Archive for the 'Technology in Ireland' Category

Quality of the services part 24539 (Irish banks)

Published at March 25, 2007 in services and Technology in Ireland. 4 Comments

I have mentioned couple of times about the quality of the services provided by the Vodafone and its staff. To be honest, the problem concerns wider range of the nationwide commercial public services including Irish banks.

Ask any Pole, Czech, or probably any Irish person about the quality of bank services and information provided by the staff. You will listen to many complains.

People who have their accounts in Bank Of Ireland have to wait months for a simply laser card, and with Bank Of Ireland Internet services you can’t do international transfers. In opinion of many customers it makes Bank Of Ireland Internet banking completely pointless.

Let’s say some bitter words about AIB. The quality of services is much better but it doesn’t mean that the staff provides them. Many of my friends - both Polish and Irish - had bad experiences with them. One of my friends has been struggling for months to get back his mortgage papers after he redeemed mortgage of another property.

One of my friends gave a verbal order to the lady in one AIB branch to have his credits payed automatically from his current account. Two months later bank surprised him with blocking his credit card. He found out that nice lady did nothing with his order.

I had my bad experiences with AIB either. First time, a year ago, during the first weeks I got my wages in a form of bank cheque. One day there was no problem to cash a cheque, but a week later lady in the bank refuse to cash it. She explained me that my company account is in Middleton branch and I should cash my cheque in Middleton. I said, that I understood, but I asked her to explain me why I could cash a cheque one week before. She couldn’t give me a sensible answer so she just cashed my cheque.

The last experience I had was more serious. I have ordered a credit card (I have my bank account for more than one year), so I had to fill in the form in Nenagh AIB branch. Since I am registered in Carlow and my AIB branch is in Carlow, I was waiting for the AIB letters to come to my place in that town. After my coming back to Ireland and to Carlow, I have realised that there was no any letter from AIB. I decided to go to the branch and to find out what is going on. So what has actually happened? Nice lady in AIB Nenagh branch took my order for credit card, but she did completely nothing with that. Lady in AIB Carlow branch asked me politely to fill the form again.

While I was in Poland I withdrawn a couple of hundreds of Euro from my AIB account. I don’t know if I have enough on it at present to fulfill requirements for AIB credit card. If not, it is not my fault but the effect of incompetence of AIB staff in Nenagh.

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www.fotoblogi.eu

Shannon Aerfort - your laptop will like it

Published at February 22, 2007 in Technology in Ireland. 7 Comments

It is the middle of the night. I am on the Shannon Airport sitting in the front of my laptop in a quite comfortable place - kinda of bar with a bar chairs - a special place for all people addicted to Internet. There are 3 desktop computers, and from 3 to 6 stations for laptop owners. There are both electrical and lan nests, and there is a free wireless Internet access (you need to sign in to get a 5 hours for free, unless you have only 15 minutes).

This comfortable place with access point helped me to stay conscious and present during the last 3 hours of waiting. I am sure I will be fine till 6.15 am when the plane takes off heading for Poland.

It is exactly what was missing on Dublin Airport (there is wi-fi access but not for free) or Huston Station.

I wish there was the same facility on stations/airport in Dublin.

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Backwater or virginland? Thinking about my own business in Ireland

Published at February 9, 2007 in Technology in Ireland, Nenagh and blog. 8 Comments

As I wrote a couple of days ago, Ireland is an Internet backwater despite of being a European centre of great IT and computer brands.

I haven’t changed my opinion about the very low quality of Internet services, especially about the helpless quality of Vodafone 3G. The reality in the other parts of IT is not good as well. In Ireland, Internet as a medium seems to be a unwanted child by many, especially by some of the local authorities - in example Nenagh.

Have you visited official Nenagh website - www.nenagh.ie? Apart of some usefull information about accommodation and buses it is not a convincing promo of the town. There is not so many photos showing tourist attractions in the town and its vicinity.

Apart of small forum on boards.ie Nenagh has no local coumunity web service (we call it portal in Polish) - kind of a local newspaper and forum online.

It concerns not only Nenagh and not only Irish community but Polish too. Apart of some good - let me call it - nationwide “Polish in Ireland” webservices there is no local ones that aim at the Polish communities of small towns - like Nenagh.

Ireland compared to Poland, seems to be a virgin land to start its own IT or electronic media business. For the last couple of weeks I have been thinking about that very much and about setting up my private, self-employed business.

Meanwhile, for the last 10 days I have been working (mostly at night) on a first community webservice (Portal) of Polish community in Nenagh. Due to my experiences in bloging (I got lot of e-mails full of thanks for providing information about Carlow and Nenagh) my intention is to provide as much as possible up to date data and information about Nenagh and to create a web platform that will assemble Polish community and maybe will help in its integration in Irish society.

