BT fault question

I have BT Infinity and in Oct last year I started losing wireless connections on all WiFi devices simultaneously. Numerous phone calls to the atrocious BT support got nowhere. Their sole solution seemed to be "I have changed some settings on your router". Off course their solutions never worked.

By January this year I kept telling their support there was clearly a BT Hub 3 problem as it was getting interference. This interference magically coincided with a few of my neighbours getting BT Infinity. Their response was, "I have changed some settings on your router".

By May I was threatening to leave BT but they told me it would cost me over £500 to do so. I asked them for a replacement BT Hub 5 which has better protection against interference. They told me they were not responsible for replacing the hub as they were of the opinion the BT Hub 3 was working fine. When I insisted their was a problem with my Hub I was told if they sent an engineer and found no problem I would be charged £95+VAT for the callout if no hub problems were found. The guy then had a cheek to send me a link to a "special offer" to purchase a new BT Hub 5 for £65.

So last month (June) I just purchased a new BT Hub 5 from a certain auction site for £35. All WiFi problems have been cured, as I suspected the Home Hub 3 was receiving interference since my neighbours got BT Infinity.

Truly BT suck, they are gangsters and my previous provider (o2) were amazing in comparison. Were it not for the fact I am tied into a contract with BT for another (at the time) 12+ months I would have left in a heartbeat. 9 months of going to BT support, being patronised when I suggested the problem was interference and being given no actual help whatsoever. In the end I had to purchase a replacement Hub 5 for the inadequate Hub 3 that BT declared working perfectly.

Only a five days to fix a BT problem, OP doesn't know how lucky he is :)
 
Last edited:
I don't know how it works with BT, but if there's any interruption of service with Virgin, you can ring them up, have a bit of a moan and they give you money off your next bill.
 
Wilbur I hope you reported that to OFCOM, I think tehre are some fairly nasty penalties for BT in that sort of situation (where a vulnerable person relies on the phone for medical/alarm purposes), I'm not sure but I think they are meant to both give it a big priority with an SLA far better than normal consumer lines, and possibly sort out some form of emergency replacement (something like a mobile network version of the alarm) whilst it's being fixed.
 
ICDP said:
I have BT Infinity and in Oct last year I started losing wireless connections on all WiFi devices simultaneously. Numerous phone calls to the atrocious BT support got nowhere. Their sole solution seemed to be "I have changed some settings on your router". Off course their solutions never worked.

By January this year I kept telling their support there was clearly a BT Hub 3 problem as it was getting interference. This interference magically coincided with a few of my neighbours getting BT Infinity. Their response was, "I have changed some settings on your router".

By May I was threatening to leave BT but they told me it would cost me over £500 to do so. I asked them for a replacement BT Hub 5 which has better protection against interference. They told me they were not responsible for replacing the hub as they were of the opinion the BT Hub 3 was working fine. When I insisted their was a problem with my Hub I was told if they sent an engineer and found no problem I would be charged £95+VAT for the callout if no hub problems were found. The guy then had a cheek to send me a link to a "special offer" to purchase a new BT Hub 5 for £65.

So last month (June) I just purchased a new BT Hub 5 from a certain auction site for £35. All WiFi problems have been cured, as I suspected the Home Hub 3 was receiving interference since my neighbours got BT Infinity.

Truly BT suck, they are gangsters and my previous provider (o2) were amazing in comparison. Were it not for the fact I am tied into a contract with BT for another (at the time) 12+ months I would have left in a heartbeat. 9 months of going to BT support, being patronised when I suggested the problem was interference and being given no actual help whatsoever. In the end I had to purchase a replacement Hub 5 for the inadequate Hub 3 that BT declared working perfectly.

Only a five days to fix a BT problem, OP doesn't know how lucky he is :)
Click to expand...

Sounds similar to me. Ended up threatening to leave, and got an ok deal which consisted of a Hub5 and much lower monthly payments. I guess I could've got another router thing from elsewhere but I also wanted to lower my monthly bill.

The worst service I've had from BT was the fact that I had to change my landline number even though it was already a BT line, after leaving Sky for BT... I now have one that I can only assume is recycled as I keep getting debt collector calls. Or messages on my answerphone. If I get to answer the call they stop after I explain whatever person they're chasing doesn't and never has lived here and I don't even know who they're after... but then another company buys the debt and the cycle starts again.

Oh and the time my line stopped ringing whenever anyone called. If I picked the phone up I could answer the call... but it never rang.

Took them 3 weeks to admit their was a fault in their box. Meh.
 
I really haven't had many dealings with BT Retail myself but these horror stories mean I certainly won't either!

Some of the issues you refer to are in Openreach's domain so generally out with the direct control of BT themselves as per OFCOM rules.

Generally line faults have an SLA of 3-5 working days although generally if there haven't been any severe weather warnings (Openreach call these a 'Matter Beyond Our Reasonable Control or MBORC) or other issues like cable theft then single line faults are often fixed in a day or two. We've seen some faults even fixed that day although it is rare. The record so far for me is 2 1/2 hours from logging to resolution but that's certainly not the norm. As said though, if the fault isn't resolved until the fifth working day then that's still within SLA.

Welfare cases (sometimes known as Blue Light) depend on what the issue is. If someone is just elderly and doesn't have a care alarm and their phone is just for contact with the outside world and they have a mobile then they aren't a priority. A care alarm, severe disability, life threatening illness etc. is a priority but if the fault is a 'common' fault (an issue affecting sometimes several hundred or a few thousand customers as has happened) then there's no priority attached to clearing just the escalated welfare case as its all fixed at once. However single faults on the line are treated as a priority but at Sky our Welfare team can take up to 48 hours to pick up our escalation to them and often, if it's a visit that's required it happens and is resolved before they get involved. I can't speak for other providers or DP's though.

Broadband issues alone aren't a priority for us whatsoever although we will use common sense of course.
 
Caged said:
Every consumer-oriented communications provider is engaged in a fight to the bottom and as a consequence are all unmitigated garbage.
Click to expand...

There are companies out there that don't follow this trend. They're not very popular. Andrews & Arnold often crop up when this kind of thing is discussed. Great levels of service apparently but prices to match.

Blowing our own trumpet a little but Sky does pretty well in OFCOM surveys about Customer satisfaction and recently OFCOM Said we have the most consistent peak time speeds of any provider.
 
wilber said:
My Gran who is 98 has an emergency alarm around her neck in case she falls or something bad happens this uses the phone line and BT are aware that this line should be a priority for them to repair if it becomes unusable.

First time the line was broken it took them 2 weeks.

Second time took them 3 weeks.


In the end I was going out to the physical break and connecting the wires myself and wrapping it up in insulation tape.

Completely ridiculous service.
Click to expand...

In their cabinet or in the house?

There are companies that have much faster fix times but you have to pay for the extra for this, but no one wants to.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom