Ipstar Tot Contract

[loong]

Hi,

I've had Ipstar for 5 months now. It's usually Ok evenings and weekend (I have corporate package 256 Kbps - 2,600 Baht/month).

As I'm looking at the possibility of changing to CATCDMA (I had no idea that this was a possibilitywhen I got Ipstar, CAT seem to like to keep it a secret!), I'm wondering about possible penalties for cancelling Ipstar. I'm sure that many people here have done this before.

I was not here when they put in the dish and made the connection. The missus paid the 5,000 Baht deposit and I suppose must have signed something. Problem is, she did not get any sort of copy of a contract and didn't even get a receipt for the 5,000 Baht. I got seperate bills for the monthly subscription, so the deposit didn't include the first months use.

Can anyone let me know what the usual terms of a contract are and if I cancel after 6 months am I likely to have to pay a penalty. I suspect that I will kiss goodbye to the deposit.

Thanks very much

[Gary A]

Hi,

I've had Ipstar for 5 months now. It's usually Ok evenings and weekend (I have corporate package 256 Kbps - 2,600 Baht/month).

As I'm looking at the possibility of changing to CATCDMA (I had no idea that this was a possibilitywhen I got Ipstar, CAT seem to like to keep it a secret!), I'm wondering about possible penalties for cancelling Ipstar. I'm sure that many people here have done this before.

I was not here when they put in the dish and made the connection. The missus paid the 5,000 Baht deposit and I suppose must have signed something. Problem is, she did not get any sort of copy of a contract and didn't even get a receipt for the 5,000 Baht. I got seperate bills for the monthly subscription, so the deposit didn't include the first months use.

Can anyone let me know what the usual terms of a contract are and if I cancel after 6 months am I likely to have to pay a penalty. I suspect that I will kiss goodbye to the deposit.

Thanks very much

For that price, you probably have Loxinfo. A truly pathetic service for a big price. I had it for several years and had no problem canceling and changing to TOT. The only difference was TOT was cheaper. It was still a pathetic service. That 5,000 baht wasn't a deposit. That was the installation fee. You WON'T get that back. I wanted to cancel and they wanted the full contract payments. I ended up keeping it for the entire year rather than fighting with them. It took them more than two months to pick up the dish and modem. That was after my wife told them I was going charge them storage OR make a bird bath out of the dish.

[loong]

Thanks for the info Gary.

It's definitely TOT. I pay extra for the corporate package, so share less bandwidth. That's why at times between 9am and 4 pm, it can be absolutely useless, it's when the business users are online. Because of the economic situation I have gone back to day trading shares and so had to have internet at home. I didn't know about the possibility of CDMA at the time as CAT do seem to want to keep it a secret. Luckily, as I'm trading Euro and US markets, it's evening and middle of the night here, so it coincides mostly with when the Ipstar service is adequate (most of the time)

So it is usually a year's contract then. When I next pay the bill, I will take the missus with me and will try to get a copy of the contract. Why they don't leave a copy, I don't know. It was the same with True UBC.

If I have to keep it, I will, but maybe will see if I can get CDMA as well, so if one's down, I may have the option of the other.

Thanks again

[Totster]

Thanks for the info Gary.

It's definitely TOT. I pay extra for the corporate package, so share less bandwidth. That's why at times between 9am and 4 pm, it can be absolutely useless, it's when the business users are online.

I get the same slow down on the normal 512 package at bt2200 per month. I 'upgraded' after the 256 became useless during the day, now with the 512 I get about 10% of the speed between 9-5 which is just enough to surf ok. Maybe go and change the package, you may at least get slightly better speeds if you have to keep it for 7 more months.

I had a chat with CAT a while back, the guy reckoned he can get me 1meg DL from where I am with an external aerial, and that will be at approx 1/3 of the monthly price, but with a 13,000bt outlay for equipment. I shall install it later this year when I'm back home.

Totster

[george]

When I cancelled my IPstar they kept sending me bills. I just wrote "See you in court!" on the bills and returned them. Never heard anything.

IPstar works excellent in India, Australia and New Zealand etc, but not in Thailand. A rippoff.

[loong]

I have to say, that I wasn't exactly keen to get Ipstar, but at the time it seemed to be the only choice. I wasn't here at the time. We'd holidayed in Pattaya and I stayed on while my Gf came back to look for internet options or look for a house to rent in Khon Kaen, so that I could get home internet access. She really didn't want to move (nor did I to be honest) and when she phoned and told me that fixed line broadband unavailable and only Ipstar, I told her to get some names of existing local customers and go and talk to them. She did and the people were quite happy with the service. So the dish was installed.

