Frustration is mounting across parts of Christchurch as residents and businesses report unreliable internet and constant dropouts.
One Christchurch business owner said they were now into the third day without internet and still had no answers from Spark or Enable.
“I’ve spoken to six Spark representatives and one from Enable, and not a single person can tell me what’s going on. Even worse, no one is willing to send an Enable technician to my property to investigate.
“In the meantime, I’m being given tone-deaf and useless suggestions, like buying a data package. That’s not a solution. It’s completely unacceptable after three days with no connection, no explanation, and no timeline for a fix.
“This is now directly affecting my working week. I work from home and rely on a stable internet connection to do my job. I’m losing income. This level of disruption is unsustainable.”
A Spark spokeswoman said, “I’ve just checked with our network team and there are no known issues on Spark’s network.”
However, a spokesperson from One NZ acknowledged issues were occurring.
“We’ve made a number of customer escalations to Enable to ask them to investigate.
“This isn’t specific to One NZ, and unfortunately customers across multiple providers are being affected.
“We’ve been assured that Enable is working closely with their vendor to identify the problem and fix it as soon as possible, but for more detailed information, you’ll need to speak to Enable directly.”
Enable is the fibre broadband provider for greater Christchurch and is wholly owned by Christchurch City Holdings Limited, the commercial arm of the Christchurch City Council.
On its website, Enable claims to “show the love” by caring for its customers, community, and the environment. But that “love” seems missing in action, with users and providers struggling to get clear communication from the company.
In an update posted online on Wednesday morning, Enable said, “There are currently no widespread outages on our network. We currently have a small number of isolated service interruptions affecting 0.3% of our network.
“The issue remains under investigation and our team is working to resolve it as quickly as possible. We understand the impact this has, and restoring services is our number one priority.
“We are unable to isolate this to a geographical area of Christchurch so if you’re experiencing a service outage, please contact your Internet Service Provider. They’ll log a fault with us so we can investigate and work to restore your connection as quickly as possible.”
No one from Enable would answer direct questions.
