[AusNOG] Q about time zones especially UTC

[Tony]

Even if you specify the timezone in your correspondence, lots of people tend to ignore it anyway and just assume local  time to where they are  (particularly Syd/Mel people during daylights savings - I'm in QLD)


Just yesterday I was logging a fault with a carrier (on an OC3 service) and I was talking to the guy and it went something like this:

me: we just has a LOS event on service xyz
him: when did it happen
me: 12:14 - 12:16 Eastern Standard Time   (note, I actually specified timezone)
him: so just over an hour ago
me: no, 12:14 EST
him: oh, you mean 12:14 Brisbane time
me: thats what I said 12:14 EST, a few minutes ago


So despite me giving him the timezone to avoid confusion he still struggled, but got there eventually.


Another incident I had was a couple of years ago now where I needed to transfer some funds (in the summer, when daylight savings time was active for the southern states). Had to fill in a form and fax it to Sydney for processing. The form said it needed to be in "before 1100 EST" for processing on the same day (it had the timezone specified on the form). I faxed the form at 1030 EST and then called them about 10 minutes later to confirm receipt of the form. I was informed that they had received it but that as it wasn't received before 1100 it wouldn't be processed today. I argued with them that it WAS submitted before 1100 EST, which is what the form said and that if they were going to go to the trouble of putting a timezone on the form then they should honour it. Was put through to a supervisor and argued with him before they grudgingly conceded and said they would put through an "urgent request" at their expense so that it would happen same day. A few
 weeks later the funds transfer form was changed to say "1100 Sydney local time" :)


regards,
Tony.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ausnog.net/pipermail/ausnog/attachments/20121122/076c94fa/attachment.html>