Spark Jump Registers – Digital Inclusion Alliance Aotearoa

More on Jump Waiting Lists

Many partners are now actively using the waiting list process to signal unmet demand for Jump modems, and we are continuously monitoring these lists to adjust delivery quantities for partners as well as priorities. We currently have 102 modem orders for partners in the pipeline, with total requests for over 1200 modems. This might seem like a lot, but the good news is that waiting times are trending down, and with Christmas coming, we expect this trend to continue at least until February. We have adjusted the re-supply trigger quantity down from 8 weeks to 5. This means that whenever you receive a new supply of modems, you should have enough to last 5 weeks (based on the number issued during the previous five weeks). We do factor in customers on waiting lists, so a couple of reminders about this process.

(1) When you add someone to the waitlist towards the bottom of your Jump Register please include their first and last name and the date they have applied for Jump. The most important field is the date – it must be in the following format: “22-Nov-2022”. Other date formats may not be recognised and this directly affects re-supply quantities.

(2) Do not add people living at locations that fail the Jump coverage test to your waitlists. You should complete an online application for them, so that we get ongoing data about demand that can not currently be met. We do double check coverage for every online application and send an email to applicants at locations where there is no Jump service.

(3) We have noticed some situations where applicants get the green light for Jump coverage when they initially apply, but by the time new modem supplies arrive the situation has changed. This is regrettable, but it is not something we can control. In these situations, please transfer the applicant from your waiting list to an online application.

(4) Some partners are confused about the address verification process and have reported that by the time they discover their customer’s address is not in coverage, they have already set up a Skinny account. The address coverage check MUST come first, and certainly before you start to set up a Skinny Jump account.

(5) And before you add anyone to your waitlist, we do strongly encourage you to use the 6 C’s checklist with your customer to make sure Jump is the right product for them. Failing to do this is likely to lead to further frustration when modem supplies become available and the customer only then discovering that the data cap is not going to work for their household, for example.

You should never run out of Jump modems but if you do….

We continue to receive requests from partners for more modems and that is fine – remember to use the following email: jump@diaa.nz . But every time we do get a request we ask ourselves why? We have this very efficient system that alerts us when a partner is running low on modems. Each partner has a trigger level that determines when new modems are sent. To make sure you never run out, we set the trigger level to the number of modems that you are typically issuing each week – this means we have a week to get new supplies to you. We know this isn’t perfect and are always happy to receive your individual requests.

The trigger level is set in cell G2 of your Jump register; we remind you what this is every time we ship modems, so do check the next box that arrives. Or if you would like access to your Jump register, please let us know (jump@diaa.nz); this does need to be a gmail address, or an email linked to a gmail address. Many of our partners set up a generic gmail for this purpose that can be used by all staff supporting the Jump programme.

We almost always find though that when we receive an email request it is because some other element of our tracking process is not working. The most common causes are:

Modems have been issued but Jump Profile Forms have not been completed. We totally rely on a form being completed for every modem issued; this allows us to mark up your Jump register, which in turn decreases your stock levels by one. If the form is not completed, we have no way of knowing that the modem has been issued. This generally results in us asking partners to do a stocktake and advise us of the IMEI numbers of the modems they are holding; we can then mark out the others in the Jump register to get things back on track.

There is an unexpected surge in demand for Jump modems. We update the Jump registers every day, but if a partner is holding 6 modems with a trigger level set at 5 and then issues 5 modems in one day, there will be a delay of a few days in getting new supplies. The solution in this case is to increase the trigger level or if partners are able to anticipate the surge, we can help you stock up in advance.

A box of modems has been misplaced. We understand that our partners lead busy lives and often many people are involved in supporting the Jump programme. It is easy for a box to be misplaced – under someone’s desk or in a storeroom. We have records of all modems dispatched, including the courier track and trace details. This includes the name of the person signing for the box of modems when it arrives. We often discover this person is on leave and no-one else knows where the box has been stored. The Jump registers include details of all modem shipments, including the Post Haste tracker code, so it is easy for us or for partners to quickly confirm whether this is a courier issue or a local one.

