BT openreach. Please.

[Lostmyrag]

Hello,

Looking for advice really, a 'what would you do scenario'

Basically, I have been a paying customer for 18 months with SKY for my fibre broadband which crashed out 2 weeks ago today. I have had 2 engineers out, the first not having a clue, the second ... told me after about an hour of fiddling and discovering no connection established to my place. He stated that my line has been allocated to someone else in the street. My jaw dropped after hearing that - "BT have allocated my line to someone else? WHAT?!"

He went on to say he will raise it with the planning team where they will need to schedule the road to be dug up and worked on in order for me to have a connection again. He also stated it could take weeks if not months for this to be resolved.

The painful thing is, I have to go through SKY to raise each query, who to be fair have been really helpful, I have been constantly calling for updates and SKY have been patient with me so far, although it has taken them 2 weeks to credit my account for a dongle (which i have to buy myself upto the value of £20) Also, They said they will reimburse any loss of service once the connection is established again. Just find it incredibly frustrating that i cannot speak to openreach about the matter and escalate it with them.

Sorry for the rant, has anybody had this or heard about such a farce before?

We all the love the internet, most of us cant live without it, I certainly fall under that bracket.

Where do i stand as a consumer?

inb4 the ol' #firstworldproblems and #coolstorybro

 

[touch]

Where do i stand as a consumer?

Your contract (and SLAs, etc) is with Sky. You're not an openreach customer.
I doubt there's anything more you can do if they are already going to refund you for the time you were without a connection (although, i guess you'd probably be within your rights to terminate the contract).

I dont understand why they have to dig up the road? Surely there is already a line from your house to the cabinet and from your neighbour to the cabinet. Seems like they have mixed up some connections in the cabinet?

 

[monkeyspank]

does your phone not work either then?

 

[MissChief]

It's true that if your phone line had been given to someone else your phone wouldn't work as it still uses the copper from the PCP to your house. I would call back and ask for it to be escalated to Openreach again.

 

[Cold_And_Miserable]

If that happened here I wouldn't waste time trying to deal with BT. They're a joke.
I'd cancel BT + Sky and get Virgin Media.
VM are a poor choice for serious gaming or getting decent pings to international servers but it's better than nothing.

 

[nade]

As touch is suggesting, I'd digout your Sky paperwork and go through it. However I'd be surprised if they did not have a clause somewhere which states they wouldn't be liable for any issues caused by a third party

Should also get back on the phone with Sky and ask to speak with a manager if you're not getting anywhere.

 

[TommyV]

If that happened here I wouldn't waste time trying to deal with BT. They're a joke.
I'd cancel BT + Sky and get Virgin Media.
VM are a poor choice for serious gaming or getting decent pings to international servers but it's better than nothing.

Why do you say that? I used a 30mb connection for a few years when living at home, and have every intention of using their 152mb service in a property I'm in the process of purchasing.

I've never had any problems with them in the way of gaming nor pings to international servers.

I'm in Bristol, could the issues simply be geographical and localised to your area?

 

[TheBDog]

BT Openreach are completely ridiculous and really terrible in my experience. I have TalkTalk(equally notoriously bad) and when I moved they had to replace my phone line because it had degraded over time. TalkTalk specifically state this type of job normally has a 1 day turn around time, however, it took over a month!

That was a month of talking to MANY TalkTalk customer service reps (only 10% of which actually had my case details/ claimed they had the power to re-escalate to Openreach), with several(often pointless) Openreach engineer visits that seemed to achieve nothing(many of which we needed to be at home for before they could achieve anything but we were told EVERY time by TalkTalk that no one needed to be present) and with no service whatsoever.

Sadly, there are many cases of this with regards to Openreach(and many more with regards to TalkTalk). Sadly, the inability to go directly through Openreach(even if you're with BT) is a real hinderance and ISPs have us by the short and curlies because of this terrible system.

My advice is go with Virgin but my evidence is fairly anecdotal there too. A friend had to have their VM line replaced and they came out the very next day. We could only dream about having a consistent service.

 

[wndsr]

If that happened here I wouldn't waste time trying to deal with BT. They're a joke.
I'd cancel BT + Sky and get Virgin Media.
VM are a poor choice for serious gaming or getting decent pings to international servers but it's better than nothing.

Gets bad connection in his house. Assumes the entire country is the same.

 

[Steveocee]

Openreach wouldn't speak to you.
Sky are there customer as far as they are concerned.
Just ask sky to escalate the case.

 

[MissChief]

BT Openreach are completely ridiculous and really terrible in my experience. I have TalkTalk(equally notoriously bad) and when I moved they had to replace my phone line because it had degraded over time. TalkTalk specifically state this type of job normally has a 1 day turn around time, however, it took over a month!

That was a month of talking to MANY TalkTalk customer service reps (only 10% of which actually had my case details/ claimed they had the power to re-escalate to Openreach), with several(often pointless) Openreach engineer visits that seemed to achieve nothing(many of which we needed to be at home for before they could achieve anything but we were told EVERY time by TalkTalk that no one needed to be present) and with no service whatsoever.

