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BillE
07-Jan-07, 22:01
Hello,


This is my first posting to Caithness.Org!

Sorry about the rant for my first posting but I have to tell someone about BT and PlusNet.

I am wondering if anyone has any clue as to what BT Engineers were doing in the Scarfskerry area on 14th December 2006, and why they were doing it ?

There were several of them climbing up the local telegraph pole, and digging a hole across the road which appears to lead to the sea and nowhere else. The bad news is that whatever they did that day and when they switched over to the new configuration that evening I lost my Broadband connection, one which had been working fine for nearly two years. Since that day I have had the dubious pleasure of watching a flashing router light and been stuck with a "temporary" dial up number. Had I known their actions would adversely effect me three weeks later I would have done an "Arthur Dent" and lay down in the road in front of their digger ! Naively I thought they were doing "improvements".

Getting hold of BT to find out what they did and to fix the fault is impossible, you must go through your ISP. Great, I have to pay BT even more money to ring PlusNet to listen to 20 or minutes of music each time I call. Goodness knows why, PlusNet had nothing to do with my problem, BT did it - I saw them. Of course now it is impossible to get just one BT engineer to come round and fix the vandalism half a dozen of them did to my line. PlusNet did eventually arrange for a BT visit on the 28th December but no one turned up. No one has turned up since.

It is now over three weeks since BT managed to murder my ADSL connection, PlusNet seem to drag their heels or are forever "awaiting a reply from BT". BT won't talk to anyone about Internet connections, why not when it was their people that (no doubt inadvertently) wrecked it.

The whole UK Broadband system is ludicrous, BT send out people to do unwanted and uncalled for work on lines we rely on, yet do not inform anyone of it. You cannot contact BT, your ISP has to do it for you even if the problem is really nothing to do with them. BT Wholesale neither communicate with the ISP nor the normal BT people that wreck our connections. They certainly do not want any customer that uses their product to contact them. Why is BT Wholesale a secret society shielded by incompetent ISPs, can't they just fix the problems BT engineers cause when interfering with people's lines ? Shouldn't BT accountable ? Shouldn't they be contactable and responsible ? To have to ring an ISP based goodness knows where to fix a local problem is exactly what is wrong with UK business today, far too many call centres that can actually do nothing to help, PlusNet don't seem to even bother passing your problem forward to BT.

I wish I had stuck with Zetnet, they were £8 a month more expensive for ADSL but I bet they would have sorted my BT problem out by now.

Final question, as you may well perceive I do not have a high regard for BT. Is there any other way locally to get Broadband and purge BT out of the equation? I could then rip my telephone line out too as I hardly ever use it except for internet access.

BT charge us in rural areas as much for inferior lines as they do for people with 8MB access down south and that is regarded as third world by many other nations. Do we really have to pay so much for our phone line rentals when the lines are not anywhere near up to scratch ? Isn't it time BT realised they give us in the far north a really bad service and reduce their charges accordingly!

OK Rant over.

If anyone does know what BT were doing on the 14th December please let me know. I would welcome a BT engineer who came to fix my problem with open arms and maybe a free pint. It is only their managers I feel like murdering.


Bill.

cuddlepop
07-Jan-07, 22:20
Bill go onto the general forum I've brought back an old thread.
Your not alone:lol:

badger
08-Jan-07, 14:38
Welcome to the club. I spent 6 months trying to sort out BT when I switched to them as my ISP but at least I got lots of refunds. Keep complaining, get very cross, demand to go higher and higher up until you get to the top. Bear in mind that BT is now several companies, none of which know what the other are doing or have any contact with each other. Worse than that, the engineers don't know what other engineers are doing (suggest they buy a computer).

BillE
08-Jan-07, 18:52
> Welcome to the club. I spent 6 months trying to sort out BT
> when I switched to them as my ISP

BT are not my ISP, I used to work at BT Internet so they would be the last ISP I would think of using. PlusNet are my ISP and I wish I hadn't changed to them either. Zetnet may have been £23 a month but they were a lot better than PN or BT Internet will ever be.

>BT is now several companies, none of which know what the other are doing
> or have any contact with each other.

That is the problem in a nutshell. The phone company (or the company that deals with line maintenence rather than that which charges you for phone calls / line rental as they may be different too) are the problem here, they did the work that has cut off my connection. Yet they cannot be contacted, they insist you must contact your ISP, who of course had nothing to do with the problem.

Neither BT nor the ISP will let you contact the people responsible for the damage directly and it takes weeks for BT and PlusNet to [not] communicate together. The whole system is a complete shambles. Engineers do not turn up when scheduled, in fact they don't turn up at all. BT say they have done tests but my access is still broken, someone is telling porkies somewhere along the tortuous route.

