19th Feb 7:30 GMT
After a couple of weeks of success, I’m back to the “what kind of sub would you like?” question, combined with “Not PeterBiddlecombe – logout”. Back to the back door entry methods for me. I could get back in within an hour or two.
15th Jan 9:00 GMT
As of yesterday, Race the Clock users can get their usernames back, though this is short-term fix rather than a robust solution. Apparently four temporary help desk staff have been drafted in to help with the registration problems.
5th Jan 9:00 GMT
There are still reports of access problems from some users. I can get in, but my RTC ID seems to switch periodically between my new ‘forename’ ‘PBID’, (chosen for uniqueness) and ‘mbe’ which Tony Sever attributes to the result of a common C programming cock-up applied to the string ‘Peter Biddlecombe’
3rd Jan 11:00 GMT
At present, I can get in with an ID that had its password reset by someone on the Times Helpdesk. But I can see plenty of evidence that others are still having trouble.
1st Jan 22:00 GMT
It’s down again – lots of club pages in browser history raise an error message from Firefox about broken redirection. IE does no better.
24 December 13:15 GMT
The site is now back up – for me, at least.
Mon 24 December 11:00 GMT
Access seems worse than ever today – nearly all URLs for the Crossword Club part of the Times site except the bulletin board now lead to a ‘Welcome to News International’ page. This includes the direct links to puzzles that worked through all the hassles of the last 10 days or so.
Although this is very frustrating, please do not use it as an excuse to put up scanned copies of puzzles in comments. This is breach of copyright.
Mon 24 December 9:30 GMT
The dodge mentioned in the comment below seemed to work yesterday, but not today – I ended up as “mbe” on the RTC list. But that seems better then being BC_HA_BA3CA0E8…. – which seems to be the fate of those who take th most obvious route to RTC. Comments on Tony Sever’s blog suggest that some people have been able to choose their own handle on the RTC page. Chaos!
Sat 22 December 9:45 GMT
Although I can log in, the identification stuff is flawed. If I look at the Race the Clock pop-up, I’m shown as “Welcome back, Peter”, not as my old userid, or even as my e-mail address. As the new registration details don’t seem to include my old userID, the only option for identifying me is my e-mail address, which I don’t want revealed on the site and which would be too long for the space available. My guess is therefore that Race the Clock will remain out of action until usernames can be restored to the registration information from which they were removed.
Tue 18 December, 18:10 GMT
The story so far (from memory, so dates may not be exactly right):
Last Wednesday, with no warning, the system for registration and log-in for Times Online services was changed – there are various other services requiring registration, though not necessarily payment, and it seems that changes were made to unify the registration and log-in process for all of these at the same time. To make the change, the Crossword Club log-in page had to be shut down. For reasons that aren’t very clear, the introduction of the new system took until some time in the afternoon of last Thursday. The implementation for the Crossword Club site was flawed, so people had problems logging in, although ‘back door’ routes to various parts of the site did work. At some time on Friday the need to log in was removed for the Crossword Club site, so that people could get access to the services they pay for. But this meant that any aspect of the pages requiring a user ID (Race the Clock contest, prize puzzle submission online) was broken.
At present I can sign in, though it’s not yet necessary to do so. I don’t know how many others can do so. The Crossword Club front page says that normal service should be back by the end of the week.
Why this has been so difficult, I can’t say. It’s irritating and makes you wonder about the planning and testing involved in the work done. My guess is that the Crossword Club staff may have had little say in this. Frustrating as it all is, please don’t use this post as a chance to add your own “what a bunch of amateurs” comments – this has already been done elsewhere and doesn’t need repeating. Please keep your comments to news about changes that I haven’t yet noted, or corrections of any information I’ve got wrong. I’ll add anything new I discover to the bottom of this message, with a date and time. Message layout changed later – latest stuff now at the TOP.
