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The BTTB Experience

My dad was insisting on trying out the BTTB internet service for a long time since some of his colleagues highly praised the internet connection from BTTB. So I finally agreed to try out the internet service from BTTB, the state owned telephony and internet service provider. There’s a nasty feeling in me about all state owned service providers. Still, to make dad happy about it, I agreed to buy a modem after he managed a telephone connection. I was a bit happy that we got a telephone connection within the 24 hours of submitting an application. I thought things have changed after the recent formation of BTCL from BTTB. My Dad and I went to the local computer market and purchased an internal modem for the purpose. I installed the modem successfully and dialed. Whoa? It worked!

I was wondering if it was the BTTB people knew years before. You had to wait hours, days, weeks and months to get a telephone connection. The service used to be very poor. The BTTB engineers used to demand bribe for their service. I see nothing today. I was glad and surfing the internet enthusiastically. My dream came to an end when I had a power cut after around 10 minutes into the browsing.

When the electricity returned, I turned on my PC and dialed. Damn. No response. Tried again and again. Nothing happened. Got frustrated enough to call the local Customer Service of BTTB Internet Section. They suggested my lack of expertise and keep trying. I said nothing and kept trying after dropping the call. I kept trying for about 30 minutes when I finally decided to give up. I called the Customer Care again and now they told me that there has to be at least one telephone line free for data connectivity. They suggested that I should call the dialup number from my telephone to see if it responds sending back a modem tone. I followed the instruction. A female voice let me know that there’s no line available at the moment. I kept trying when a single line would be free. I waited for 4 hours. No way!! No lines free. Now it’s around 5.45 PM in the afternoon when I found a line free and got connected to the internet. It’s true that BTTB has made fair progress in providing cheap services, but they need to scale. Being a GP Internet user from the beginning, I never knew that I had to wait for a telephone line to remain free before I could connect to the internet. And it’s the national ISP. The other day they blocked Youtube. I wish our internet was free from the clutches of the corrupted people working at the BTTB.