A partner has raised a question about whether a Ciena customer can continue on the programme if their modem becomes faulty.
The short answer is, YES.
There is a provision on the Modem Return form to indicate if the customer reporting the faulty modem is on a sponsored plan, such as Ciena or OCHT. Partners should make sure this option is selected and this will trigger an action to get the replacement modem re-provisioned for Ciena or OCHT.
The Ministry of Education’s Equitable Digital Access (EDOS) programme is definitely ending on 30 June 2024. Some were hoping there would be a further extension announced in yesterday’s Budget, as there was last year.
But here is the decision in black and white in the Budget documents:
The Ministry is currently finalising an offer for households that are currently part of the programme and expects this to be finalised next week. In the meantime, any inquiries should be directed to EDOS on 0800 441 844.
What does this mean for Jump customers who have been part of EDOS?
Yesterday, the Skinny Jump team notified all EDOS households with an MOE-sponsored Jump connection that the sponsorship will end in 30 days and their Jump connections will revert to standard Skinny Jump. This will happen automatically unless customers contact Skinny to advise that they wish to terminate their connection.
Customers who want to terminate their service will be encouraged to return their unwanted Jump modem to their nearest Jump partner and this can be processed through our standard modem returns process.
We do not know the details of what the Ministry will be offering other EDOS households, but it could lead to some choosing to switch to Jump. They are of course welcome to do this, subject to normal Jump coverage and eligibility criteria.
Please encourage them to also return any unwanted modems; we can arrange collection and send them for recycling. If it is not a Skinny Jump modem then it shouldn’t be managed through our standard Modem Returns process; please just set them aside and let us know (jump@diaa.nz) so that we can send you a return courier bag or label.
Two partners have been in touch this week (and it’s only Tuesday!) about handling modems that have been returned and then reset remotely by Skinny for re-issue.
The dilemma they face (which I am sure is shared by many other partners) is whether to issue the modem without its packaging. As one partner pointed out, it is not very professional to issue a modem and its extras – power supply, ethernet cable, user guide, modem return flyer and ‘keeping your whānau safe’ pamphlet- without some form of packaging. They have used library bags in the past, but these are no more.
Our approach to date has been to encourage partners to issue reset modems without packaging, but we really didn’t think about all the tag-along bits and pieces.
We have raised this with the Skinny Jump team at Spark to see if we could get supplies of new packaging but a good interim step was suggested by another partner – set aside any packaging returned by customers rather than send it back to us.
We are going to do this as well, at least in the meantime – we recover an average of 30 faulty modems every week, and many of these include their packaging; we are going to start retaining the packaging so that we can send some to partners as required.
Couriering a single empty box is probably a bit over the top, but we could possibly package six Smart Modem boxes using the same boxes that the modems arrive in.
If anyone has a better idea, please shout it from the rooftops!
I had an inquiry today from a partner wondering if the modem she had entered on a Modem Returns form had been de-linked yet, as she wanted to proceed in setting up her customer with a new modem.
I explained to her that she should have received an email notification from the Skinny Care Team, advising her when the modem has been delinked. But then I checked her Modem Return responses and realised she had used a generic email at the start of the form.
This email should always be the one belonging to the staff member completing the form.
Skinny uses this email to notify you when the modem has been de-linked and whether it is ready for re-issue or whether it should be set aside until we (DIAA) send you a recovery bag.
In the case above the partner had used a generic internal email, so that not only did she not receive the notification email, no-one would have received it. As an internal email, it was set to reject any outside messages.
Partners should get a heads-up about this as soon as they submit a Modems Return form, as a copy of the information submitted on the form is returned to the email entered in the first field on the form. If you don’t receive this, then it is possible you have used an email that is blocked for outside parties like Skinny Jump.
I had a call today from a Jump partner who was unsure about whether she could issue a replacement modem for a faulty one, when the coverage checker was indicating no coverage or capacity at her address.
The short answer is ‘Yes, you can’. When it comes to replacing faulty modems, we want to make this as seamless as possible, so there really isn’t any need to do a coverage check at all.
Unless of course if the customer has moved to a new address and not notified Skinny. But if they are at the same address and they already have Jump service, then you should just be as helpful as possible in getting them a replacement modem.
If all Jump customer played by our “rules”, partners should not even be involved in issuing replacement modems – this is for the Skinny Care Team to do when a customer calls them with a suspected faulty modem.
But we know customers don’t always follow the rules, so they turn up on your doorstep and you have to take it from there. C’est la Vie! That’s life!
The Skinny Care team has advised that there could be some delays in de-linking and resetting modems; some staff have been temporarily diverted to assist with call queues.
Their goal is to action all de-linking/ reset requests lodged through the Modem Return form within 36 hours.
This is just a heads up in case your customers expect you to arrange instant de-linking of faulty and returned modems. Do remind them that the correct procedure is to report the fault to the Care team and this will trigger a replacement modem being couriered to them. By the time it arrives they can be 100% sure that their faulty modem has been de-linked and they can use the same email to set up a new Skinny account with their replacement modem.