It is about BT got their act together and took some responsibility and allowed people to contact them about faults that they themselves cause without passing you via everyone else in the meantime.

Bill.

PS.


If anyone from BT /is/ reading this, please tell me what you are going to do to repair the damge that /you/ caused ! PlusNet do not seem to be passing on any information that I send to them, to you.

Tony
08-Jan-07, 23:40
Noticed this in B.T service status:

07 January 2007
01:51 PM
Problem in the Durness area (01971)
We are aware of a problem in the Durness area which may prevent customers from accessing the internet. Our engineers are working to resolve the problem. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. Dialling codes affected: 01971 http://help.btinternet.com/service_status_home/Resolved.gifResolved
Updated on:
07 January 2007
03:20 PM 07 January 2007
11:09 AM
Problem in the Scottish Highlands (01571 01847 01971)
We are aware of a problem in the Scottish HIghlands, which may prevent customers from accessing the internet. Our engineers are working to resolve the problem. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. Dialling code(s) affected: 01571 01847 01971 http://help.btinternet.com/service_status_home/Resolved.gifResolved
Updated on:
07 January 2007
12:45 PM


Incidentally B.T appear to control the telephone exchanges, lines etc so it makes sense to use them rather than another ISP/3RD Party. If you have problems then they seem to make an effort (or at least they have for me in the past) in solving a problem IF I CAN GET THROUGH.
As far as I know B.T Internet was not B.T but B.T Broadband is.

blueivy
08-Jan-07, 23:42
PlusNet do not seem to be passing on any information that I send to them, to you.

I hope you've stopped paying for your (lack of) service?

Doesn't help the problem you're having but I can hear your frustration so thought I'd chip in with something ...

BillE
09-Jan-07, 16:04
Noticed this in B.T service status:

Problem in the Scottish Highlands (01571 01847 01971)
We are aware of a problem in the Scottish HIghlands, which may prevent customers from accessing the internet. Our engineers are working to resolve the problem. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. Dialling code(s) affected: 01571 01847 01971

Do you have the URL for this information ?
Is it actually BT the phone company or BT as a Service Provider, because BT are not my ISP.

I do not think this is relevant to my problem though. They say it has been resolved whereas my problem isn't. Also it is too much of a coincidence that my connection should go down immediately after seeing dozens of BT engineers doing something [the function of which is still a mystery] at my local telegraph pole almost four weeks ago.



Incidentally BT appear to control the telephone exchanges, lines etc. so it makes sense to use them rather than another ISP/3RD Party.

Which is exactly what I have been trying to tell both BT and my Service Provider. BT will just not consider registering a problem that has anything to do with Broadband even if it was their people that originally caused it. The problem is that BT *do* control the lines but take no responsibility for repairing them when they damage them. You have to go through your ISP like it or not - and I don't like that solution at all. It takes months to get anything done.


This morning PlusNet seemed to have closed my complaint, they have re-opened it. Apparently BT reported back that the case had been closed but sorry BT it is very much still open. All ISPs and BT do is pass the buck to each other, it is a very unsatisfactory system.

Things get even more complicated if you pay your phone bill by Post Office Home Phone as BT do not even recognise you as being a customer. I wonder then if I am not a BT customer who gave them permission to interfere with my line in the first place !



Bill
PS. Something just cracked me up. I was writing a letter and my spell checker did not recognise PlusNet and suggested I should replace the word by "Pleasant". That is just about as far from the truth as you can get !

Tony
09-Jan-07, 21:17
http://help.btinternet.com/yahoo/help/servicestatus

B.T The ISP but in saying that if I phone B.T they know I am a broadband customer and the service is charged to the phone bill. When the original B.T internet ran things you could only pay by card as was not B.T.
Personally I would terminate the contract with Plusnet as the service is not being provided and sign up with B.T Broadband. Once this was done and the problem hasn't been resolved you can complain directly.

colmac
09-Jan-07, 22:10
I have had BT Broadband for 10 months now and I have no complaints with them at all. In fact, they were able to get my broadband up and running in 7 days when it took Tiscali 2 months to admit that they were unable to provide me with BB service to my new house. Only once have I had problems with my broadband, but that was an honest technical problem BT were having and it was quickly sorted out by their engineers.

I worked for BT Internet for 17 months a few years back and the amount of customers that would leave BT Internet to go to a cheaper ISP, only to return to BT six months or so later with their tails between their legs because they found out that you get what you pay for. If you want cheap, no frills service by all means go to the cheaper isp's and you soon see how eager they are to help when problems start to surface. They aren't eager at all. My only "complaint" that I have with BT IS that they are slightly dearer, but all in all I have been only too happy with them as my ISP, as I WAS with Tiscali before I moved out of their area of coverage.

