BT/Openreach - Useless

[AliG]

Just venting really.

 

My parents who are in their 70s moved into a new apartment on the 11th May.

 

They had called BT 2 weeks earlier to get broadband and a phone line installed.

 

Somehow BT got the wrong address. Not only did they get the wrong apartment number and building they spelled the street incorrectly.

 

My parents called them up to get this fixed.

 

As far as I can see on BT's system they have created and cancelled three accounts all with the wrong address.

 

Eventually they were got someone who claimed to fix it, but still the 4th modem that came out was sent to the wrong address, but they got it from the neighbour.

 

As I expected on the day that their service was to start it didn't. If you call BT in this scenario they always fall back on that it can start at any time up until midnight. This conveniently stops you being able to complain until the next day.

 

They called to complain and of course got the excuse that the fibre in their building wasn't working. Of course their neighbours have had their phones installed already so this is highly unlikely.

 

Eventually an Openreach engineer came out and mucked about for 2.5 hours. Then said variously that the "Pro boffins" at BT had to look at it and it was the fault of the modem. Quite how your broadband modem would stop your phone working escapes me.

 

I gave up and wrote an email complaint to CEO's email address hoping this would escalate things.

 

I got a phone call on Friday night which I missed, it was 836pm. I also got an email. I was promised a call back yesterday which didn't happen. My parents did get a call and the person promised to email me which also didn't happen.

 

They were told that the phone would work today, any time up to midnight again, but their broadband order had been cancelled and couldn't happen until the phone worked. Now they have had a call saying that it won't be connected today and an engineer needs to look at it. They didn't seem to know that this had already happened.

 

I tried to call the number of the person who called me, it doesn't work, and the number of the executive complaints team went to a mobile voicemail.

 

My parents just called me almost in tears. Having no phone and particularly no broadband is very difficult today. As their apartment is a concrete and steel new build, mobile signal is very poor.

 

Truly in my entire build I have never come across such incompetency. What really frustrates me, and this is true of many large companies nowadays is that rather than own up to a problem, mistake etc, they habitually lie to customers and waste everyone's time.

 

Rant over.

[Temp]

If it's a new build check their address including number is offered when you type their postcode into one of the websites that does address lookups. If not then they need to get that sorted by the council or they may also have issues with other utilities.

 

Looks like about 6 weeks since they first contacted BT. They seem to be in the same state we were after that time. Might still have four weeks to go if our experience is typical.

 

Next time you speak to BT make sure they know the line is for a vunerable person with medical issues and they can't even make emergency voice calls. Broadband is very unlikely to work until voice is working so keep stressing they can't make voice calls so that they keep the right department working on the problem. 

 

You could also try reporting it as a faulty line. However I think they want £125(?) deposit to get an engineer to look at it. If no fault found you loose the money.

[newhome]

BT still don’t have my address in their postcode lookup and I’ve had an account with them here for 9 years! 

[AliG]

Postcode checker is all fine, official addresses were issued months ago. Thus I cannot understand how BT managed to have the address misspelled as I would assume that they use the automated system internally.

 

I did point out to my parents that they would be better ordering things on line than phoning as then no one is going to get your address wrong. Still BT were informed of the correct address over a month ago, yet I still cannot see an account with the correct address on it.

 

I did point out in my email to BT that my dad has had 2 cataract operations on the last three months. They have been utterly useless.

 

I work less than 10 minutes walk from the HQ in London. I did say that they can have a personal visit if it helps!

[ProDave]

You have hit the nail on the head when you say they are disinterested. Took nearly 2 months for our connection which was a pantomime.

 

Look on the bright side. WHEN it finally gets connected, get onto that CEO's number and negotiate your compensation. I got all but £5 of the connection fee refunded and a substantial discount for 12 months.  I have just renewed even cheaper, they price matched what Plusnet would offer for a new customer. There is no need to pay BT anything like their fictitious full price.

[AliG]

My parents have bene promised some kind of compensation. We will see once it actually works.

 

They are extremely conscientious and hard working people and to them they just cannot understand how something can be so hopelessly organised.

