Prefix Delegation Disabled

Hello @Comcast_Marcus I sent a chat message to Comcast Business with a link to this post.

Hey there, Allan! I see that your ticket is still open, but we wanted to check in with you to see how everything is going.

The tech replaced the modem with an older firmware version on Nov 13 as I posted above. It worked without issue until Nov 18 when the modem updated to the faulty version again - 8.2p5s1. I confirmed just now (Nov 20) that our IPv6 service is still down. We thought we presented enough evidence that this is firmware related. Needless to say we are disappointed that we have to go through this service outage again. This is unacceptable for a business-class service.

Good evening allan thank you so much for taking the time to follow up on this issue! We do still have an open line of communication with the advanced team that have been assisting, and would be happy to forward any new findings or testing you have so this issue can be worked through. Please reach us via the open 1-1 conversation we have saved with you. 

Hello, @thetommyc! You are at the right place for further help with the router prefix. I am sorry you are feeling that way. We want your service to work flawlessly. We understand it is frustrating when there is a problem. Our advanced team goes through a number of steps to find and resolve the issue. Their work can sometimes take a little bit depending on what needs to be done, such as an engineering issue. We can check on your advanced repair ticket and go from there.

Please send us a direct message with your full name and complete service address to “Xfinity Support”. To do so, click on the direct messaging icon located at the top right of this forums page.

Here's the detailed steps to direct message us:
• Click "Sign In" if necessary
• Click the "Direct Message” icon (upper right corner of this page)
• Click the "New message" (pencil and paper) icon
• Type "Xfinity Support" in the to line and select "Xfinity Support" from the drop-down list
• Type your message in the text area near the bottom of the window
• Press Enter to send your message

@Comcast_Ray​ I sent a message. It wouldn't be as big an issue for the research to take a while if there was ANY communication with customers. Leaving us totally in the dark isn't really acceptable, especially when first line support says I should expect to hear from someone within 8 hours.

@gantzm_mi Thanks for that feedback, and I will make sure it is submitted. We are always looking for ways to improve the customer experience. We want to ensure that your services are working throughout firmware updates. Let us know if you have any additional feedback we can provide. 

@Comcast_Jen​ Following up on this, it has now been since 02:00 on Tuesday that I've been dealing with this. Comcast support has "escalated" my ticket to Tier 2 support, who has not done anything with the ticket. I have requested a manager call back, which has gone ignored. I have requested an update on the ticket's progress, which has gone unanswered.

I pay for this service, and the official policy of Comcast is that it's in essence unsupported. I have had issues several times in the past with the static IPv6 service, and no changes have been made. Level 1 support doesn't understand the difference between IPv4 and IPv6, which would be fine if they didn't keep trying to diagnose IPv4 issues when I call in.

At this point, I'm honestly at a loss. There's clearly a bug here. Level 2 support either knows about it and isn't doing anything or even communicating that they know back to customers, OR they aren't actually looking into the problem and don't care to diagnose the IPv6 trouble tickets they receive. That's the only conclusion I can possibly come to after waiting a week for help. I have no real recourse whatsoever, since nobody inside support feels any pressure to get this fixed. So I'm left to complain to the void here on the forums.

@Comcast_Jen​ - Comcast as a company has demonstrated, time and again, that they absolutely don't give a [Edited - Language] about serving their business customers any better than this.  This is their chosen level of regard for customers.  All the company cares more about is receiving their payments from the customers for their monthly bills.  I challenge you to show and prove to us otherwise.  I'm waiting.

(PS - This isn't anything personal against you.  This is from a customer to the company, and both know this isn't acceptable service)

Incredibly, corporate escalations got back to me, said the problem is my fault since my router has an address assigned to its external interface, and they seemed really stunned by the fact I have logs showing interface addresses and the prefix error response. My ticket is now "being escalated" even though that was supposed to happen on Wednesday.

@thetommyc​ when I opened the ticket on Nov 8, I made sure to call out that our modem has its assigned /56 and the issue is on the modem itself--not upstream. All their monitors are green because everything is working except for the handoff.