Modems appear to be faulty during the set up process and are not recorded. It is easy to make mistakes when helping a customer set up their modems and their Skinny accounts and, at times, the most pragmatic thing to do is simply move on to another modem. But is is important to contact the Skinny support team by email (support-team@skinny.co.nz) and make sure the modem is delinked and reset, ready for issue to another customer. If the modem is genuinely faulty and has not been allocated, partners should indicate this by entering ‘faulty’ in column B of the Jump register. This then reduces your stock count by one, as the modem is not available for re-issue. Or if you don’t want to mark up the Register, you can always send us an email with the IMEI number (jump@diaa.nz) and we’ll mark it up for you.

What happened to the Jump Participant GDoc Registers?

Things changed on 25 March (not just the Covid-19 lockdown!) with the expansion of the criteria for Jump. When we introduced the home-delivery option (that has now reached nearly 4000 people), we abandoned the Kawa of Care form that we used to update the Jump registers in GDocs and replaced this with a Stepping UP Profile form which is to be used by partners when issuing Jump modems. We also plan to progressively use this for other DIAA digital inclusion programmes, to create a more comprehensive picture of the people who are participating.

For the home-delivery Jump option, we created a new form (Skinny Jump Application Form), based on the Stepping UP profile form, but with some additional contact information, such as a physical address so that we can check Skinny Jump coverage and courier modems to applicants.

For modems issued by partners, we are continuing to update the individual partner Jump register GDocs, using information captured in the Stepping UP profile form, but we are only including name and date information (linked to IMEI and BB numbers). The remaining data is consolidated in a national database where we can analyse the profile of people participating. The advice we received from privacy lawyers was that we were exposing ourselves and our partners to possible privacy breaches by recording participant details in a GDoc that could be easily shared and copied.

Our main reason for maintaining the individual partner GDocs is for stock control purposes, so that we can re-issue modems as required. Partners are welcome to continue to have access to this if they find it helpful.

JUMP Modem re-stocking

We have received feedback from some JUMP delivery partners that they are holding too many modems, while others feel they are not holding enough. Our general rule has been to re-supply when your stocks drop below 5, but for high turnover sites the trigger is set at 10. We now have the capability to set a re-stocking number for each partner, so please do let us know if you have a preference (E: sparkjump@diaa.nz). Your stock level is recorded in cell F4 of your JUMP register. This is based on a calculation of the number of modems supplied, less the number issued (counted by ‘Firstname’ in column B), less the number of returned faulty modems (counted by the dates in column X).

This number can overstate your stock level if you do not record at least the family’s firstname in column B and if for any reason we do not receive the Kawa of Care. So please keep an eye on cell F4 to make sure it matches the number of modems you are actually holding.

Faulty and Returned JUMP Modems

I think we finally have a process that is working for the return of faulty and returned modems; I know many JUMP delivery partners are still holding modems waiting for courier bags to arrive.

The process Skinny has advised is to first and foremost encourage families to contact the Skinny Helpdesk on 0800 475 4669 whenever they any encounter any problem with their modems, whether this be during setup, or if the modem appears to be faulty, or if they no longer want to use it. The Skinny Helpdesk team will attempt to resolve the issue remotely, but where this is not possible, they will instruct the family to return the modem to the partner who helped them set it up in the first place. At the same time, the Helpdesk team will enter the modem details into the Spark JUMP Faulty modems register; this triggers the generation of a work order number that in turn initiates the process to send a courier bag.

When families return a modem, partners are asked to check if families have already reported the faulty or ‘no longer required’ modem to Skinny. If they have, you should proceed to allocate a new modem if required (making sure the family completes a new Kawa of Care). If the faulty or returned modem has not been reported to the Skinny Helpdesk, partners should contact the Skinny Helpdesk on behalf of the family and request that the modem be logged in the Spark JUMP Faulty modems register. Skinny sometimes responds to email requests, but they much prefer phone contacts, as this means their Helpdesk team can log the faulty unit in real time.

So our advice is: if partners are holding modems that have been reported as faulty or returned in a state unfit for re-issue, and no courier bag has arrived within two weeks, contact the Skinny Helpdesk and ask for the modem to be logged in the Spark JUMP Faulty modems register.

This means that you no longer have to complete the Faulty Modem Return Form, although we at DIAA have found this helpful to keep our records up to date. As an alternative, we suggest that you simply add a note in column H of your JUMP Google Register, confirming what action has been taken.