I had seen that Hutch do CDMA in Pattaya and when I enquired, they told me that there was no coverage for the internet in Khon Kaen. Of course they also didn't volunteer the info that CAT had that area.

I have to say that overall the Ipstar service has been better than expected, but far from great. The recent thunderstorms had little or no effect at all. I could still access the internet, and that was a concern of mine.

Totster, did they guarantee that you will get a good signal in Kalasin? Do you know how far you are from the nearest tower? I think that the nearest tower to me is at the Post Office in Nam Phong, about 12 Km from the house.

BTW Totster, if you still need to borrow some books, PM me.

[Totster]

Totster, did they guarantee that you will get a good signal in Kalasin? Do you know how far you are from the nearest tower? I think that the nearest tower to me is at the Post Office in Nam Phong, about 12 Km from the house.

I'm in the middle of 3 towers, approx 15km away for each. The good thing is that the engineer will come and check the signal before you have to buy any equipment. When I spoke to him he seemed confident this would be ok as long as I use an aerial as he had connected someone else not too far away from me - but he will come and check first.

Totster

p.s - i'll send a PM shortly about the books

[loong]

Thanks Totster,

CAT engineers sound like they actually know what they,re doing. And they will check the signal before you commit your hard-earned. That sounds good.

I will have to get my finger out and have a word with them

I had a chat with CAT a while back, the guy reckoned he can get me 1meg DL from where I am with an external aerial, and that will be at approx 1/3 of the monthly price, but with a 13,000bt outlay for equipment. I shall install it later this year when I'm back home.

Btw, is that 13,000 Baht for everything? Modem, aerial and fitting?

Edited March 31, 2009 by loong

[Totster]

Btw, is that 13,000 Baht for everything? Modem, aerial and fitting?

Yes, can't remember the exact price or breakdown, but the USB Modem is bt8500 and the rest being the aerial and installation (something like bt1000 for installation and bt3500 for the aerial - give or take bt500 here and there)

Totster

[loong]

Thanks Tots, doesn't sound so bad to me.

Trouble is with me, I just hate throwing away money, it;s not that easy to come by and all the time my Ipstar is working quite well, I'm happy. But when it start sodding about, I just want to dump it.

If CDMA costs about 13,000 to set up, I'd have to pay that anyway when the contract with Ipstar finishes, so it's only going to cost 6 months @ whatever CDMA is..about 1000 Baht per month? So it really does make sense for me to go for it.

Thanks everybody, you've been a great help

[loong]

I signed up to CAT CDMA today.

After running around Khon Kaen, looking for the office, was finally directed to Dtuk Com (Oasis center). It's on floor 2.

They assured me that I could get the signal at home (5km from nearest tower) and that there is no need for an antenna. Theoretically DL speed of 3Mb possible, but not to expect that very often. A bit of honesty for a change. So I bought the MC727 USB modem.

It will work here, but very slow. I have to go outside to get a half decent signal and using the ThaiVisa broadband speedtest (what happened to the link to that btw, it used to be at the top of the page?), the best I could get was 155 DLoad and that was with signal strength showing Revdo. Inside the house, it's absolutely useless.

So at the moment, I'm using Ipstar as is faster than CDMA.

I have read good reports of CDMA in other threads and as I can get a signal here, I'm optimistic that I will be happy with it once I get an antenna.

[Totster]

I signed up to CAT CDMA today.

After running around Khon Kaen, looking for the office, was finally directed to Dtuk Com (Oasis center). It's on floor 2.

They assured me that I could get the signal at home (5km from nearest tower) and that there is no need for an antenna. Theoretically DL speed of 3Mb possible, but not to expect that very often. A bit of honesty for a change. So I bought the MC727 USB modem.

It will work here, but very slow. I have to go outside to get a half decent signal and using the ThaiVisa broadband speedtest (what happened to the link to that btw, it used to be at the top of the page?), the best I could get was 155 DLoad and that was with signal strength showing Revdo. Inside the house, it's absolutely useless.

So at the moment, I'm using Ipstar as is faster than CDMA.

I have read good reports of CDMA in other threads and as I can get a signal here, I'm optimistic that I will be happy with it once I get an antenna.

Hi Loong,

Did you actually speak to CAT, or one of their agents ? Seems like they just wanted to sell you the modem without checking.

CAT would have sent an engineer first to check it out and advise you.