 

I notice that BT have a rating of 0.5/10 on Trustnet. I have never seen anything close to this.

 

It is all well and good that Openreach is separately managed to BT and there is even talk of totally splitting it off, but by necessity the cable owner is likely to be a monopoly. It wouldn't make much sense to have two companies installing lines to your house. Thus it is not clear how to change their attitude. Perhaps management should be remunerated on customer service rather than profits and this should be imposed by the regulator.

 

I suspect that when there are problems the division between Openreach and BT actually exacerbates them and I am doubtful that it actually helps consumers.

 

I have had various gas meters, electricity meters, Virgin etc all installed in my build. All has been pretty painless. I actually went straight to Virgin for the broadband as I knew getting Openreach to install a new line would take forever and Virgin is faster. Openreach have been along with conduit that we have just put in as we are landscaping the garden. Thankfully I am not beholden to them to get an installation.

[AliG]

If you fancy a laugh-

 

https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/bt.com

 

I notice that lying to customers is a common theme.

 

 

 

 

[Roundtuit]

Coincedentally, or possibly not, I had to call bt today to tell them the account we set up last week has been set up in our name, but with our (soon to be) next door neighbours address. They can't just amend the address - far too simple - they've had to cancel the account and open a new one, with a new engineers date (tbc...).  Wouldn't mind so much but we're in the process of moving from talktalk as we thought they were hard work.  Daren't tell the kids they'll be another week without internet...

Feels like the 'new accounts' team are on commission for signing up an account and don't give a toss whether it sticks or not.

[PeterW]

I had 3 broadband accounts on one line at one point - asked them how it was possible and got no answer !

 

Business team are UK based so a bit easier to deal with - I got them to agree that as it was their issue and I was helping them that anything over a 5 minute phone call was me charging them £120/hr +VAT.... soon got their attention !

[AliG]

Pretty much every day this week they have been told it will be working tomorrow and it hasn't.

 

Today I spoke to someone in executive level complaints as I had emailed the CEO address. They told me that the problems all go back to duplicating a number in their system and so two apartments were showing on the same equipment.

 

This has apparently now been fixed but there are other issues.

 

Reading between the lines it seems that many problems at BT/Openreach are caused by poor systems and incorrect data input. It doesn't work if all the equipment and lines are not correctly identified.

 

The Openreach engineer replaced the fibre modem in my parents' apartment but did not record this. My mum had to give BT the serial number off the new unit.

 

They also seem to be unable to amend incorrect accounts but instead create one order after another each with a new account number and my parents receiving an email both their new service.

 

Parents go on holiday on Sunday and come back on the 15th. BT say that an Openreach engineer will come on the 18th and should get the system up and running. I did query why an engineer cannot come on the Saturday considering the long notice. Then I discovered that part of the issue is that as it is a FTTH install which they have only just started, not all engineers are trained to do it.

 

The people I spoke to today were very nice and apologetic, but really we just want it working.

[Temp]

We ran a wire from our house to the bottom of their pole for them and ordered a connection. They called me once a week to say they were working on it then suddenly they stopped calling so I rang them only to be told the work was all finished. So I walk down my driveway to the pole (we had been in four weeks by now I think) and the coil of wire we had left for them was still there. The lady says it's definitely all finished and that if it's not working it must be faulty. So I let them send out a fault engineer who insists on testing my line from the master socket (we had fitted). He wouldn't listen to my protest that it wasn't connected at the pole yet. Some minutes go by while he fiddles with some test kit then askes me to show him where I think the problem is. Fortunately he took the embarrassment rather well. He couldn't fix it on the spot as they aren't allowed to climb poles these days without a cherry picker (or so he said) but made a few calls and a crew turned up about a week later.

 

 

Edited June 1, 2018 by Temp

[AliG]

I have this to look forward to still on my build, but as of today I am getting 100MB from Virgin so I don't have to rely on BT.

 

This is over Ubiquiti wifi as discussed in other threads re wifi and ethernet.

 

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Edited June 1, 2018 by AliG