Poor customer service from Plusnet and deadlock between SKY and Plusnet
Be was (still is for a few) a fairly specialist "premium" service. I happily paid them about 50% more than I now do to PN for something fairly similar at a cursory glance.
Many customers demanded a lot technically and Sky have tried to supply a similar service, not entirely successfully.
But Be's inability to negotiate an FTTC service was probably part of their inevitable downfall.
It's still a "work in progress" and migration depended on which Be package you were on, who your phone service was with and what extras such as Annex M (which Sky cannot supply) or single/multiple static IP you had.
Sky also imposed a limitation that they would ONLY supply a fibre service in conjunction with their phone service. For some people, me included, that was an impossible condition.
Not that I have fibre, it's not even available on my cabinet yet (though the exchange is live), but I expect to at some point in the future.
A couple of my neighbours, who joined Be on my recommendation, are staying with it and letting the migration happen. They don't have my technical requirements though and will still be on rolling 1-month contracts so should be able to leave easily.
On the other hand I have my suspicions that Sky is like Hotel California.
Many customers demanded a lot technically and Sky have tried to supply a similar service, not entirely successfully.
But Be's inability to negotiate an FTTC service was probably part of their inevitable downfall.
It's still a "work in progress" and migration depended on which Be package you were on, who your phone service was with and what extras such as Annex M (which Sky cannot supply) or single/multiple static IP you had.
Sky also imposed a limitation that they would ONLY supply a fibre service in conjunction with their phone service. For some people, me included, that was an impossible condition.
Not that I have fibre, it's not even available on my cabinet yet (though the exchange is live), but I expect to at some point in the future.
A couple of my neighbours, who joined Be on my recommendation, are staying with it and letting the migration happen. They don't have my technical requirements though and will still be on rolling 1-month contracts so should be able to leave easily.
On the other hand I have my suspicions that Sky is like Hotel California.
I am learning new things every day on here! Thank you for the explanation.
If SKY cannot supply a similar service/certain specifications to the majority of Be customers, I wonder why they acquired these customers as part of the Telefonica deal. Perhaps it was part of a "bundle" and the O2 deal was too good to turn down?
That is a shame, as it means less choice for the customer. Indeed, there appears to be a certain regression in terms of competition in many rural areas.
I understand. SKY would not provide a competitive package (on a downgraded service) unless I agreed to transfer my phone service or acquired SKY TV.
In my case, I have limited expectations. I am just grateful to have any broadband service in this area. This exchange only acquired broadband around 4 years ago. I do find it strange that this exchange has not been upgraded, as we have a 2 x garages, hotel/conference centre and castle/garden which is a tourist attraction within a 2 mile radius of the exchange. But perhaps they have secured other means of a faster broadband service.
I think that description of SKY seems pretty apt.
If SKY cannot supply a similar service/certain specifications to the majority of Be customers, I wonder why they acquired these customers as part of the Telefonica deal. Perhaps it was part of a "bundle" and the O2 deal was too good to turn down?
That is a shame, as it means less choice for the customer. Indeed, there appears to be a certain regression in terms of competition in many rural areas.
I understand. SKY would not provide a competitive package (on a downgraded service) unless I agreed to transfer my phone service or acquired SKY TV.
In my case, I have limited expectations. I am just grateful to have any broadband service in this area. This exchange only acquired broadband around 4 years ago. I do find it strange that this exchange has not been upgraded, as we have a 2 x garages, hotel/conference centre and castle/garden which is a tourist attraction within a 2 mile radius of the exchange. But perhaps they have secured other means of a faster broadband service.
I think that description of SKY seems pretty apt.
The many tales I heard in that vein persuaded me to leave Be before my account was transferred to Sky administration, which I managed with a couple of weeks to spare.
Quote from: abstruse21 You have my sympathies with sky billing and marketing departments. Their automated systems just keep blundering on with apparently little control or opportunity to override it by a real human.
The Be systems were, at best "quaint" and are totally hopeless at dealing with people leaving - I don't think they ever expected or planned for that in any serious way.
On the other hand the support people on phone and online are excellent, so when things go wrong in the transfer process (which seems very common) they resolve it quickly and effectively.
Anyway, Be's systems will be history pretty soon, so they were never going to fix them.
Quote from: Kelly I've not heard of it before 😕 I'm not particularly close to provisioning though!
I suspect actually Sky aren't entirely innocent here. If there is still a Sky tag on the line in Wholesale's systems, they should be able to generate a mac code which we can process. Feels like their system also schedules a cancellation, which prevents a new Mac code being generated. I've absolutely no evidence of this, I'm just rolling it around in my head, because frankly, it's a ridiculous situation.
I don't understand why OFCOM are telling you that it is our job to sort though. If we were able to, what would be to stop Sky phoning up and "sorting out" Jelv's connection and slamming him.....
The whole process is planned to change to be "gaining provider led" as part of their new recommendations over the next few years. Right now though, you need a valid mac code from the losing provider
Hi Kelly,
I found this over the weekend. This is virtually word for word what I was told about removing the TAG and the fact it could take up to 10 days:
http://ask.ofcom.org.uk/help/internet-service/tagremoval
Hopefully, it won't come to that in this instance. But I think in my case it plays into SKY's hands and Ofcom aren't helping the consumer. You can envisage many wanting to stay with their old provider after this hassle and Ofcom provides that option.
Quote from: abstruse21 You have my sympathies with sky billing and marketing departments. Their automated systems just keep blundering on with apparently little control or opportunity to override it by a real human.
You will have to be extremely forceful and insist managers talk to you every call to get it resolved.
I always rang their sales number and asked to be transferred. Annoyed the hell out of them. Also insisting you will call back every 10 minutes until a manager is out of their 'meeting' (sky and plusnet managers both are in a perpetual meeting. No matter what time you ring or how long youhold. They obviously never leave the meeting either. For months on end. As the promised he will call you as soon as the meeting is over doesnt happen. I assume that the meeting therefore never ends..or surely they would have called back?)
Take heart in the fact that they seem to stopped contacting us now. So they do give up eventually.
The computer appears to say "no" to anything that involves leaving SKY's service.
I haven't had the meeting excuse from either SKY or Plusnet but I have made a note of that issue
I was, nevertheless, informed that phone calls delayed by 24 hours were perfectly reasonable by SKY and I should change my plans the subsequent night to answer their telephone call. I hope so.
Quote from: HPsauce
Quote from: abstruse21 You have my sympathies with sky billing and marketing departments. Their automated systems just keep blundering on with apparently little control or opportunity to override it by a real human.
The Be systems were, at best "quaint" and are totally hopeless at dealing with people leaving - I don't think they ever expected or planned for that in any serious way.
On the other hand the support people on phone and online are excellent, so when things go wrong in the transfer process (which seems very common) they resolve it quickly and effectively.
Anyway, Be's systems will be history pretty soon, so they were never going to fix them.
I didn't have that choice, as I planned to stay with SKY for a few months in order to bundle things together, when the phone line was out of contract. When I tried to switch the broadband as a standalone product, I was going to be locked into a further 12-18 month contract with BT and there was a surcharge with Plusnet. If I had known about the downgrade, I would have taken action. nevertheless.
Poor Be. Sounds like you were far more sensible than I was.