Tue 18 December, 17:25 GMT
“Click here for details of how to submit entries for crossword competitions, and the prizes to be won”, results in correct userid rather than “welcome..”
Submission still not working.
Surely this is wrong? I’m already subscribed.
In computer parlance, this is an infinite loop!
Paul W.
PS As problems are ongoing, is there anyway of making this thread more prominent?
Varying tactics including using Google’s cached versions of the login/registration pages achieve a variety of results including a notice that my account requires activation from an email that is, as far as I can tell, wholly fictitious.
I’m not going to bother contacting them whilst they’ve still got the ‘login and registrations are screwed’ messages up. Once they come down, then I’ll start chasing.
Dear cannon alan
Thank you for your email. I must apologise for the delay in replying but we only received your email today. We can only assume there must have been server problems which caused this unfortunate delay.
I would be grateful if you could advise if you are still having problems. If you do require our assistance please do not hesitate to contact us again.
Kind regards
Daniel Shuter
Online Customer Liaison Department
readers email address: ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
<—- Original Message —->
Hi
I am crossword member originally registering as AlanJC.
I have no idea what i should be registering as now.
Please advise either to this email address or to
alanjcannon@email.com
Reading the bulletin board it has become obvious
that only another newspaper would capable of reporting
an expose of what can only be described as a scandal
as internal communication on yours seems to be
non-existent.
I as do others i think
REALLY
would like to know what has been going on.
It isn’t classified information surely.
yours alan j cannon
__________________________________________________________
Sent from Yahoo! Mail – a smarter inbox http://uk.mail.yahoo.com
“Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail”
The Newspaper Marketing Agency: Opening Up Newspapers:
http://www.nmauk.co.uk
This e-mail and all attachments are confidential and may be privileged. If you have received this e-mail in error, notify the sender immediately. Do not use, disseminate, store or copy it in any way. Statements or opinions in this e-mail or any attachment are those of the author and are not necessarily agreed or authorised by News International (NI). NI Group may monitor emails sent or received for operational or business reasons as permitted by law. NI Group accepts no liability for viruses introduced by this e-mail or attachments. You should employ virus checking software. News International Limited, 1 Virginia St, London E98 1XY, is the holding company for the News International group and is registered in England No 81701
To which i replied the following on Thursday aft 3rd
Dear cannon alan
Thank you for your email. I must apologise for the delay in replying but we only received your email today. We can only assume there must have been server problems which caused this unfortunate delay.
I would be grateful if you could advise if you are still having problems. If you do require our assistance please do not hesitate to contact us again.
Kind regards
Daniel Shuter
Online Customer Liaison Department
readers email address: ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
<—- Original Message —->
Hi
I am crossword member originally registering as AlanJC.
I have no idea what i should be registering as now.
Please advise either to this email address or to
alanjcannon@email.com
Reading the bulletin board it has become obvious
that only another newspaper would capable of reporting
an expose of what can only be described as a scandal
as internal communication on yours seems to be
non-existent.
I as do others i think
REALLY
would like to know what has been going on.
It isn’t classified information surely.
yours alan j cannon
__________________________________________________________
Sent from Yahoo! Mail – a smarter inbox http://uk.mail.yahoo.com
“Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail”
The Newspaper Marketing Agency: Opening Up Newspapers:
http://www.nmauk.co.uk
This e-mail and all attachments are confidential and may be privileged. If you have received this e-mail in error, notify the sender immediately. Do not use, disseminate, store or copy it in any way. Statements or opinions in this e-mail or any attachment are those of the author and are not necessarily agreed or authorised by News International (NI). NI Group may monitor emails sent or received for operational or business reasons as permitted by law. NI Group accepts no liability for viruses introduced by this e-mail or attachments. You should employ virus checking software. News International Limited, 1 Virginia St, London E98 1XY, is the holding company for the News International group and is registered in England No 81701
To which i replied the following on Thursday aft 3rd
<Hi Daniel
Yes i am still unable to access the Times Crossword Club website and as a paid-up member with user name of AlanJC, my expectation is, as you have my details linked to this moniker and thus be informing me
i) when the registration will be reinstated,
ii) what reparations the company will be making for the interruption of
service.
