No broadband or phone - poor start to Plusnet

[#1]

Hi Susan,
I completely sympathise with you as that's exactly what happened to me.  Engineer turned up to connect us to fibre and I was told there was a fault on the telephone line (no fault or any problems before PN arrived to connect me!).  It just seems to me that the OR service is very hit and miss. The next engineer that turned up could apparently find no fault whatsoever with my phone line and said everything was in full working order!  Luckily, the 3rd engineer managed to get everything connected.  However, I still got a phone call at work two days later from an OR engineer who had just randomly turned up on my doorstep believing he had an appointment to sort out the phone line!  I had no idea about this so called appointment!  Suffice to say, the OR service is very hit and miss and extremely poorly organised.  It took a week to get my phone/broadband up and running and, like you, if I had known what was involved I would have thought twice about it for sure.  I was also unaware before swapping to PN that you are unable to barr calls from home phones which for me, with three teenagers in the house who have a tendency to call mobiles non stop, is also a nightmare.  With the benefit of hindsight........................  Good luck with everything and I hope you get connected soon - its amazing how much you miss broadband when you don't have it!

[#2]

not sure whether it's coincidence, but my first reply failed to post (some 'terminal server' error).
I've now been given a Monday morning install time.... though I'm not optimistic. It'll be nearly a week late, and I've had the full gamut of excuses. I'm not sure the 'honest' part of the advertising claim has filtered through to the installs department.
From a commercial perspective, I don't buy this "its out of our control, its the suppliers" excuse. Many businesses outsource or subcontract, and my contract is with PN.  I wonder if senior management are aware of this issue (which appears to be quite common judging by the forum)? and if so, do they care?

[#3]

Hi Susan,
We're aware of the problems that have been experienced by a number of people recently with regards to Openreach attendance and so on.
We do have weekly and monthly service reviews with Openreach and they are going through a restructure currently to ensure that the right people are looking at the problems that have been experienced by service providers.
You are quite right that you are our customer and it is our responsibility to fix, but sadly some things are outside of our control.

[#4]

@James & @Chris

Quote

I have looked into your account and install and can see that when the engineer went to activate your line a fault was detected. I know that is no good to you but we [Plus Net?] have to resolve this...

The real question is "When a BT engineer turns up to do a job and finds there is a fault, why do they not fully own the problem through to resolution, rather than pass it back to their customer Plus Net?".  This forum is full of stories of engineers turning up and not being able to do the job they have been charged with for a wide number of (non) issues, from claimed line faults (which were working the previous day) to not having keys for the cabinet.  Thereafter the middle-man has to chase resolution and rearrange new appointments - WHY?  This is total incomptence - what are PN doing to fix this unaccpetable behaviour from their supplier?  Has any background analysis been undertaken on these failings?  For example, what is the cause profile of 'line faults' experienced on installation on what was previously a fully functioning line?  For example, was the 'fault' the result of misadministration on terminating the previous supplier?  Are the engineers adequately trained?  Surely in comparison to BB & Fiber, checking a voice circuit issue is a simple task that all BT engineers should be capable of doing, rather than needing to pass it to another unavailable engineer!
I've worked for 35 years in IT - if I had a customer fault condition caused by or was the responsibility of some other part of my organisation, then it was my job to coordinate resolution within my organisation, not to pass the problem back to the customer.  BT Openreach needs to be brought to account for their unprofessional service provision, so that PN can deliver a better service to their end users.

[#5]

A very good and pertinent question

[#6]

"have not got the keys to the CAB" is not an uncommon cause of not being able to do FTTC installations - see here: http://forums.thinkbroadband.com/plusnet/4182828-fttc-install-fail.html#Post4182828

[#7]

As an oldie, I am more likely than some to think, that much that is blamed on institutional inefficiency, is down to human foible and error.

