New VOIP Adptr frm Source has US MAC address - NFG in Canada

Posts: 4 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 25, 2006 Posts: 4

Just bought a New PAP2 Vonage Phone Adaptor from The Source in North Vancouver and attempted to sign up a new Account. The screen for the MAC address returns and says that this device is not configured for use on Vonage CA and to call Customer Service to have it activated. Call CS and first was in India and then sent to New Jersey where the tech support guy says, "Yes, I get the same reply when I try to do it on the CA sight BUT it works on the US site."

He creates a Trouble Ticket and says that it could take up to 24 hours!! to get dealt with. He says he has not run across this problem before. Takes my e-mail and phone number and now I sit with my alegeded "instant" Vonage setup stalled for who knows how long.

The Source says they have not heard of this and hace gonew away to figure out what the problem is.

sigh...

Posts: 4 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 25, 2006 Posts: 4

So Vonage Customer Care have been very inconclusive as to what a time frame to upload a simple MAC address to an inventory list to make it accessible in Canada will be.

The store clerk in The Source in North Vancouver has tried to be as helpful as she can be but had not received a call back from their Vonage retail rep for clarification. the were out of stock in that store or we could have tried other addresses to find one that worked. She is going to call me when they get more in the next day.

This morning I spoke with a local district office for the Source and Nadia listened to what I had to tell her. She took the MAC address and tracked down their Vonage rep. She soon called me back to say he told her that there was a mix of US and Canadian mac addresses in recent shipments and that when these turn up the number is added to a log file that is uploaded every two hours to the main servers. He took my mac number from Nadia and said it should be available for me by 12:30 local time. Time will tell.

Posts: 14 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jan 20, 2006 Posts: 14

2 hours.

HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA
AHA
Ha
ha
heh..
*wipes tear from eye*

sigh..

Other people here are reporting 5 days.

Posts: 4 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 25, 2006 Posts: 4

So I tried a few times during the morning to register the mac address to no avail. Remember, the rep told the Source contact it should be available by 12:30. I went to the cafe next door for lunch about 12:15 and returned just after 1PM. With quivering anticipation I tried the mac address input yet again.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that it took it!! The rest of the account creation process proceeded normally. I set up the adaptor and plugged in the power. It flashed a while but did not give me a dial tone. I had not yet received my welcome e-mail either. By 2 :30 though the thing began to work. Now it will be running beside my landline phone for a while until I am confident in it and then telus can take a hike.

A word to the wise: Have the sales clerk demonstrate that the mac address of the retial adaptor is accepted in Canada BEFORE you leave the store.

Posts: 1 · New Forum Member Joined: Feb 15, 2006 Posts: 1

[B] Yes this problem is still ongoing, and the MAC addy on the PAP2 device which is causing me headaches and costing a small fortune calling tech support of course starts with 000F66F ....... imagine that. Lol i should have read the forums BEFORE purchasing.

Once i had read the forums, and got ahold of another tech support person the problem seems to be on its way to being resolved. Will find out in 12 hours Confused

Have to give the call centre kudos for being as pleasant as they are ..... but come on as wide-spread as this problem seems to be I do have to wonder why it was such a pain to rectify, they know they mixed up shipments, why isn't this a flagged issue that once it shows up the device is automatically registerred for canadian use. The additional wait and repeatted calls trying to solve the problem is unbelievable if in 12 hours this isn't resolved, I will be calling them once more only to arrange for a return on the adapter cancellation of service and give rogers net-phone a try, for only $5 more I would be ecstatic not to have to deal with problems like this.

Posts: 15 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Feb 16, 2006 Posts: 15

The same thing happened to me about two weeks ago... I spent about 30 minutes calling and calling and calling and speaking to nice sounding people in India who kept on transferring my call around and around... until I called back for the fourth time, explained my situation yet again, and the guy knew exactly what I was talking about right off the bat. An hour and a half later they actually called me back to let me know it was active for Canada.

It just seems like their phone people are very spotty on this issue, which can be very frustrating.

Posts: 16 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 15, 2005 Posts: 16

Check this thread for how I resolved the problem myself. It'll be faster than waiting to change MAC addresses or registering your US one as a CDN one:

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic10288.html

Posts: 10 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Feb 07, 2006 Posts: 10

A question maybe off topic: will the $39.99 activation fee incur if activate Vonage with PAP2 bought from retail store (The Source for example)?

Posts: 15 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Feb 16, 2006 Posts: 15

No, no activation fee here. I got mine from Best Buy.

In fact after three months you're supposed to get a $65 credit still, aren't you? That's what the signs at Best Buy indicate but you never know.

Posts: 10 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Feb 07, 2006 Posts: 10

chuma wrote:

No, no activation fee here. I got mine from Best Buy.

In fact after three months you're supposed to get a $65 credit still, aren't you? That's what the signs at Best Buy indicate but you never know.

That depends on when did you buy PAP2. A few months ago many retailers have $65 promotions, now only the source still have $65MIR, they sell PAP2 for $89.99.

If no specially in favor of PAP2 over RTP300, you can signup online to get RTP300 for free and activation/shipping fee waived plus one month free.

Last question: is there any chance can get one/two months free for retailed pap2 signup? I am thinking switch to Vonage, not decide buy pap2 in store or signup online.