@allan​ I have explained to support reps countless times at this point how v6 works on the Comcast network, and how without PD I can't get traffic routed because their network won't have a route for my address(es). I've also had to explain how I have logs showing their modem's LAN interface responding with NoPrefixAvail to my router's WAN interface. The corporate escalations lady had a accusatory attitude from the jump, and finally when I told her I have call logs and router logs showing how long I've been dealing with this and that it's clearly their problem, she said she'd escalate to another internal group almost as a challenge to me.

I'm finally talking to people that might be able to do something for me, but I'm still having to explain v6 PD to everybody. Every single person says because the router has a public v6 address it's clearly working until I point out that the part I PAY for is the static assignment which requires PD. There's no recourse for us as customers, because Comcast basically refuses to support this service that we pay for, they're clearly not training people internally on IPv6, and if you live where there's no competition (yet) there isn't a service you can leave them for.

Fortunately for me, the new year should be bringing a new service provider to my area. Hopefully I can move off this service and get support for the products I pay for.

Greetings, kweevuss! I hope your weekend has been treating you well. Thanks so much for taking a moment out of your busy day to leave a post on our Comcast Business Community forum. I'm sorry to hear you're experiencing the same issue. We understand it is vital for you to have peace of mind when you're connected online. Rest assured, you have reached the right team to assist you with this matter. I noticed you have sent us a direct message. We will proceed with a direct message for further assistance. 

oh not again... Me and a friend worked with Phil (your IP Engr VP), your IPv6 3rd level support guy in Colorado Springs and the India coding team for ~4 mos to figure out the last bug, which was they forgot to update the ipfw filter rules in the box when assiging a new address or PD, so it was deaf inbound after an IA-PD. It worked exactly once. Remember that one ? They also had the exp timers set to totally silly values too.  That took 2 more months to get fixed. Seems like they have busted  IA-PD again in a new way. Looks like you folks have the bug identified,  let me see if that VP is still on the job. I just checked, he's gone. What really bugs me is that I have to explain IPv6 every time I call in, it's really annoying. Before you ask, the way I was able to get to them was that another member of the IETF, (ex Silicon Valley Area Director) who worked on much of the v6 RFCs knows those guys and I know him and he called up and spoke with them and me. I cant tell you how many dozens of emails, calls, txts we exchanged. I will start again with my fellow IETF friends and see whom I can call.

@geoffb I’m sorry to hear you're having repeat issues with your connection. Our apologies you have to start over when reaching out. Please give us a call at (800) 391-3000 so we can assist you and escalate your concerns accordingly.  

Kei, I will call, but there must be HUNDREDS of boxes affected for you guys. A second problem is that your CMTS Net Mgmt sytem thinks everything is fine because there is a v6 address assigned to the exterior modem interface, *but there's no route internally as the PD didnt fly*, so just seeing an address, with no route, is meaningless. But my larger issue is that people at the ISP's still seem untrained on IPv6 generally, sigh... Example, I am testing Sonic Fiber and they have their own set of issues with v6, such as having the timers for IA's set to ~5 min, which causes flapping, so.. They admitted they have no idea about IPv6 and said I should make a Forum posting over there for help, like really ? I may just have to go back to Hurricane and run a 6 in 4 off a pi like I did in 2018 ? In 2025, geez... Not being rude ! 

@geoffb I'm sorry to hear you were told to reach out on the forums when you called in. This is not the experience we want for anyone. Can you please direct message me your first and last name along with your full service address so that I can assist.
Here's the detailed steps to direct message us:
• Click "Sign In" if necessary
• Click the "Direct Message” icon (upper right corner of this page)
• Click the "New message" (pencil and paper) icon
• Type "Comcast Business" in the to line and select "Comcast Business" from the drop-down list
• Type your message in the text area near the bottom of the window
• Press Enter to send your message.

