Absolute garbage experience switching to Plusnet

[#1]

Hello,
In October we ordered Fibre broadband from Plusnet, switching from Sky. We had an activation date for 2/11/15. It is now 3/12/15 and we have no broadband at all.
On 2/11/15 the engineer phoned us and said something was wrong with the local exchange, phone Plusnet and get them to put us on an ADSL line until it is fixed.
Plusnet then convinced us to wait, and wait, and wait until the issue would be fixed for a whole month. Every 2 or 3 days we got an update that told us to wait another few days.
When the local exchange problem was finally fixed, we were told we had to wait almost 2 weeks to get an engineer out to set us up. I managed to get them to move this sooner, which was today (3/12/15). I'm a masters student, and had to leave uni early missing some meetings and waited in all day (told it would be anytime 1-6pm). No one showed up, no phone calls or emails from anyone. I phoned Plusnet at 6pm and the person on the phone had absolutely no help to offer us. They gave us some typical reply of "there's no update on your account notes".
He also told us we would need to wait till tomorrow morning to hear from the suppliers on what happened.
Let me make this clear, if I am buying broadband from Plusnet then PLUSNET are the suppliers and NOT BT. I could not care less about what problems Plusnet have in conducing business with BT. If I buy broadband from Plusnet, I expect to receive Broadband from them. The fact that they are completely at the mercy of another company is ridiculous and can get no information from them is a complete joke.
This motto of "We'll do you proud" is just infuriating right now.

[#2]

Hi mgrant31,
A warm welcome to the forums.  Your frustration is sadly all too common - BTOR are letting down ISPs and their customers everywhere.  Other than Virgin Media they are the only people who actually supply phone and internet connectivity to the home.  Once inside the exchange there are a number of options on how the service is delivered, but between your home and the exchange it is all BT supplied.
If you buy electricity off British Gas, it does not come through their gas pipes to your home, but over the local wires network own by the area provider.  If BTOR cannot supply a connectivity service, no ISP can deliver the service - they are all dependent upon BTOR doing their job properly - that means having capacity, turning up on time and updating customer visits (or non-visits) in a timely fashion.  The target update time is 2 hours after the appointment slot, so that means by 15:00 for a morning appointment or 20:00 for an afternoon appointment.
I can understand why you might think it should be different and perfect, but it is not and in this case the issues start with BTOR, not PlusNet.  They do however own the responsibility of picking up the pieces - you might care to ask about recompense for BTOR's failure to attend.  Certainly ISPs get some recompense for missed appointments.