A Jump delivery partner was cleaning out a storage cupboard today and came across three “reset” modems; they were “pretty old and not looking in the best of condition”; one was missing cables and another had very dirty cables. The label with the Broadband number had come off the other modem and had been stuck back on with cellotape.
In her assessment, as well as the person who assigned the modems to the storage cupboard in the first place, these modems were not fit for reissue. Hence they had been assigned to the storage cupboard awaiting a courier bag to return them for repair or recycling. But after about 6 months, when no courier bag had arrived, they were discovered by another staff member.
So what went wrong with our Modem Return process?
When a customer reports a faulty modem to the Skinny Care Team, the agent does their best to fix the problem remotely, but if they determine the modem has a technical fault, they complete a Modem Return form to arrange for a replacement to be sent and the faulty unit recovered.
However if a customer just turns up on a Jump delivery partner’s doorstep with what they claim is a faulty modem, partners have to take this at face value – we do not expect you to try and diagnose the problem or fix it in any way. All we ask partners to do is to complete a Modem Return form and wait for Skinny to reset the modem so that it can be re-issued, or assessed as faulty so that it needs to be returned for repair, e.g. because the SIM card has expired.
Now comes the interesting part. The Skinny Care team can not determine the physical state of the modem; some returned modems have been used as an artist’s canvas (not always to everyone’s taste); others have missing parts and many are physically dirty. Some even come loaded with cockroaches!
So we need Jump partners to make a judgement call – is the modem physically suitable for re-issue? For our library partners, this is something they are used to – at what point are books withdrawn from circulation and send for repair?
Even if the modem gets the green (technical) tick from the Skinny Care Team, partners may need to override the ‘reissue’ judgement with ‘return for repair’, based on a physical assessment.
If it is just a missing ethernet cable or even a missing power supply, we (DIAA), can send you a replacement. But if it is dirty or defaced, then the modem is immediately classified as faulty (based on being unsuitable for re-issue to another customer).
One of the questions asked in the Modem Return form is “Why is the modem to be delinked and reset?”. If you feel the modem is unsuitable for re-issue, please add a comment to this effect. This will result in a recovery courier bag being sent to you. If we don’t have this information, we act on Skinny’s technical evaluation, which often means the modem is relisted in your Google sheet ready for reissue, but in reality it is sitting in a cupboard.
To cut a long story short, please keep an eye on unallocated reset modems in your Google sheets and please advise jump@diaa.nz if the Google sheet does not align with actual stock on hand. And remember, reset modems should always be issued before new stock.
Two partners have been in touch this week, reporting that the transparent stickers with the broadband number and verification code were missing when they removed a new modem from its box.
I encouraged them both to check the box in case the stickers had come off in transit and in one case, this was in fact the case. No such luck with the other one.
So what to do if you discover a missing BB sticker?
First of all, check the box. You might find it stuck to the inside. I have discovered that it can come off when inserting or removing the modem.
If you can’t find the sticker, then clearly you can’t use the modem, so enter whatever details you do have in a Modems Return form and we’ll get a recovery courier bag on its way.
I had a question today from one of our partners about the process when Jump customers move to a new address. I thought this might be a good opportunity to remind all partners.
Here it is in a nutshell:
It is good to see that nearly half of the Jump Partners who are participating in the Ciena Pilot have now signed up one or more students in their area. Over 80 families with school-aged children are already benefitting.
But as partners sign up their first customers, they are discovering little challenges in remembering exactly what to do in terms of our back-end processes.
Yesterday a partner signed up their first customer and issued a new modem but then discovered the family already had a Jump modem. The family said “thank you very much for the new modem; we’ll bring the old one back”.
Unfortunately, issuing a new modem to family that already has a Jump connection creates a number of problems:
(1) Ciena modems are exactly the same as standard Jump modems; the only difference is the Jump plan (the Ciena Plan) that is applied to the customer’s account linked to the modem.
(2) We have an ongoing national shortage of modems; we do not issue replacement modems when the current one is working perfectly well and in the case of Ciena customers, this is a back-end process in terms of provisioning a new plan on the customer’s account (nothing to do with the hardware).
(3) Customers are unable to activate a replacement modem using the same email address until their old modem goes through our Modem Returns process (where the customer’s account is de-linked from the modem), and this generally takes up to 24 hours.
(4) Customers could use a different email for the replacement modem but then they would not be able to transfer any residual funds from their existing account to their new one.
So, any partner traversing this path is creating a lot of problems for their customer, when all that is needed is a new Profile Form (where the details of the existing modem are recorded) and the Ciena Referral Form. The Skinny Team then works their magic to reprovision the customer’s existing modem for the Ciena Plan. No new accounts to be set up. No new WiFi passwords needed. No modems to be returned. Simple as!
Digital Inclusion Alliance Aotearoa 