Tony
10-Jan-07, 15:26
I had been with B.T for some years but I was one of those that left and went back as when I bought another p.c I was offered a deal I could not refuse with Supanet. I am now back with B.T and at one point they reduced the cost of the Broadband, increased the speed and provided higher usage. I don,t think many ISP'S do that. The only problem I have with them is when you call it takes for ever to get through and then you get somebody (India perhaps) that you have difficulty understanding.
An online help service is available but this is of little use as the chances are you are contacting them because of broadband connection difficulties and of course you will need to be connected to communicate online doh.

BillE
13-Jan-07, 20:10
It would appear from the above two messages that BT take more notice of complaints from the BT ISP than they do from others. They are suppose to treat all their resellers equally but I can believe BT are corrupt enough to show favouritism to their own supplier.

On the other hand no BT department seems able to communicate amongst themselves so maybe not, it would be just as difficult. Anyway my recent experience with BT would ensure that I would *never* even consider giving them any more business by switching to their ISP. If there were any other way I would stop using their low quality phone lines too but unfortunately in this area BT are the only way to connect to a Bradypnoea provider.

I have had difficulty with PlusNet but all ISPs seem as bad and are all at the mercy of BT when it comes to dealing with connection faults. PlusNet have at least refunded a month's payment so far, despite the whole problem being due to BT. PN have also arranged several times for BT to visit to try and sort the problem but it is BT who do not show up and give no explanation to either the user nor the ISP BT insist you have to go through.

few days ago I found my complaint ticket had been closed, followed very quickly by an apologetic mail from PlusNet saying that they had reinstated the problem. It appears that for reasons only know to themselves, BT had decided that they were going to close my issue without contacting me nor doing anything to solve my problem. This is incredible, what sort of organisation are BT? Thankfully PN knew my problem was still ongoing and re-opened it and got back in touch with BT. Finally four weeks after the group of BT engineers ruined my line someone from that mighty organisation deigned to send a BT man round. I wonder why they even bothered to be honest. He did the usual tests from the exchange which had been long established as a waste of time, the problem is to repair the damage BT did on December 14th. He then came around and after fitting the BT equipment to my wall socket came to the amazing conclusion I was not getting a sync to the exchange. Hold on, I have been telling them tha
t for four weeks, this is nothing new. Is this the best BT can come up with.

I showed him the pole where the work was done and the whole dug across the road that leads to nowhere but the sea. apparently a new house across the road had a new line installed, but this "shouldn't" affect me, said rather cagily as if he knew something else but did not want to comment more. Of course this does not explain other holes dug across the road between me and my exchange nor the fact the whole dug leads away from the new house and not towards it. Furthermore no one would have need to climb the pole to put in that cable which could be seen going underground away from the road to the new house. Yet people were up that pole which connects to my property but no explanation was given for this.

Someone, note the word "someone" not him, would need to check the underground cable as it seems something may have affected me. There is no "may" about this, something that day "has" affected e for over four weeks now and BT are doing sod all to resolve it. Apparently this guy cannot do anything, as he is not allowed to climb the pole as he works for "BT OpenReach". So who does I ask, when will they come and do it. No answer other than a stuck record response of you "need to contact your service provider". It took four weeks after contacting my service provider before anyone from BT could even be bothered to come round. My "Service Provider" were not the ones that dug up my line and caused my current problem. He can't arrange for someone to come and look at it, despite working for "BT Difficult to Reach". He will send a report in 10 minutes to my ISP and I need to contact them again. Great. Since then nothing, PN know about this fruitless visit that just told me the bleeding obvious b
ut achieved nothing. Yet there is no more info from BT about it yet. Why do BT hide behind ISPs rather than just getting on and fixing their own problems?

Why are BT very cagey about the work they did on 14th December, what do they have to hide. I got the impression I was not being told anything useful and quite a lot was being held back. BT know there is a problem, they know that before the 14th there wasn't one. Why are BT OpenReach unwilling to pass the fault back to those who originally caused my never ending ADSL problem. They do not seem to realise that the public do not care whether they call themselves "BT OpenReach", "BT Phone Lines", "BT Line Wreckers" or just "BT Bloody Useless", all we want is for them to repair damage they cause when they are blundering about doing things that it certainly seems they are not really qualified to be doing in the first place.

So despite eventually getting BT to come and look at the problem still nothing has been done. The only useful suggestion that the man from BT OpenReach came up with was maybe I ought to write to my MP. That is actually something worth considering as BT themselves are not going to do anything to repair their own damage without being prodded into it.

BillE
15-Jan-07, 20:48
I wrote:

but unfortunately in this area BT are the only way to connect to a Bradypnoea provider.

If you are wondering, "Bradypnoea" is what my spell checker decided to replace Broadband by.

Never use spell checkers !

The other howler was replacing PlusNet by Pleasant !


Bill.