Sadly, there are many cases of this with regards to Openreach(and many more with regards to TalkTalk). Sadly, the inability to go directly through Openreach(even if you're with BT) is a real hinderance and ISPs have us by the short and curlies because of this terrible system.

My advice is go with Virgin but my evidence is fairly anecdotal there too. A friend had to have their VM line replaced and they came out the very next day. We could only dream about having a consistent service.

90% (estimated but probably not that far off) of the faults I raise, under normal circumstances, are fixed next working day.

Until a provider decides to lay their own cabling (which won't happen as to even consider it is financial suicide) then Openreach do indeed have nearly every ISP (and consequently their customers also) by the short and curlies. It's easy to have low standards when you run a virtual monopoly.

 

[Lostmyrag]

does your phone not work either then?

Nope, phone line is completely dead. Although i dont actually use the land line I use my mobile instead, i still had to purchase a line to have internet.


Thanks for the input everyone. I have raised and escalated it to SKY numerous times now. SKY havent been bad in dealing with the matter, it seems they cant do too much either, it's a case of BT will do their thing when they get round to it.

Im not sure what's happened in regards why they need to dig the road up, im going on what the engineer has said. He stated he tried to sort a temp fix by hooking me up to another telephone pole/exchange, what am i to know.

 

[R4z0r]

Escalate with Sky.

 

[Mark This Day]

get virgin

 

[MissChief]

Very helpful. NOT.

 

[Steveocee]

Ask to escalate with sky, ask escalation person at sky to escalate with BT.
Unfortunately the pathway will more than likely be;

You >> Sky >> BT Wholesale >> BT Openreach

So no matter how hard you convey this is a problem for you, your message will get dulled down as it traverses the chain. A formal escalation is the only real way of getting yourself heard.

 

[86JR]

Probably given your allocation to the local DHS.

When they wouldn't plumb mine in I was told by the agency dealing with rollout in the SW that they were reserving 50 slots for the new council house estate (that still requires foundations and has been sitting there for 7 years) which is why we could not have it (ours being the most expensive street in the village).

I asked them why there was not enough to go round and they told me that they consider number of people per household and their likely occupation; therefore a house full of dole scum needs it more than a working family do because they will be stuck in the house and using it more!!!!

I complained to the council and quoted him (bit naughty as he was off record I guess) and threatened to take it to the Daily Mail knowing they love dole scum as much as I do and my house got plumbed to the cabinet two weeks later.

 

[Doogles]

I want your broadband! Best I can get is ADSL which is 8meg

Hope you get it fixed openreach are awful unfortunately, trust me had them myself.

Probably given your allocation to the local DHS.

When they wouldn't plumb mine in I was told by the agency dealing with rollout in the SW that they were reserving 50 slots for the new council house estate (that still requires foundations and has been sitting there for 7 years) which is why we could not have it (ours being the most expensive street in the village).

I asked them why there was not enough to go round and they told me that they consider number of people per household and their likely occupation; therefore a house full of dole scum needs it more than a working family do because they will be stuck in the house and using it more!!!!

I complained to the council and quoted him (bit naughty as he was off record I guess) and threatened to take it to the Daily Mail knowing they love dole scum as much as I do and my house got plumbed to the cabinet two weeks later.

Suppose with our government this really isn't a surprise!

 

[Jez]

Probably given your allocation to the local DHS.

When they wouldn't plumb mine in I was told by the agency dealing with rollout in the SW that they were reserving 50 slots for the new council house estate (that still requires foundations and has been sitting there for 7 years) which is why we could not have it (ours being the most expensive street in the village).

I asked them why there was not enough to go round and they told me that they consider number of people per household and their likely occupation; therefore a house full of dole scum needs it more than a working family do because they will be stuck in the house and using it more!!!!

I complained to the council and quoted him (bit naughty as he was off record I guess) and threatened to take it to the Daily Mail knowing they love dole scum as much as I do and my house got plumbed to the cabinet two weeks later.

This is all absolutely fictitious! BTW do not operate in this way, never have done, and never would. Each primary line and associated services is a separate entity with equal importance regardless of situation.

Did you just make all of that up in your head or hear it down the pub?

 

[zoomee]

BT engineers are well known to just take a connection from one port in the cabinet and whack it into another when they cba and just want to resolve something quickly. Their not supposed to do that but the BT bloke who was at my house the other day confirmed this also!

I got so miffed off dealing with BT's pathetic service (Was with Sky, and even BT themselves for fibre) - that I switched to virgin. Non of this crap with having to get them out every two years to fix a fault (which usually took a month+ to sort). Thats one thing I will say about virgin - at least their connection is reliable, and for the extra couple of quid its well worthwhile if available in your area.

PS - If you try to leave a BT fibre connection completely (and move to virgin for example) they will try to screw you out of £30 for disconnection too! (even if your out of contract).