All posts cancelled (VM cover up) :o)

Gary L · 11-05-2008, 10:30

Alex Brown posted in the feedback group about newsgroup technical support. and since posting it the whole thread and all the posts have been deleted and no longer available on the server. the only posts that remain are the ones asking why the whole thread has been deleted

Hi all,

Sorry for the delay in responding to this one, but have had a 'mare
with all kinds of things going on (work and personal) and not been
able to be online much over the last few days.

I've spoken to the relevant technical support contacts, and can
confirm that newsgroup technical support is to continue and will not
be ceased. It will also remain to be sourced out of our Liverpool TSC
(Technical Support Centre) with the second line support guys picking
it up from e-contact.

Chris (who is in charge of second line there) is a cracking lad too!

I hope this clarifies.

Cheers

Alex

moaningmags · 11-05-2008, 14:49

I can see that whole thread including one from Karl Rio and Ian Hagon
Nope,

were being let go. Second line will look after the bbi groups, the digi team
may look at the telco/TV groups..... don't know who will look at feedback,
but they are not as technical as we are.

hth

--
Kind Regards
Karl Rio
Virgin Media Technical Support

With a post in between saying good to hear that

Good to hear they're being let go? Wow those are some harsh words or
you can't read.

--
Cheers

Ian Hagon
Internet Engineering Manager

Is it this thread you're on about or a different one?

ceedee · 11-05-2008, 16:59

Sorry Mags, but a load of the early posts to that thread ("Newsgroup Support") are unavailable on both news.vm.com and text.news.vm.com -- apparently there are as many as "26 posts gone".

(The oldest message I've been able to download is from Baldylocks at 23:03 on the 9th but the next message available isn't until 19:23 on the 10th.)

I'd be most grateful if you could copy all those from VM personnel (and even more so if you could use the "quote" format so they're easily readable).

Very sorry to hear that decent staff are actually being removed -- wonder if the 2nd line crew will be as good?

Gary L · 11-05-2008, 20:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by moaningmags

Is it this thread you're on about or a different one?

That's the thread, but they have been deleted off the server as confirmed by others.

moaningmags · 12-05-2008, 00:39

Right, the first post I can see about it is the one from Alex Brown.
10 others after that then the one from Baldylocks.
4th post after Alex is questions from Wrabbit with answers from Alex
>No It's perfectly legitimate. I hope I have misuderstood Alex, but what I
>take his post to mean is this:
>
>Newsgroup based support will continue
>Newsgroup support is currently provided by the 'e-contact team'
>Newsgroup support will now be provided by 'second line'
>E-contact is no no longer necessary - bye bye.
>
>Alex can you confirm is this the case - and what will happen to response
>times?

I think no longer necessary is a little harsh - the decision has been
made to close the e-contact function and move newsgroup support to
second line.

Response times shouldn't be affected and are unchanged - as is the
SLA.

> It's been noted on multiple occasions in this group that there are
>often long delays in replying to webform submissions, which are/were handled
>by e-contact.

Additional resource is going to be used for webform (e-mail) support,
so the good work done on improving this in the last few months should
also continue.

> Surely if a dedicated team struggles to cope with the volume,
>then adding it as a supplemental role to another team will lead to further
>delays.

All depends on how you resource things doesn't it? The vast majority
of e-mail contacts for example can be dealt with by some of the first
line guys, which is how the model has been built for improving e-mail
support in the future.

>Will there still be dedicated people handling the newsgroups, and will it be
>given equal priority with other contact mediums subject to a reasonable SLA
>at least?

As per the previous response, the SLA is unchanged but it won't be
dedicated resource - the second line guys do all kinds of other things
and have fingers in lots of pies.

> It is a unique support medium because it is carried
>out in the full glare of public scrutiny (and as newsgroup users tend to be
>more tech savvy than the average user mistakes will be noticed. If
>redundancies are happening I wish them every success in the future.

I agree with your sentiments - the guys have done a cracking job and
it's much appreciated.

Alex

--

Alex Brown
Senior Product Manager

HTH

grungernut · 14-05-2008, 11:42

The posts were canceled because the current situation, moving econtact to first line and giving 2nd line the news groups, is only a proposal, the guys are on a 30 day consultation, but it is only still only allowed to be referred to as a proposal. Alex confirmed the work WAS going to 2nd line etc, possibly confirming that the proposal description is effectively a lie and the transfer of work is as good as a done deal. This leaves the E-contact guys with a possible claim for unfair dismissal NOT redundancy or termination of assignment as they have some claim that the decision was made before the end of the legal consultation period,based on Alex's comments, which I know the guys made copies of before they were deleted from the server. It could get messy if the guys wished to take it further. Time will tell.

ceedee · 14-05-2008, 12:21

Many thanks to Mags for explaining the newsgroup dialogue and to grungernut for the context.

If VM hadn't been trying to scrape a relatively small support saving seemingly without evaluating the impact on users, they wouldn't have got themselves in this legal mess, so I hope the relevant staff can use Alex's (mis)post to their advantage.
But I guess the repercussions mean there's yet another reason for VM to not keep us informed of developments in the future.

Yet another VM foot-in-mouth moment...

grungernut · 03-06-2008, 20:12

Just to update you guys. The team that answer the emails and moderate the news groups are oficialy redundant as of friday 6th June. They have all been let go today by the client. The news groups wil now be looked after by the 2nd line broadband support team and 2nd line Dtv and Telco teams respectively. The emails will be answered by first line TSC or anybody that has a few minutes basically.

kryogenik · 03-06-2008, 20:15

Oh - what bad news.

Best of luck to them if they ever see this anyway.

homealone · 03-06-2008, 20:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by grungernut

Just to update you guys. The team that answer the emails and moderate the news groups are oficialy redundant as of friday 6th June. They have all been let go today by the client. The news groups wil now be looked after by the 2nd line broadband support team and 2nd line Dtv and Telco teams respectively. The emails will be answered by first line TSC or anybody that has a few minutes basically.

That is such bad news, I was recently made redundant myself & can really sympathise - especially as they did such a good job.

I can only wish them every success for the future & hope they don't stay unemployed for too long ...

grungernut · 03-06-2008, 21:56

Quite a few of the team have been taken straight on by BT,some of them are happy to spend some time looking and spending their redundancy and every one of them seem happy to be out of there.

PeteTheMusicGuy · 04-06-2008, 10:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by grungernut

Quite a few of the team have been taken straight on by BT

I bet they have been as they are good