JUMP modem supplies

In a perfect world, partners should never run out of JUMP modems. We monitor your stock of unallocated modems (cell F4 in your Google Sheet) and when this drops to 5, we courier a new box of five modems. You can always check in column AB of the Google Sheet to find the date when modems have been couriered. The delivery is normally overnight in the North Island and 2 days for the South Island; the date we record is the date they leave Wellington.

In a not so perfect world, when partners allocate a modem and fail to record the family name in columns B and C, our automatic trigger doesn’t fall to 5, and so no further modems are dispatched. If partners find they are having to always request further supplies, it could be that modems have been issued but not recorded. It is helpful if you check your modem stocks from time to time to see that the number you are holding matches the number in cell F4. If not, let us know the IMEI numbers of the modems you are holding and we can mark out the others.

We don’t live in a perfect world, so this cunning plan to automatically replenish your supplies will not always work, in which case you are welcome to contact us at sparkjump@diaa.nz to order further supplies.

The Spark Jump Gsheet register challenge!

Some Spark Jump delivery partners have trouble accessing the Google sheet set up to record modem allocations. This is usually because the partner does not have a Gmail address linked to their normal email. Partners must have a Gmail address to access and update the Spark Jump Google Sheets. This affects many libraries in particular where staff have a district council email address. Check first with your IT team whether it is possible to link a Gmail account to your work email. If not, we suggest you do what a number of libraries have done and set up a generic library Gmail address such as southland.library@gmail.com and then we can add this email as an authorised user in the Spark Jump register.

More Spark Give vouchers distributed

We have received 451 complimentary $10 Spark Jump vouchers as a result of donations by Spark staff during the third quarter (ending 30 September). They have been allocated as follows:

Canterbury 74
Auckland 151
Wellington 28
Porirua 14
Napier 7
Northland 28
Hutt Valley 28
Dunedin 7
Gisborne 7
Dannevirke 7
National 106

These vouchers have been distributed to partners in these regions for use at their discretion to support families with the greatest need. Partners receiving the vouchers must provide details on the second tab of their Spark Jump registers, indicating how the vouchers have been allocated – refer to the instructions in my previous post. Further details are also on the Spark Give Information Sheet that we send with each batch of vouchers.

For regions not receiving these vouchers, do encourage anyone you know who works for Spark to nominate your region when they join the Spark Give staff programme.

Spark Jump Test Modems

A number of partners have requested use of a Spark Jump modem as a Test Modem, i.e. one that they can use for training and for testing performance in marginal coverage areas. Spark Foundation has approved this use, which is generally limited to one unit per delivery partner. Someone needs to be accountable for the Test Modem and must complete an online Kawa of Care with contact name and address. We suggest that the School field in the Kawa of Care be used to identify this as a Test Modem, as well as a note in the Comments field (column H) of the Spark Jump register. The pre-loaded $10 will expire after 30 days, as for other Spark Jump modems, and partners have the choice of topping up to retain the modem as a test unit, or advising DIAA (sparkjump@diaa.nz) that the modem can be reset for re-issue.

Spark Give Vouchers

Many of our partners will be aware of the Spark Give scheme, whereby Spark staff have the opportunity to make a contribution each pay day to a programme that they would like to support. A large number of staff have selected the Spark Jump programme, with most contributing $5 every fortnight. This means that each month these staff members contribute $10, which is the cost of one Spark Jump voucher. The Spark Foundation matches this contribution and each quarter allocates vouchers to its Spark Jump partners. For the last two quarters, DIAA, as a Spark Foundation partner, has received around 500 $10 Spark Jump vouchers. These in turn are distributed to delivery partners in the regions nominated by Spark staff.

Delivery partners have the discretion to allocate these vouchers to Spark Jump families who they feel could benefit the most. We have received very positive feedback from recipient families who are very grateful for this extra support. $10 might not seem a lot, but when you are facing financial difficulties this can make the difference between retaining the internet or having to let it go.

Partners are expected to account for vouchers that they receive by entering details of recipients in the second tab of their Spark Jump registers. The number of new vouchers entered each quarter is allocated by DIAA in row 3. Partners are expected to record the names of recipients and the number of vouchers allocated to each family.

If you are in a region that has not yet received any vouchers, that means Spark staff have not yet nominated your region, so this might be a good chance to persuade any friends or family who work for Spark to nominate your region for their Spark Give payroll programme.