What did it take last time there was a modem firmware bug? What was necessary to get that escalated to the point where anybody took it serious? Do we just rely on someone here happening to know an executive, or is there an official process that those of us with engineering skills can use to get to the correct people internally and work on these kinds of problems?

It takes one of us to get lucky and find someone who is willing to listen and has connections into engineering or knows the process. I tried emailing my contact from the last firmware bug but he sadly passed away. I am working with someone on the Business Escalation team and he just got a path into engineering. This should not stop anyone affected from opening a ticket though. We need more customers reporting this. We are at a disadvantage now compared to the last firmware bug since IPv6-PD users are a small subset of their already small IPv6 user base. To them, IPv6 users are not calling in with issues.

@allan​ The support person who has been calling me managed to get the internal team to rollback my modem to the previous firmware.  Seems there were some issues and rolling back proved a little troublesome as the modem didn't exactly want to do that.  They are presently "monitoring the situation", I'm not sure exactly what that means.  I'm assuming they are either going to start rolling back other modems, or maybe just fix whatever the bug is.

As someone who has been writing software professionally for almost four decades now I'm rather appalled at the apparent lack of testing.  As I mentioned above these aren't corner cases, and testing them wouldn't involve much expense.

Whatever the issue is, it appears to have also broken ND proxy (detailed in another thread.)

@gantzm_mi​ The tech who replaced my modem said he knows someone within engineering and he would forward my findings. I don't think that happened since the firmware updated a week later.  No one I spoke with offered the option to rollback. I considered asking for one after reading your post, but I figured it would just upgrade again. Hopefully, they added your modem to a block list but "monitoring the situation" sounds like they are waiting to see what happens next.

I think the most frustrating part is the lack of communication from engineering. Tier 2 support seems to be in the dark like us.

@allan​ I was informed my modem was locked to this version at the moment.  I don't think my modem is going to automatically update at this point.  What wasn't clear is the path forward.  The support guy was offering a bunch of help but he obviously has no control over firmware engineering.  So I don't know if my modem will update when the next patch comes out.  The actual firmware engineering team doesn't seem very open about what's going on or willing to discuss a path forward.

My prefix delegation has been broken since I got a new modem...edit: going on 5 weeks soon. 

After it was replaced, I was getting the wrong block (out of a different /56 than my static).  Then it died for af ew days, came back, and has been down for ~ 10+ days.  Now it's "working" again as of this morning (I think something was done to the cable modem, as I lost all internet for ~ 10 minutes and when it came back PD was working again), and when I mean "working" I mean I get the wrong prefix again, not out of my block.

I'm still hoping this will eventually be fixed.   I was told this was a known issue and it's being worked on in engineering.  I have a thread open in here already in this forum, and the reps have helped me, and it's getting escalated, but just wanted to post something encouraging others to post an issue here so that the reps can get their issue escalated as well.

@rob__jr​ FYI: somehow IPv6 /56's are tied to the modem.  Anytime you get a new modem, the /56 changes.  It's been that way for some time.

I agree with @gantzm_mi  here. We pay a premium for this business-class service with assurances that we get business-class support any time. We should not have to go through the Tier 1 interrogation every time we call for help. I am the IT support for our business and I make sure all the reboots and testing were done before I pick up the phone. I don't want to call support any more than I have to; I have other stuff to do.

I'd suggest opening a case.  The more they have the more likely someone is going to notice.

I opened mine almost a week ago.  Just called in and it is in a status of "parked," which I'm told means a tier 2 tech has taken ownership.

It's very frustrating to have a business class service have an issue that has an obvious fix and I haven't even heard anything for nearly a week.  Admittedly, a week that includes a Thanksgiving holiday, but it's now two business days after that long weekend.

Well. someone got my modem rolled back to firmware image      CGA4332COM_8.1p8s2_PROD_sey ...and my static route capabilities are back and working again.

Does anyone have any information about that?

@user_6ae3dc​ I'm assuming at this point that someone at Comcast finally figured out that the 8.2 firmware was bad and is just rolling everybody back.