Hello? Bueller? Internode? Bueller?

I'm disappointed with Internode. Bottom line. We've been customers for 5 years and have been happy with their service. But their inactivity and fingerpointing over our congestion issue has soured our opinion of them greatly.

Thank you for your email.

I understand your frustration with the congestion issue, taking place at the XXXXXX exchange. As previously mentioned in my last email, in order to fix this problem, we require our wholesaler to perform an upgrade at the XXXXXX exchange.

As you are aware, this issue is out of Internodes control and will affect any service, with any Internet Service Provider at this exchange. We will continue to apply pressure to our wholesaler to resolve the issue as soon as possible however; it is only within their power to advise when this upgrade will take place.

I am sorry that I have not been able to assist you further at this stage, but please be assured we are doing all we can at this point.

Thank you for your patience.

We've heard not a peep from them apart from the cop-out email with token "soother paragraph" you see above. I'd love to know what pressure Internode are applying, and what "doing all we can at this point" means exactly.

Internode have a direct relationship with Telstra Wholesale.

The Internode ticket has been open since 18 January 2009.

And we're still paying full price for a *known* deficient service. Internode's answer for us seeking any financial relief for this crippled service? Choose a cheaper plan. The mind, it boggles.

In another email, Internode advise:

As stated on our website and in our terms and conditions, Internode ADSL connections are not a service that we can provide an operational guarantee on, beyond the commitments made in our SFoA. We do guarantee that we will promptly investigate all matters brought to our attention and work with you to resolve any issues that we are able to; however, some things are simply outside of our control, such as those that occur within external networks and infrastructure and therefore we do not compensate for these issues.

We do apologise for this inconvenience and please be assured that we will be doing everything within our ability to keep escalating this issue to Telstra Wholesale.

Really? Really Internode? Y'know, I don't think you are doing everything within your ability.

It took me banging on the virtual door of the Telstra CEO to get any action on this issue.

Poor form, Internode, poor form indeed.