be common. i have replaced sim card and still no better. I have talked to telecom serveral times and no true remedy only they will get back to me. The last conversation I was told they wll contact me in two weeks. I look forward to here of other persons experiences
recently my employer switched our mobile phones to the telecom XT network i have had nothing but problems, i have returned my ph 3 times due to faults, have recieved mixed to no service from the store, Txts have come through 3 days after being sent, voicemails come through in blocks not at the time message left. VERY frustrating as this is a business ph, network has crashed on 2 business days - beware of the XT network
XT net work, still know remedy from telecom. Talking with other telecom customers after my blog, I have found the problem more common than first thought. Thank you Di for your blog.
I would like to know if Comsumer NZ would do a investigation into the depth of this problem NZers need answers that are more than justified under the Consumer Guarantees Act and the Fair Trading Act.
I look forward to further information.
There is NO XT coverage in Oamaru today, 14/12/09. Not good for people & businesses alike!!!!
ha ha ha ha! I think this is what an evil company like Telecom gets from screwing us technicians last year! Well Done! Who's gonna fix your cell sites now?
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