Screw you Saunalahti Group Oyj
Up until yesterday I used an Internet connection provided by Saunalahti. The connection was a rather flaky one, and very complex to set up. My firewall box connects to a HomePNA switch in the basement through a 1 Mbps link. The switch has a 2 Mbps xDSL link to Saunalahti. My firewall box gets an IP through DHCP. Simple enough, right?
Not so fast... The IP is an internal IP in Saunalahti's network. In order to connect to the Internet I have to create a VPN tunnel using PPTP, through which I can finally connect to the Internet. In order to make things worse the PPTP implementation in question uses weird authentication protocols developed largely by Microsoft. My GNU/Linux based firewall does manage to connect, but it's not like anyone wanted to help me with the settings.
Adding insult to injury, they call this broadband...
This crazy ass configuration would not be so much of a problem if things actually worked after I got it all configured. But noooo... until very recently the VPN gateway kept crashing and dropping connections. Then they got a new gateway, and told me to use that one. It seemed to work for a while, apart from a weird HTTP problem.
In the beginning of this week the connection pretty much went dead. I was able to connect to the gateway, and pinging worked, but that was about it. I proceed to call Saunalahti's error reporting number. After queuing for ten minutes I gave up. Queuing to this number isn't free. The help desk is not an option, it's 1.34 euros per minute. No way am I going to pay in order to find out if they broke something.
The next day I take a look at the Saunalahti news page, no problems are mentioned. I try to call the error reporting number both during the day and in the evening, no luck. At work I mail the helpdesk and ask if there are any problems.
I try again at home the next day. No luck. I finally call their general customer service number, and explain that I would like to find out if there are any known problems with the gateway I'm using. They tell me to call the error reporting number. I explain I can't seem to get through the queue, and I don't wish to pay for finding out if they have their systems in order. I request they have the error reporting guys call me instead. Nope, not possible. I ask if they are in the same building, yes they are. I ask if it is totally impossible to write my name on a piece of paper and carry it over there. Yes it is indeed impossible. They suggest I call the help desk, then I shouldn't have to wait so long. I explain it is unreasonable that I pay for information, and explain I've tried looking at their news page. They still make no effort to provide a constructive solution. I ask them if the error reporting number is open 24/7. Yes it is. I request they make an effort to solve this problem, there needs to be a way to find out if everything is working right. They say something about employing more people maybe sometime perhaps... I give up and end the call.
I finally reached the error reporting number yesterday, at 0700 hours. This time I only had to queue for 5 minutes. I explain my problem and they confirm that a security update to the VPN gateway has caused problems for Win98 and Linux users. I ask them why there has been no mention of this at the news page, they say something about the news page not being their responsibility. They give me a few tips on what might work, but explain that there is no known sure-to-work fix at the moment. I ask them if there is a way to be notified when a fix eventually turns up, like information being posted on the news page perhaps? No, you have to call us. I ask them if they plan to continue to do updates without telling people anything. They think that it is unnecessary to tell people when systems are updated. I ask them if they plan to start telling people when they break stuff. This guy doesn't know. I give up.
Conclusions, resolution
In a nutshell it seems Saunalahti plans to keep making it next to impossible to find out when they break something. Given that my connection has been flaky for quite some time It's quite amazing I've put up with it at all. The reason is simple, the fee is included in my rent, regardless of if I use it or not.
But after this last episode I figured I'd rather pay for something which actually works than keep messing up my head by trying to fight virtual windmills.
I ended up fetching an HTV cable modem yesterday. I had my connection up and running in about ten minutes. That about 0.002% of the time it took to find out Saunalahti had broken my connection, not me.
'nuff said.