It is still under construction, and it needs about one or two weeks of work, but the service is operating and providing some useful information for local Polish community. Check this out: www.nenagh.pl

It is based on Drupal 5.1 engine.

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www.fotoblogi.eu

Ireland – Internet backwater

Published at February 5, 2007 in Technology in Ireland. 4 Comments

There is a lot of talk about the Ireland as a Celtic Tiger in the Europen economy. In the picture of growing Irish economy the very important place take IT companies and computer manufacturers as Google, Apple, Dell, Intel, Microsoft etc. Together with strong development it seems that Ireland is European most advanced superpower – a center of the new technologies. There is no bigger mistake than such assumption.

As far as new technologies like Internet and computers are concerned Ireland is a technological backwater. For instance – Internet. There is no good Internet infrastructure and there is not so many ISP’ with a well quality service. All ISP’ have not sufficient offers, and most of them have limited coverage. Common problem is a time gap between the order and the visit of the technician at the place. Many of my friends were deceived by the help desks – couple of them in Ballina/Killaloe had to wait 3 weeks for the technician, who at last stated that there is no coverage of his ISP. On the Internet people are complaining on almost every Irish ISP. There are of course some exception but mostly in the big cities.

Apart of low quality connections, jammed lines, disconnections etc. many of the ISP provide data caps. It seems they haven’t realized that we are living in the era of VOIP, Skype talks, Internet television or radios.

Maybe it is an exaggeration, but quality of the Internet services in Ireland reminds me Poland 8 years ago.

Because I had a lot of problems in getting a broadband in Ballina, then in Nenagh, I have chosen 3G unlimited Internet access provided by Vodafone. We have some similar services in Poland provided by a local mobile networks, but the the quality gap between them and Irish Vodafone is incomparable.

First of all – the Vodafone staff is completely uninformed and not prepared for that kind of job. Almost in every single Vodafone store you can get completely different information – for example, I asked about data limits for my connection and in 4 of them I got answer that there is a transfer cap, but in the other 5 the staff told me that there is no cap for service I got. Where does the truth lay? Fortunately some of my friends has this service and they usually have monthly transfers 3 times bigger than a 5 GB. Many people still don’t know is there a data limit in Vodafone or not. Some of my friends bought HSPD for 39 Eu per month with data limit, and the staff in the Vodafone shop didn’t tell them that there is an option of unlimited data for 49 Eu. Data limit in Voda is just like a rumor, not a official information from Vodafone.

I can sleep well then, and I don’t need to be afraid about the data limit, not only because of my friends but also due to the terrible quality of service provided by that biggest Irish mobile network. Connection is jammed all the time, and it needs to be restarted couple of dozens times a day. Usually the transfer is low, or there is no transfer at all, and 3G speed is available only at night and during the weekends. There is no problems with GPRS connection, but for God’s sake, I don’t want to pay 50 Eu a month for GPRS service. Working on sites and uploading many files to the servers is a torture in that conditions. I wasted a lot of time uploading the same folders again and again.

Uploading this post took about 20 minutes… using a marvelous 3G technology.

Another example: some of my friends tried to buy a Voda HSPD in Nenagh, but the girl at the shop told them that that service is not available yet. All of them went to Limerick, where it is available. Some of them had some problems, to buy it in one Voda shop, due to having Polish ID cards instead of passports. They tried again in the shopping center – there was no problem at all to buy it.

Woda (pronunciation: Voda) in Polish means Water… Vodafone – a backwater in the Irish IT?

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Nenagh, struggle for an Internet access part 2.

Published at October 1, 2006 in Technology in Ireland and Nenagh. 3 Comments

Despite of the undoubtedly beauty of Killaloe and Ballina living in that place, being almost completely cut off – without internet, TV and radio – without a car and without furniture at the place, could be very hard. Luckily I made a quick recon among the archaeologists I have been working with, and finally I have found a couple that have been living in Nenagh. At present I am living in Nenagh town centre, in a small cozy old tiny house just couple of meters from ruins of 13th century Franciscan Abbey.

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

Nenagh seems to be as large as Carlow, and it counts about 6 thousands citizens, but the building are much higher and the main junction in the center reminds much bigger cities.

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

nenagh, www.eire.drakkart.com

I expected that my problems with getting internet access would be solved afterwards. I was wrong. Nenagh is another city out of the recent trends in electronic communication. There is only one (or maybe two) internet caffes. The one I know doesn’t provide wireless access for customers with their own laptops. They have only one lan socket, which is broken. Finally I have found computer shop that have its own hot – spot (wi-fi access point) for 30 euro per month. Unfortunately the coverage diameter is only 40 meters – because of electrical wires on the street. I paid charge and I have internet access from the pub on the opposite side of the street.

I am thinking about 3G from Vodafone, but I need current bank statement, and AIB is open only till 5 pm. Things seem not to be user friendly at all.

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