Sadly leaving Plusnet
on - last edited on by
Mav
I've been a happy customer since 2011. Never had any issues previously, no reason to contact customer support, have had a solid line with great speeds and I've always sung their praises to friends and family.
We moved house a few weeks ago so naturally decided to migrate our Plusnet account across.
First experience calling customer support isn't great, being told wait times are up to 15 minutes but actually had to wait an hour.
I finally get through. We were on Fibre Extra at our old address and were told we could get Fibre at our new address. It was all going to take 10 days with activation on the 4th August. Not so bad.
On the Monday I get a text message from Plusnet explaining that in the process of transferring our service to our new property BT have informed them that there are no more Fibre ports available in the cabinet and that I need to call them.
I prepare myself for another hour on hold. Again, I'm told wait times up to 15 minutes but it takes closer to 50. It's explained to me that I need to downgrade my account to the unlimited broadband package and that if I want to upgrade to fibre I'll need to keep checking BT's broadband availability checker until it switches to 'Available'. I agree with the downgrade and am told activation will still be on the 4th August.
Slightly annoyed that I won't be getting fibre but accept it's not Plusnet's fault. That week I keep checking the dslchecker site (https://www.dslchecker.bt.com/). On the Wednesday it flicks to 'Available'. Happy days. I call support and manage to get myself through to the customer options team without any wait. I explain the situation, the guy double checks and confirms there are now some fibre ports available. We switch up the contract, he gives me Fibre Extra for 18 months at £9.99 + line rental with activation on the Tuesday (8th Aug). Alright!
Tuesday comes round. Router's plugged in ready to go. Switch it on but still getting the dreaded flashing red 'b'. I was told it can take up until midnight so I'm not concerned but keep checking. Midnight comes round, the broadband light's still flashing. Okay.
Call support again in the morning. By now the hold music is doing my head in.
Speak to a friendly and helpful chap who does some troubleshooting with me and checks things his end. Everything looks okay from his side so he arranges for an engineer to come round. This gets booked in for the next day (8am till 1pm).
I take the morning off work. Surprised to get a call first thing at 8am from the engineer who's already at the cabinet checking the wiring. Good start! He tells me he'll be round in 5 minutes. 5 minutes passes I get another call. "Simon, I think I'm at your mum and dads house?". F#####K! He's at my old address and tells me I'll need to phone my supplier.
I brace myself for more waiting. This time I get through reasonably quickly. I explain the situation and they do some checks. It turns out all they've done is downgrade my service at my old address. I'm informed I need to speak to the provisioning team but they're not open till 9 so I'll need to call back. I reluctantly agree.
9am rolls through. I call support, 10-15 minutes later I get through and ask to be put through to provisioning. More waiting. I get through and explain the situation. The guy is super apologetic, calls Openreach for me then calls me back. In the time all of this has happened fibre availability in my cabinet has gone back to 'Waiting list'. The guy tells me he'll get us back onto broadband within 24-48 hours and that he'll phone me in the morning (today) to confirm whether he can do anything about the fibre connection.
So today, no call. No text updates. No notes in my account area.
I call in the evening to get a status update. Takes about 45 minutes. Hold music feels like a bad joke by now. Every call now taking longer and longer as I have to explain the whole situation. The guy informs me they've got an engineer booked for Monday. I challenge this as I've been told 24-48 hours. Monday's the earliest they can do. He confirms the address but lo and behold, IT'S STILL THE OLD ADDRESS!
Sounds like they were just going to upgrade my old address back up to fibre. The guy I'm speaking to is apologetic and 'gets it', offers to sort it all for me but explains I'll be waiting a week and a half at least. By this time I'm done with it all so ask him if he can just cancel my account. He puts me through to cancellations, no challenge on their side, they accept they've ballsed up and waive the £30 cancellation fee.
I'm massively disappointed and hugely frustrated after so many years of good service. Everyone I've spoken to has been really friendly, seemingly on the ball and that they 'get' the situation I'm in but then there's been no continuation leaving me to explain my case over and over again. I'm guessing these issues lay at a system level where it's so rigid you can't deal with a house move + downgrade/upgrade at the same time, but surely that's a common situation? We're also going to have to wait again until fibre is available now that it's gone back to waiting list.
My partner works from home full time (as do I occasionally) so this has been massively inconvenient for both of us. I was really hoping you would 'do us proud' but unfortunately going to have to look elsewhere 
Moderator's note by Mike (Mav): 2 identical Posts released from Spam Filter and removed one of them.
