Wife Can't Report Fault as not authorised!

[#1]

Madness. Why does my wife need to know user name and password to report a fault. Plusnet quoted Data Protection issues but why should that stop ability to report a fault. It's irrelevant and certainly don't need personal details with BT.
Disappointed with process for first outage with Plusnet. Unnecessary red tape from a company that says cost wont compromise service.

[#2]

What if some claiming to be you asked for your landline/DSL canceled, would you then think its not right for verification checks.

[#3]

????  Read the post again    The OP is asking why data protection checks are required just to report a fault. He said nothing about changes to his account!
I agree it's madness.  Perhaps PlusNet can re-train their 1st line support staff so they don't insist on DPA checks unless they're necessary to protect the account i.e what they're there for!

[#4]

Agreed, there's a world of difference between reporting a fault and requesting any kind of account change.
To report a fault I would have thought it sufficient to provide the phone number and address (for confirmation), maybe the name of the 'account holder' (unless, perhaps, accepting a possible charge for sending an engineer if the fault is found to be with the account holder's equipment - only at this point should the username & password be required).

[#5]

Hi all,
I'm sorry that account security got in the way of reporting this fault. I can see that your wife has been added to the account as an authorized contact so that shouldn't be an obstacle again in the future.
It's worth noting too that faults can be reported online at http://faults.plus.net that obviously assumes that you're still able to connect or have another way of connecting.

[#6]

It's because there's a potential charge of £60.  If it wasn't for this, we wouldn't have an issue with just testing the line.

[#7]

Sorry Plusnet Complaint Manager but that's process getting in the way of common sense. You must be able to investigate the fault and resolve those that are not customers fault. If it requires a charge then that's when you can get account holders permission. I was told on the call that I made that they would contact me again to advise if a charge is likely. So you seem to contact account holder again anyway.

[#8]

Yep - Not disputing that at all!
We've added your wife to the account as an authorised user so this shouldn't happen again.  I was just trying to offer an explanation as to why we may not have been able to progress the fault, but like you say, a lot of it is down to common sense.

[#9]

Quote from: _Adam_Walker_

It's worth noting too that faults can be reported online at http://faults.plus.net that obviously assumes that you're still able to connect or have another way of connecting.

That still requires you to log in with a username and password.
My line rental stays with BT for this reason.

[#10]

Absolutely, I suppose that all depends on how you'd feel about sharing your login info with your spouse or whoever else you might want to be able to raise a fault on your behalf.

[#11]

I think the point was that BT allow anyone to report a fault.  Very useful for if the line 'owner' is un-contactable because of a fault. 
I once reported a fault on my MiL's line and BT fixed it the next day.  No need to pretend to be her in order to make the initial report.  Clearly, if the fault had been diagnosed as internal it would have required her permission to proceed...

[#12]

I felt obliged to continue this discussion after experiencing both mindless and brain dead quoting of the Data Protection Act (an all too regular favourite of card carrying jobsworth type call centre workers who also seem to have a missed vocation for working as traffic wardens or speed gun cops) tonight by no less than three different members of Plusnet staff when trying to simply ask why we had been experiencing regular losses of FTTC sync on the line here over the last few days that are only resolved by power cycling the VDSL BT Openreach modem and the Plusnet Technicolor router.
I am actually the person who gave Plusnet the business in the first place two years ago by switching my mother over to them (with her agreement) when FTTC went live here (previous service with Be Unlimited) and I also filled out the online application form with her (she is now 80 and was then 78 but is a very regular computer user and a twice or more weekly onine grocery home delivery shopper).  So I know damn well that there was no facility to create additional "authorised users" of the account when it was set up and that no such field exists today through the online account portal (which I have the username and password for)
But when I speak to your support staff on the phone at 3am tonight (this is the only time of day there isn't a quite deliberately customer repelling call queue of half an hour or more and I also can't sleep tonight due to an injury I suffered in a fall earlier on today) about the loss of sync problem they refuse to answer any of my questions about why our line keeps losing sync despite the fact I have given them the correct user name and password.  This is basically because they choose to apply an additional voice gender test on the phone that does not exist at all for customers using the online interface.
I accept that Plusnet must protect its customers against malicious termination of the line or use of house move service to move it elsewhere or any changes of the phone packages or card payment details without the customer's permission.  But when someone calling about an existing broadband line does not wish any of those customer damaging things to be done but just wants the broadband service that Plusnet is already being paid to provide on the line to be provided as specified then your staff are acting both Robotically and in a Brain Dead Manner by abusively citing the Data Protection Act as a reason why they will not discuss Plusnet's failure to continue to deliver the already contract FTTC/VDSL service on the line.
The strange thing is that in the last two years I have called Plusnet about several other issues with the line and as long as I have been able to quote the username and password and explain I am another person in the same household who is the technically knowledgeable one there has been no problem.
The reason we all want to phone Plusnet instead of raise queries online is because we know that on the phone we might get some useful information about problems with the FTTC service not working straight away whereas we all know that any online query form will be sat on and either not responded to at all or otherwise certainly not for several days (especially if a weekend is involved).
Someone senior at Plusnet really needs to deal with and sit down hard on these extremely militant new customer crunching night time support workers (who seem like a return to some of the old customer hating telephone support staff who used to be around back in Lee Stafford's day at Plusnet) who actually seem to have almost no customers to support (the phone always goes straight to an adviser with no queue despite the threatened 15 minute wait) but who seem to go out of their way to find unreasonable reasons not to resolve their query.  And I repeat if the authorised user is now such an important new tool  in telephone customer interactions with Plusnet then why does the online customer account record not provide such a field at all?!!!!
Also lastly surely there is no point at all paying to have expensive support staff on the phone in Yorkshire if they are then going to act in the same kind of mindless unhelpful way that both BT's and many other companies Indian Call Centres are all too rightly infamous for.
I look forward to the comments of a senior Plusnet member of staff on this seemingly very fast growing problem in how telephone support calls are now being dealt with.

[#13]

Some good points made there.
Another thought:
There must be some couples in the same situation as us. The name on the joint bank account used for the direct debit (as shown in the member centre) is Mr J & Mrs A B xxx
If I was away from home on business my wife couldn't report a fault. But she could cancel the direct debit and order a service from a different LLU supplier where a MAC is not required!

[#14]

This is indeed non-thinking irrelevant obstruction.  The DPA only comes into play when PlusNET starts to disclose information about the account holder.  The key word PROTECTION relates to what PlusNET does with the data it holds.
DPA has nothing to do with talking about / reporting a fault with the service.  If the service had been curtailed due to a payment failure, that would be a different matter - explaining that would have been disclosure of personal information.
Plusnet's concern for not breaching DPA did not stop the disclosure of numerous email addresses associated with individual's billing details - this looks like double standards - adherence when not required / unhelpful and a failure to adhear when essential.
PlusNET need to make it easier for relations and friends to help aged users... or just do spousely things.

[#15]

I see two illogicalities that need to be addressed.

• The whole DPA issue, already well covered but consider the following extrapolation if it agreed to be a valid interpretation.
  • You are walking past a house and see smoke / smell gas / see a dropped power line and ring the appropriate service centre to be greeted with "....and are you the registered home owner Sir?  Without this detail I cannot take any action."    Clearly an incorrect use of DPA, so what's so special about Broadband?
  
  


• The belief by Plusnet that provision of broadband at premises is to a named User rather than as a 'Service' to the houshold.  Current thinking now strongly supports the 'Service' view rather the older Geeky interpretation.

Time to move on and review a few of the internal processes