PLUSNET - Award winningly poor customer service!

[#1]

Took a day off work today (self employed so it cost me a days wage, £200) to be at home for the engineer to come and install my new fibre service between 8am and 1pm. Thought I would finally be rid of my dodgy Virgin connection and their complete lack of customer service but alas it's not to be because the engineer didn't turn up. I phone customer services who informed me it had been done already! I assured them it hadn't and they said they would look into it. After an afternoon of phone calls both ways it turns out that the engineer had "run out of hours" and gone off home without passing my job on. Now I'm told that they will provisionally book me in again for the 10th May (10 working days time) but will try and escalate it and get it done sooner. If they don't I'll cancel.
All in all not a very good start and the two most annoying bits

1) The text when I placed my order saying if I missed the appointment they'd charge me £50 for another! So when should I expect my cheque for PLUSNET missing the appointment?
2) Having to listen to the recorded " Plusnet, award winning broadband" message all afternoon!

[#2]

It's Not Plusnet that missed the appointment, it's BT Openreach, however that doesn't excuse the fiascos that seem to occur with these Fibre installs!

[#3]

It's about time someone established the precedent that when someone loses out like this they are entitled to recover their losses. This looks a prime case to do so.
Have a read of this: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/delivery-rights
Reading through that page, Plusnet will need to arrange an appointment on a date when you were not going to be working (e.g. a Saturday) to avoid having to compensate you.

[#4]

I fully appreciate that it was an OPENREACH engineer and not a PLUSNET one that didn't turn up (and I know they are run as a separate company) but they are both from the same B.T.group. Obviously that means that when the engineer doesn't turn up PLUSNET don't take any meaningful sanctions against OPENREACH and so no one really cares!

[#5]

That it was an OpenReach engineer is irrelevant. Your contract is with Plusnet. Plusnet duck their responsibility by blaming OpenReach, if it became the norm that people stood up for their rights and claimed against Plusnet you can bet that PN would go after OR.

[#6]

And I didn't know that BT Group owned Plusnet - not 

[#7]

HI SimonMunson,
From what I can see an agent has picked this up and has escalated it with our suppliers. I've asked him to give me an update as soon as he can.
Jojo

[#8]

Just thought I would update.
Tom from the Customer Options team rang me today at 11.47 to let me know that he had asked the Provisions team to bring forward my installation and that they in turn would be in touch, within 24 hours, once they had spoken to Openreach. So basically just ringing to tell me that nothing had changed since Friday but still a nice touch to keep me informed.
Unknown to both him and me at that point though was the fact that just 5 minutes earlier one of the provisions team had replied to the question thread raised to let me know that "fibre appointments cannot be brought forward." So basically I've been waiting since Friday to find out that when they screw up their way of putting things right is to put you at the back of the queue until they are good and ready to come and do your install. A* customer service !
I rang and spoke to another member of the Customer Options team who confirmed that it couldn't be brought forward but did offer to set an appointment in "stone" for me on the 10th, If only I'd known before that my previous one was set in jelly!
Anyway I have been left with no option but to cancel my proposed install.

[#9]

Yet another reason for me to put off fibre (available to me now) until the process has stabilised.
P.S. I also find it extremely annoying that only one party in a two party contract can claim compensation from the other for a breech of that contract.

[#10]

Quote from: SimonMunson

Anyway I have been left with no option but to cancel my proposed install.

Is that because you don't want to wait that long or an install or the day is not suitable?

[#11]

Simon, if you cancel you won't be able to make a claim. You can only claim for the second day of work (i.e. the additional costs) if the appointment made by Plusnet means that is needed.

[#12]

Quote from: Strat

Yet another reason for me to put off fibre (available to me now) until the process has stabilised.

I know three people personally in our village (me and two others on Infinity) who have had FTTC installed since it went live, and ALL of us have had the appointment cancelled at least once. Ours was cancelled twice and then happened the third time. One of the others was cancelled three times, installed on the fourth, and the other cancelled once and then fitted on the second date.
It seems to me as though something is majorly borked in the appointment booking system or more simply that Openreach are assigning too many jobs to one engineer / taking too many bookings for engineers for a single day and not being able to attend them all.

[#13]

I was lucky enough to get mine installed on the first attempt but the engineer was running late (turned up a bit after 1pm for a 'morning' appointment).
What really amazed me is that I live in Northampton and the engineer came from Milton Keynes (and had to get back to Milton Keynes for his next appointment - no time to stop for any kind of lunch), this suggests a relative lack of suitably trained engineers could well be the real issue.

[#14]

Quote from: houlton23

<snipped> It seems to me as though something is majorly borked in the appointment booking system or more simply that Openreach are assigning too many jobs to one engineer / taking too many bookings for engineers for a single day and not being able to attend them all.

Or maybe just indicates that OpenReach are incompetently managed, or both 

[#15]

Joanne - I really want Fibre and if I had originally been told it would take this long then I'd have gladly waited. My issue is that I don't see why I should be put to the back of the queue when it's not my fault, Plusnet are effectively punishing me for their mistake. When something goes wrong you hold your hands up, say sorry and put it right, simple. Can you guarantee the engineer will turn up next time? If so then rebook me in but if he doesn't show how about you give me a year free?
Jelv I'm aware that if I cancel then I can't make a claim but what am I supposed to do, just sit in every time until they eventually turn up and then bill them for all the days off?
On another note houlton23 can you provide details of the appointments that you say were missed in your village? No personal details just date missed, reason given, reschedule date etc. I am going to start collating these and see just how many people are being let down
Thanks
Simon