Vodafone and Internet Connection
Briefly:
- Good Internet connection is important for a range of tasks vital to my operations, for example: retrieving information from the Web and sending emails.
- Internet service through the Hospital's Wi-Fi quickly deteriorated as I went about my work. The Trust's IT Department lied, was evasive and then refused to answer my questions regarding those problems.
- I bought a dongle from Vodafone but Internet connection through that device soon deteriorated.
- As had the Trust, Vodafone first lied about the reasons for such poor connection and then refused to answer questions.
- The problems have persisted since early 2021 and continue to defy explanation.
1. At the start of January, 2021, I was transferred to a low-secure hospital. I had more access to the
Internet. The Wi-Fi service worked very well: there were no connection problems and throughput
was excellent.
2. As I went about the work of writing to authorities, Wi-Fi performance deteriorated markedly: sometimes, I
was unable even to connect to the Internet. On one of those occasions, I wrote to the Hospital’s IT Department,
enquiring as to the cause of those problems.
(i). They said there was no problem with the Wi-Fi service: it must be my computer.
(ii). I put detailed questions to the IT Department, regarding that opinion. It couldn't answer them. It now
said there had been problems with its Wi-Fi service but they would soon be resolved: it lied.
(iii). I put further questions to the IT Department, regarding the problems it claimed were causing the
connection failures. It did not reply.
(iv). I asked one of the nurses to have the IT Department answer my questions. He said the IT Department
told him to mind his own business, not to approach it on such matters and to follow correct channels. He was unaware
of what those channels might be.
(v). I asked the Chief Executive of the NHS Trust that runs the Hospital to have those questions answered.
She did not.
3. Wi-Fi connection became so unreliable I bought a Dongle from Vodafone, so I could have a serviceable
Internet connection. Initially, the Dongle worked well. Soon, however, throughput on the dongle unaccountably fell
and remained low.
4. I kept logs of throughput speeds. In June, I telephoned Vodafone and asked if it could
explain the low bandwidth. It checked the signalling equipment in my area and could find no explanation. It
said it would telephone me the following day. It did not.
(i). A week later, I telephoned Vodafone again. It was unable to explain the problem.
5. In August, I wrote to the Chief Executive of Vodafone: I asked him to explain the poor throughput. I was
informed work was being carried out on signalling equipment in my area. They said it would be completed by the end
of August.
(i). I asked questions regarding the nature of the work: the times it was being carried out, whether it
caused poor speeds throughout the day, regardless of whether work was actually in progress. I also requested logs
from the signalling equipment showing whether, even with the work in progress, I should have such poor service.
(ii). Vodafone refused to answer my questions: it said only the engineers could answer those questions. For
reasons it would not divulge, it refused, to put the questions to the engineers.
(iii). I thought it curious that, if the problems were caused by work on signalling equipment, this
would not have been discovered two months earlier, when Vodafone had been unable to explain the slow speeds,
even after checking the signalling equipment in my area.
6. In September, upload and download speeds were still poor. I wrote to the Chief Executives of Vodafone
Limited and Vodafone Group Plc, asking when work on the equipment would be completed.
(i). I repeated the questions I had earlier put to the Chief Executive of Vodafone Limited and, I requested
logs from the signalling equipment, during the period in question. I asked whether those logs explained such poor
throughput.
(ii). My questions were not answered; the logs were not provided and no description of them was offered.
(iii). Vodafone said there had been no work on signalling equipment in my area, in August - that explanation had
been a fabrication.
(a). The poor throughput remained completely unexplained.
7. For two days, in September, I was unable even to download ordinary web pages: effectively, I had no access
to the Internet.
8. I sent copies of my throughput logs to the Chief Executives of Vodafone and put to them questions about
the levels of throughput and other information revealed by those logs.
(i). They did not answer my questions. When I pressed for answers, Vodafone informed me it considered the
matter was closed.
9. The refusal by the Chief Executives to answer pertinent questions and to try to address the problem is
confusing:
(i). They had incontrovertible evidence, in the form of the logs, that a client was having difficulty
connecting to the Internet, using their Dongle. They did not try to understand or solve the problem.
(ii). They knew or ought to have known of the Campaign against me (I provided them with a description and
evidence of such a Campaign)
(iii). The logs showed two things that might suggest interference:
(a). connections were ruptured repeatedly and
(b). I was unable to use the Internet because upload and download speeds were low. At the same time, it
appeared most of the bandwidth was being used to transmit data from my Machine: upload speed is much higher than
download speed - see logs for 08 and 09 September.
I observed, in my exchanges with Vodafone, the Machine should not have been transmitting data at such a rate.
10. Good Internet connection is important in carrying out many tasks, from sending emails even to simply
searching the Web. It happens, often, that I have difficulty carrying out tasks because of poor Internet connection:
(repeatedly ruptured connections, poor throughput), etc. there appears to be a strategy to deny me reliable,
reasonable quality Internet connection.
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