THIS IS URGENT! Broadband and phone cancelled by someone else!
Hi @phj I'm sorry for the issues you're having.
Could you PM me your username please so I can take a look for you?
Hi @phj
Thanks for the PM, we're looking into it now to see what we can do, from here on out we will have to discuss the issue via our internal ticket system and not on the forums due to the fact that we will be discussing account sensitive information.
In the interest of clarity for yourself and others who may be impacted by issues such as this I'd like to just clarify the process when we receive an order against a customer’s line.
Since the abolition of MAC codes all orders are now classed as Gaining Provider Led (GPL) more below is an outline of the process.
Under a 'gaining provider-led' process, your new provider will arrange the transfer for you.
You only need to contact the provider you wish to switch to, who will notify your old provider of the intended transfer - you do not need to cancel your contract with your old provider.
If you change your mind, you must contact your new provider to cancel your request to switch. You have a ten working day period from the date your new provider notifies your old provider during which you have a right to cancel your request to switch without being charged.
Once you have contacted your new provider to begin the switching process, both your new provider and the provider you're leaving must both send you a notification letter to inform you of the switch.
The letter from the provider you are leaving must include details of:
- the services which are affected,
- the services which are unaffected, and
- any applicable early termination charges that relate to the services you currently take.
The letters from the provider you are leaving and your new provider must also give details of the switch, including a reasonable estimate of the date it will happen.
Your new provider must also keep a record of your consent to switch services for a minimum of 12 months.
This makes switching much easier for the customer, contacting the old supplier is no longer required and your orders are beyond the old suppliers control so they are less able to frustrate the process and your migration should be simpler.
The problem is that we do not know if the order that has been placed on your line is due to a decision that you have made to migrate your services, or if you're completely unaware that the services are about to cease.
In some (rare) circumstances we are able to cancel the other providers order. To do this we must be able to establish that Slamming (being switched from your provider to another without your knowledge or consent) has occurred or that there has been a failure of the other provider to cancel the order on your line after you have requested it.
This is why we send the following service notice by email to the account holders registered email address as well as the notification of transfer letter that we send via the post.
Service Notice:
Another service provider has told us that someone wants to take over the above line at *your address* on *a date.* This usually means that you're moving to a new home, or someone is moving into your property.
Your Plusnet broadband and phone service will be affected by this order. If you have an alarm, medical alerting system, CCTV or any other services connected to your phone line you'll need to speak to the supplier as these will be stopped when your line is taken over.
If you're not moving or the above information is wrong
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Please call us as soon as you can on 0800 073 3057 or 0330 123 0178.
We can stop the order if you contact us before 4pm on a date -2 days.
If you're moving and you've already arranged to move your Plusnet service
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You can ignore this email, thanks for choosing to stay with us.
If you're moving and not taking your Plusnet service with you
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Sorry to hear that you're leaving us.
* When your line is taken over, your account will be cancelled and you'll lose your broadband and phone service
* You'll also lose any extra services we supply to you (e.g. your Plusnet email address, Plusnet Protect, BT Sport)
* If you're within your minimum term, cancellation charges may apply - find out more about this in our Price guide - http://www.plus.net/priceguide
* Please be aware that once your service is cancelled with Plusnet you'll no longer have access to your online customer account
Need to talk to us?
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If you have any questions or if any of the information in this email is wrong, please contact our house move team. They're available on 0800 073 3057 or 0330 123 0178 between 8am-8pm Monday-Friday or 9am-7pm on Saturdays and 9am-6pm on Sundays.
Unless you respond to us when we send this the order will complete and your services will be with the new provider.
I hope that clears things up?
I understand that you did not ask to start the process, but nor did we and we were powerless to prevent it without a response from yourself.
If you check your inbox for the email address on the account you should see that service notice SN320892801 was sent to you on the 05/06/17 at 19:30 alternatively you can view the actual copy we sent you here
Regarding taking ownership we've actually already started to try to resolve the problem but we cant talk about specific information here, I can however confirm that @HarryB placed the orders to reactivate your service and we're awaiting a response from our supplier so that we can confirm the date, should there be any issues we do not have any contact details for you on our system (if you have new details please add them via the member centre so that we can be in touch)
The new orders will technically be a GPL transfer in (like the process I linked above) and as such it will take a minimum of 10 working days to complete and we are unable to make this complete quicker.
Whilst every effort will be made to retain your telephone number we cannot guarantee it, it shouldn't be a problem and its usually a success but I'd like to manage your expectations and warn you that there is a slight possibility that it may not be retrievable.