[#8]

Hi all,
This is something we're feeding back on and pushing for resolution for, and discussions with our suppliers are ongoing. Unfortunately though it's not something that will happen quickly though as some threads are indicating third party engineers have been engaged to help with this and I've no doubt further solutions will be introduced in the future.
This isn't something we have any direct control over but we will absolutely continue to raise any issues we come across.

[#9]

Matt,
Does PN have a cause analysis of BTOR first time fit failures?  I suggest that it would be useful to undertake a simple classification of each incidence where a new install has failed... the list does not need to be long, but enough to clearly inform BTOR what is going wrong.  PN could even publish it here on the forum!!
Engineer did not turn up
No keys to cabinet (contractor)
No keys to cabinet (BT enginner)
Circult not available
Circuit faulty
BTOR claimed customer not available
Customer really not available
PN Order wrong
You might think of a few more, with enough evidence in the public domain, PN's image might look better, whilst BTOR's is exposed for the apparent shabbiness it is!
Hmmm if PN cannot do this, then may be PN users can... now then let me see if I can remember how to set up a poll on here.... 
Thinking about 'claims' that customer was not available, does the system used by PN to place orders on BTOR provide a means of passing on special instructions - e.g. "Door to flat is round the side of the building, press top door bell button..."?  If it does is there merit in providing a "special instructions" box on PN's ordering pages on the protal?  Just thinking of ways that excuses for not being able to contact the customer might be avoided.
Cheers,
Kevin

[#10]

Hi there,
Yes and thanks for the suggestions. I'm doing a lot of work relating to this at the moment and this is largely what I'm already doing in terms of cases that I've become aware of via community and social media. I'm reviewing an analysing each case and where I see any issues with our suppliers I'm discussing/feeding back with our suppliers via a weekly focus group and any issues I see that are caused by us are being fed back into the business or are being tracked against any existing work or problem investigations.

Quote

Thinking about 'claims' that customer was not available, does the system used by PN to place orders on BTOR provide a means of passing on special instructions - e.g. "Door to flat is round the side of the building, press top door bell button..."?  If it does is there merit in providing a "special instructions" box on PN's ordering pages on the protal?  Just thinking of ways that excuses for not being able to contact the customer might be avoided.

I don't think so, but I will check if there's any way the we'd be able to do that in future and what the implications might be with our suppliers. One idea we've put to our suppliers is for engineers to leave a card if no one answers the door as that would help manage and avoid any possible disputes about engineers calling/claiming to have called on a visitor who does not seem to agree! I'll certainly let you know what comes back from that if we're able to make any movement.

[#11]

Quote from: _Adam_Walker_

One idea we've put to our suppliers is for engineers to leave a card if no one answers the door as that would help manage and avoid any possible disputes about engineers calling/claiming to have called on a visitor who does not seem to agree!

Sorry to be cynical, but that could lead to a new Olympic sport, how fast can you ring doorbell, push card through door, sprint down pathway, jump in van and drive off?

[#12]

That one? City Link and HDN have been playing that for years...

[#13]

Quote from: _Adam_Walker_

One idea we've put to our suppliers is for engineers to leave a card if no one answers the door

That might help in some situations, but not when, for example:
Wrong door is visited.
Engineer doesn't give adequate time for door to be answered (e.g. occupant in bathroom etc.)
Given the "reputation" of this aspect of BT most people, even if they did find a card on their doormat, would be well advised to not acknowledge it's existence.  
How many times over what period are engineers supposed to try to gain access?
Would the cards have the details of WHO they were trying to contact (name & address) AND the engineers name and BT business mobile number?

[#14]

One thing that would help would be if Plusnet gave the user prior instructions that if they received on of the cards they should contact Plusnet IMMEDIATELY (perhaps a dedicated straight through phone number?). A call from a customer within 5 or 10 minutes of the time the engineer said he called would be a dead giveaway!

[#15]

A good idea jelv, however if that were put into place when we call BTW to chase issues with engineer visits there is a delay on notes coming through which means we have to wait until an hour after the prearranged time slot so we usually have to wait a little while before we can chase up any such issues.