All the best alan j cannon
ps
alanjcannon@email.com as well this address should appear in your records just in case there is some doubt as to my identity.
>
No reply as yet but then it is the weekend now and it’s probably not the right department. My reply above is a final draft of a much longer and crazed email. Trying to leave the problem alone especially as i am experiencing pc problems galore myself. Still going to consult the bank as i believe the fraudulent act has been already committed; it’s probably too late for apologies and claims of ignorance.
Thank you for your email.
ajcauk@tiscali.co.uk
I have refunded the premier crossword and standard crossword that you
created.
ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
premier crossword club working – I have refund £5 due to problems This
is now your only crossword account.
Regards
Glenn Hatch
Online Customer Liaison Department
readers email address: ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
<—- Original Message —->
Dear Glenn
Yes i registered through ajcauk@tiscali.co.uk for the Standard
and monthlong Premium as the the other email was already
used.
Yours alan j cannon
—– Original Message —-
From: “Questions, Technical” <technical@timesonline.co.uk>
To: ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
Sent: Friday, 25 January, 2008 3:49:17 PM
Subject: Re: Re: registration our NI ref: [[[1592744N]]]
Dear cannon alan
Thank you for your email.
I have checked your account and can see the premium crossword club
membership on account
ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
but nothing relating to the standard crossword club – did you set up a
new registration for this on another email address?
Regards
Glenn Hatch
Online Customer Liaison Department
readers email address: ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
<—- Original Message —->
Dear Jane
Thank you for manually activating my old account last friday
which seems to be working okay as far i can tell. However earlier
that day by way of an experiment i registered as Standard member
not entirely intentionally so i decided to switch to the month long
offer
on Premium. I didn’t see your email below until later in the week.
I notice the latter account recognises me as the same user as the
re-activated old account. The upshot is that i am now a Standard member
and a Premium member twice over. It would great if you could cancel
the redundant newly acquired accounts and refund me if that is
possible.
I haven’t picked up what the directive might be regarding
re-imbursement
for the interrupted service this past month; i know many were affected
and
there is still some bad feeling about it all. Look forward to any
illumination
you might be able to shed,
All the best Alan J Cannon
—– Original Message —-
From: “Questions, Technical” <technical@timesonline.co.uk>
To: ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
Sent: Friday, 18 January, 2008 5:23:27 PM
Subject: Re: registration our NI ref: [[[1592744N]]]
Dear cannon alan
Thank you for your email, I’m sorry to hear you have had difficulties
logging in and accessing the site.
Please be advised that your account has now been manually activated by
us and you can now log in with your email address and password.
To ensure that the correct page displays, please click the refresh icon
on your browser toolbar. If the correct page fails to display,
previous pages may have cached on your computer. PC users, please hold CTRL
and click F5 to refresh the page while ignoring any cached versions of
the page. Mac users, please hold the Apple key and click R.
If you do require further assistance please do not hesitate to contact
us again.
Do not respond if no action is required.
Kind regards
Jane Reynolds
Customer Liaison Department
ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
18/Jan/2008
<—- Original Message —->
Hi
Although some members have been able to access the crossword club
i am still unable to. Please advise.
My original handle is
AlanJC
this email address is
ajcauk@yahoo.co.uk
I registered from the email address alanjcannon@email.com and is a bona
fide
working account.
What further information might you require to reinstate my membership?
This is not the first time i have emailled concerning this matter.
I did have an exchange of emails with Daniel Shuter but i have the
conviction
built up from some years of experience that it is corporate policy to
not reply
beyond the cursory ‘we are doing all we can’ etc. message.
yours alan j cannon
Help!
Peter Biddlecombe, Sunday Times Crossword Editor