Northeastern Region Department

Location - 294/1 Soonratchakarn Rd., Tambon Nai Mueang, Amphoe Mueang Khon Kean 40000

Telephone - 0 4323 6051, 0 4324 1223

Fax - 0 4324 3115, 0 4324 1560-8 Ext. 4209

http://www.cattelecom.com/site/en/contact.php?cat=429

totster

[loong]

Hello Totster,

I did go to the address that you have given above. It's still there but seems to function as a depot and head office. The security guard told me that they'd moved the sales office a long time ago and were now at the Oasis (Dtuk Com) centre.

So I'm pretty sure that it's not an agency - certainly seemed to be the sales office for CAT. Only deal with CAT products and services and big CAT logo over the door - nothing else.

They looked at the map on the computer and I guess that as I am so close to a tower, they considered that there would be a good signal.

I will be in touch with them next week and arrange for an engineer to come and check. I expected to have to get an antenna anyway, so it's no big deal really. Just as long as I finish up with a better service than I have with Ipstar. If I could actually get a constant 1Mb dload speed, I would be over the moon.

Since my last post, I have found that I can get a very slow service indoors sometimes. The modem comes with a short USB extension and laptop monitor clip (sometimes when traveling not convenient to have the modem sticking out the side where it can be knocked). Using this, the Aeriel is just that little bit higher and can add 1 bar to the signal strength. So I'm sure that an external antenna will solve the problem.

Will add new developments as they happen.

PS. I'm about 5km from the nearest tower driving, but as the crow flies, probably a lot closer. Maybe there is a problem with the tower and I'm actually connecting to one 10km away.

Loong

Edited April 5, 2009 by loong

[Totster]

The security guard told me that they'd moved the sales office a long time ago and were now at the Oasis (Dtuk Com) centre.

So I'm pretty sure that it's not an agency - certainly seemed to be the sales office for CAT. Only deal with CAT products and services and big CAT logo over the door - nothing else.

Ah yes.. I see now. Sorry, I misread your post previously

Well hopefully the aerial will make the difference and you can enjoy decent speeds throughout the day, I'll be following with interest how you get on !

Totster

[loong]

Hello again Totster,

obviously, I'm hoping that I will get decent speeds with the aerial and I will update everything here good or bad.

[loong]

Hello again.

George, if you come back to read this - I realise that the topic title doesn't reflect everything in this thread now. Is it possible to add a second line to the title? Maybe something like "Changing to CAT CDMA"

Thanks

It's Monday morning, and I've been up early. Surfing with Ipstar, but lost the signal. So I tried CDMA again.

For some reason, it's totally different today, maybe it helps that there is lower internet traffic at 6am.

Using the ThaiVisa Speed test, been achieving regular speeds of 400Kbs u/l plus and 180Kbs d/l.

As you will see I am achieving these speeds with only 3 bars signal strength.

I wonder, will there be much improvement if I can get maximum signal strength by adding an antenna?

To be honest, if this continues throughout the day, I will be quite happy.

I will let you know later.

Edited April 6, 2009 by loong

[loong]

Well according to ThaiVisa speedtest I've been averaging 500/180 today. I'm quite happy with that, but if can do better will be well pleased.

As I'm getting a reasonable signal , does anybody know for sure that adding an antenna will improve the speed?

I also have another problem, but don't want to confuse this thread any more (hope George will look in and change the title)

I've posted here

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Testing-Usb-Ports-t255264.html

[loong]

The CAT CDMA connection has been very patchy these last few days. It's much slower than it was and disconnects quite often. I think the speed thing is a pretty general internet thing in Thailand at the moment, but the disconnects are definitely to do with CAT. Maybe it's a local problem with the nearest tower.

Will see how it goes.

I will post recent speeds in this thread soon

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Cat-Cdma-Spe....html&st=25

[loong]

The CAT CDMA connection has been terrible lately, but it's still better than the Ipstar service.

I found out today that cancelling the contract with TOT Ipstar will incur a penalty of 3 months payments, so I will have to pay just over 8,000 Baht to end the contract. That I will sort out tomorrow.

The CAT engineers have been here today and they are a great bunch of blokes, 2 technicians and an apprentice. the connection was working quite well when they came with download speeds of 350 plus. They thought that that was terrible, although I'd be content if I had that all the time.

They've confirmed that I need an antenna and are planning to come back tonight. It'll be dark soon, so I dont know what they will be able to do.

I have to say that I have confidence in these guys, they seem to enjoy their work and seem to know what they are talking about.

[loong]

I've settled the contract with TOT Ipstar now. Because it was a few days into a new month period, they screwed an extra months fee, so it cost me over 10,000 Baht. It means that the total I have paid for 6 months poor service is 30,000 Baht including the 5,000 installation. If only I had known about CAT at the outset.

I've had an antenna fitted and I'm now getting a good internet connection.

I've posted at the following link......

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?s=...t&p=2684236