FTTP Installation Shambles

[#1]

FTTP Installation Shambles.
Let me start by saying that I am a long standing client of Plusnet without any serious issues for many years and would always recommend them if asked, that is until I made the fatal decision to upgrade to FTTP.
I will try and keep this as short as possible as I have no wish to bore you with the finer details
Day One:
The installation was booked for 22 August and the Openreach
engineer managed to install the fibre through the existing ducting,
unfortunately the PON light was off. Wait until tomorrow to see if it
comes on, if not ring Plusnet he told me. I rang the next morning to
be told that the installation was complete, which it obviously wasn't,
further wasted time on phone calls and eventually I was informed
that an engineer visit was booked for 8 Sept, it seemed rather a long
time but I was prepared to accept it as I still had FTTC working
Day Three:
On Wednesday 24 August low and behold an engineer turned up to
fix the problem, and eventually the PON light was on, but still no
internet. After calls to Openreach tech support he was told to mark
the job as complete and the fault would be escalated to Openreach
support because of the issues with KCI3. Of course once that was
done Openreach/BT/Plusnet switched off my FTTC which left me
without internet.
Day Four:
Numerous time wasting phone calls with "Tech support" (I use the
term loosely) and eventually an engineer was booked for the next day.
The engineer turned up and carried out numerous checks, contacted
Openreach Tech Support and was escalated to "Level 2" and was told
it was an issue with KCI 3, apparently this is a suffix for reserved lines
(Government Buildings, Schools, Hospitals, etc.) this resulted in
"tags" on the line which needed to be removed. I had no idea what
he was talking about and after speaking with Plusnet "Tech Support"
neither do they. I was told that work on the line would be carried out
to remove these "tags"
Day TEN:
I was phoned by Plusnet, apparently Openreach needed to revisit
and an appointment was arranged for Thursday 1 Sept between !-6
p.m.
Day ELEVEN:
Nobody turned up, I phoned Plusnet yet again to be told that they
had the engineers report from his visit today. I'm sure you can
imagine my reaction to this, remember I have been without internet
for 9 days and I said I required a Manager to call me the next day.
Day TWELVE:
Nothing, nada, zilch, they cannot even show the courtesy of a call to
explain what the hell is going on, I have spent hours on the phone
and all I get are apologies, apologies are fine if you act on the issue
that has caused you to apologise in the first place, but no, I am still
sitting here with no internet and not a clue as to what is being done
about it. I have wasted hours on the phone, and I am now losing out
financially because I cannot use my desktop. Due to the energy crisis
my wife is on flexible working, she now has to make a round trip of
40 miles a day to work because she can't work from home.
I am not one to accept poor customer service such as that provided
to me by Plusnet and sit around doing nothing so I phoned the
Openreach engineer. He investigated and came back with the
following: 3rd line support had fully investigated this problem and
had previously informed Plusnet that the order needed to be
cancelled, fully reordered and rebuilt, there was no need for an
engineer to visit the premises as the FTTP was correctly installed and
fully operational and that the report I was given by Tech Support was
from last Friday's visit. He also said that Plusnet should have
reinstated my FTTC as a temporary measure to provide me with
internet until this was sorted.
By now I am at boiling point, waited 45 minutes to get through to
Plusnet and spoke to Hassan, who immediately took control of the
situation, was in contact with his Manager Ash who phoned me back
after speaking to Openreach and other Departments within Plusnet
in order to resolve this appalling situation, he has promised to keep
me fully informed of what is going on and will hopefully get my FTTC
restored whilst the rest of the backroom work is going on.
After speaking with these two Plusnet Tech Support staff I can say
that they are the only people who have taken upon themselves to
action things, and I'm sorry to say that the rest of Tech Support (and
I've lost count of how many I've spoken to) have proved totally
unable to grasp the situation or take any action and have just let the
situation drift endlessly on.
As for Plusnet themselves, they were fully informed of the issues by
Openreach last week and the actions that needed taking, and yet it
appears to me that like Tech Support they have done absolutely
nothing to rectify the situation.
Day 14:
Latest comment from Bill Swales - CSC Analyst.
"Does not meet CAT criteria. No VLAN issue is found. E-chat request should be raised as per process for build check"

What on earth does all this mean, I'm the paying client here, please
speak in a language I understand. Are they saying there is a formal
process to follow?. They seem to forget that I have been sitting here
for two weeks without internet.
And rest assured that there will be a formal process, as I am now
going to instigate a formal letter of complaint to Plusnet.
I am sorry if this post looks a mess but it is copied from a pdf as I have no internet.