Finally early termination charges that were levied against this account were requested via direct debit and as such we have no control over the process until either the direct debit clears or it is rejected.
@phj wrote:
Will @HarryB be updating my open question in the member centre with details of the order?
I've already escalated the ticket on your account to myself and added a note of the order references. I've not provided much more yet as I was allowing some time for the orders to progress to hopefully be able to provide you with a committed date of the orders.
@phj wrote:
When will he be able to confirm my old phone number ending 597 has been secured?
I've placed the orders reserving the number that was stored on your account that we were previously providing services on. This is currently only provisional, until the orders reach a committed state.
@phj wrote:
If it is dialled at the moment it is "unavailable" so presumably has not been assigned to another user at this stage.
That's to be expected until the orders complete to re-provide the service, however as @JonoH advised, there is a minimum 10 working day lead time on migrating the line back from the new provider.
Hi @maranello
Marenello wrote:
This situation is one which I would expect the Superusers to take an active interest in. The customer is at risk of losing a phone number he has held for 30 years, due to slamming and poor means of communication, exacerbated by a process (albeit out of Plusnet's control) in which the gaining provider does not have an obligation to confirm the migrating details.
I understand why you might feel this way, we're very close to certain that the number can be retained, but we're not quite certain. I feel it's better to make a customer aware of that from the outset and in the rare instances that we cannot keep the number this will be because of something that will be outside the sphere of influence of Plusnet and as such our Superusers.
There appears to be no flexibility within Plusnet's billing process to stop payments being taken or to expedite confirmation of payment taken and subsequent refund. Taking an unexpected payment of £200 from an account could result in a significant hardship to some, result in bank charges, as well as causing distress,
Once the account was closed (when the migration order completed) we requested the final fees via direct debit as per the instruction on the notifications. Once a direct debit is submitted we do not have the ability to edit it, this isn't something that is possible within the direct debit system and as such again is something that the Superusers will be unable to influence.
I would expect that such a high amount for termination would be a flag to Plusnet that something was amiss and to ask for confirmation from the customer irrespective of the 'rules.
People move for all kinds of reasons and whilst this amount does seem large it is by no means unusual, again we've got 10 working days from the order being placed to completion, 8 working days before it becomes too late for us to cancel. In that time we've emailed the account holders registered email address and in some cases but not all sent a written letter to the home address.
I appreciate that when this process goes wrong it doesn't make for a good customer experience, and that these errors could not happen under the old system of MAC codes but there is little more we can do under the current system and for the vast majority of customers the new system is much more convenient.
PJH wrote:
Is that considered a robust enough process then, just an email saying that service is switching? Emails are easily junked as spam etc. I seem to recall reading on the 'Which?' website that a letter should be sent to my home address too?
I'll be the first to admit that when this process goes wrong it can be frustrating for the customer and can cause significant downtime, there's also the cost to Plusnet of replacing the provisioning orders with our suppliers and the staff costs associated with putting everything right. Technically we don't need to send a physical letter, the email we send is enough as upon sign up the customer must agree that communication regarding the account will be via the registered email address. In some circumstances though we do still send a written copy via normal mail.
Will @HarryB be updating my open question in the member centre with details of the order? When will he be able to confirm my old phone number ending 597 has been secured? If it is dialled at the moment it is "unavailable" so presumably has not been assigned to another user at this stage.
The social media team are owning this internally, we will between us ensure you're kept up to date every step of the way, we will confirm that the number can be confirmed once our suppliers have given us that commitment.
Can you confirm the £200+ charge can be resolved and refunded after the direct debit runs its course. Also, will my contract start as a 14 month contact, as per what was remaining before this situation arose?
Absolutely, as part of our monitoring of the account we we will refund any payment received that is not owed, Direct Debit refunds do take 10 working days from the date of refund though. We will also refund you for downtime. Your contract will be reverted to the same duration as it was when it was cancelled.
I know it's frustrating but we're doing all we can to get you online as quickly as possible, we will monitor the orders and make you aware of any potential delays as soon as e know of them.
@maranello wrote:
But if your role is merely to flag up forum posts to give them greater visibility to Plusnet Staff Community members then that would be somewhat disappointing.
It's early days yet @maranello Still exploring the facilities AND boundaries. 
My first post was to alert the CS staff on duty to prioritise this case, followed up by an escalation for higher review. @JonoH is on the case which is very positive.
Remember the pioneer is the guy with arrows in his back!
M