Moderator's note by Dick (Strat): Post released from Auto Spam Filter.

[#2]

Thank you for your time on the phone @Natchez, it was good to speak with you and thanks for your post!

I am genuinely sorry for the horrible experience you've had when trying to upgrade your broadband to full fibre. I appreciate the massive amount of aggravation and stress this has caused you.

I've updated the support ticket on your account Here following our conversation, but to summarise here an engineer's asked us to review the VLAN which is BT's equipment at the exchange. I've passed feedback on with regards to the way this request has been handled internally, and I've messaged a colleague in our suppliers complex faults team to take a look.

The complex faults helpdesk is closed today so can't guarantee he'll get back to me, but I will ask one of my colleagues in my own team to contact them tomorrow while I'm out of the office, and I'll call you at 9am on Tuesday either way.

As for your FTTC service, unfortunately I can't reactivate this even though the copper cabling may physically still be there at your property, because you're in what's now as a Stop Sell area, where our suppliers are prioritising FTTP at your exchange, so have stopped accepting orders for copper products, including ADSL or FTTC.

I'll take personal ownership and make sure to get your FTTP service working as soon as possible.

If you've got further queries, feel free to get back to me here or by replying to the ticket 227095535.

[#3]

Thank you for your call and this update, I very much appreciate your intervention and look forward to getting this resolved ASAP, before my wife issues divorce proceedings.

[#4]

Cheers for getting back to me,

Not a problem! Happy to help and will keep at this for you.

(I hope that last part was tongue in cheek...)

[#5]

Hiya, I've just rang your mobile, but it looks like you were busy as I got an engaged tone. Not to worry, I've messaged my colleague in the supplier helpdesk for an update on the VLAN move.

When Lauren contacted the supplier helpdesk (complex faults / quality assurance) however, the agent said that he doesn't believe the problem is the VLAN but will arrange the move anyway.

Unfortunately as there's no spare VLAN, they have to first create a new one, which I've asked for an update on ^

In the meantime, I'd like to arrange another engineer visit then raise an escalation to try to get a senior engineer arranged to make sure everything is absolutely how it should be on that side.

Are you okay with this? At the moment I can see a slot for tomorrow afternoon 1pm-6pm as the earliest appointment.

I've also updated the ticket on your account Here with this

[#6]

I've updated the ticket after you've got back to me there, but just to keep your forum thread updated.

I've had 4 people from BT's complex faults team look at this for me today and they all can't see an issue their side. Also the move to a different VLAN has completed, so could you try turning the Openreach ONT as well as the router off and on?

We don't think there was anything wrong with the previous VLAN, so this may have no effect at all, but it was worth a go.

Lastly I've arranged the engineer visit for tomorrow 1pm to 6pm.

I've asked Openreach's helpdesk to leave notes to explain we've checked things out this side and there's no issue with the VLAN. I've also asked that they email the Patch Manager to allocate a senior engineer.

I'll check back tomorrow but feel free to get back to me if you can get online after rebooting or if you've got further queries.

[#7 · Accepted solution]

Thank you again for your time on the phone @Natchez, it was good to speak with you! 

Just to summarise things here, I'm relieved that your full fibre service is finally working. Openreach's diagnostics team took another look yesterday ahead of the engineer visit, and found some incorrect data in their systems, which was stopping your router from getting online. Once they corrected it, you could connect and I cancelled the visit. 

I can't apologise enough for the stress you've gone through, so I've made sure feedback's passed on for you. I've updated the ticket 227095535 following our conversation with what we've discussed, including compensation. The ticket's closed now, but you should be able to view it still and I've also dropped you an email.

If there's ever anything else you'd need help with, feel free to get back to me and I'll be happy to help.

[#8]

Hi Anoush,

Good to speak to you today and very pleased that you have resolved this ongoing issue. Hopefully I won't have any further problems, but if  I do I will get back to you.

Once again many thanks for all your assistance.

Regards

Natchez

[#9]

No problem at all! I'm just glad this is resolved for you now. 

Cheers