worst transfer ever and still no broadband
I recently recommended to my parents to transfer to plusnet – I have been with them since I moved to my new flat 18months ago and have been very happy with everything, so I thought that as they could save money and not have to deal with overseas call centres and their poor service and have been having problems with very slow broadband, plusnet was the way to go.
HOW WRONG CAN YOU BE?
Order placed 16/6/13 to transfer on 1/7/13 (phone expected first then broadband up to a day or so later they said). Line was checked during order process and found to be working and all fine.
30/6/13 broadband ceased, 1/7/13 phone ceased
Out of the blue an Openreach engineer appears 1/7/13 pm saying there’s a problem with the line he needs to fix – he fiddles about with the main socket then says it’s the exchange; he has to go there to fix something
2/7/13 (still no phone or bb), informed by engineer that he couldn’t fix the exchange, something needs replacing – the only information my mum is getting is when she phones plusnet on payg mobile so at sig cost to herself as there is no proactive updates coming to her
3/7/13 late afternoon phone starts working – still no broadband, nor updates to inform us of the problem/status
4/7/13 message received saying that BT need to change something in the exchange and it will be up to 5 working days to fix (by this time mum’s had not bb for 5 days already). I phoned to see if I could find out more detail – mum’s elderly, not tech savvy – distinct lack of detail from plusnet cs they just repeat things that are clearly logged on their system such as – our suppliers have to do fix something and it’ll be 5 working days. Why are plusnet not being provided with specific information? Why has it taken a further 2 days for Openreach to start the process of fixing the exchange when the engineer noted it on 1st/2nd July?? Why do plusnet not question the vagueness and complete lack of service from Openreach?? Do they not have SLA’s in their contracts – they are paying BT for the use of their lines, this includes that servicing/repairs happens surely?? This is the nature of contracts; does BT just think that as they have a monopoly they can get away with anything, like network rail??? Or is plusnet just unable to negotiate a proper contract or just unwilling to do anything about it and uncaring about their customers that they think this is acceptable?
9/7/13 – no news, yes this is the full 5 working days after the order was placed for the exchange repairs and still we have heard nothing from plusnet. So mum calls up and is told that the order can’t go through (in fact it has been cancelled!) because she has a business line – this was news to us, we’ve lived in the house since 1977 with one domestic line and the same number. My mum put plusnet straight.
10/7/13 – mum was called and told that as it’s a problem with the line in the house an engineer needs to call to fix it, the earliest appointment is 22/7/13 –yes I did say the twenty second of July! And plusnet claim that there’s nothing they can do about this!!! So it’ll be over 3 weeks without broadband (assuming that this appointment happens and the engineer can do whatever they seem to think the problem is – I come back to the question though, if the phone and broadband worked with another provider for years, why all of a sudden doesn’t it work now; if we had not looked to change provider it appears all would have continued on as it was – working. Yet no one is able to actually say why the transfer of provider has meant this big hoo-ha and allegedly identified problems in the exchange – if there were really problems then surely the broadband would have stopped working whilst with TalkTalk. No one has answered this fundamental question.
So here we are, 2 weeks after they were supposed to be transferred to a company that prides itself (and is not backwards in coming forwards in advertising this) on service and I can honestly say that I have very rarely had worse service. Though some of the issues are not directly within plusnet’s direct control (ie they don't own the actual phone lines) the distinct lack of communication, particularly when there is a problem with an order is. The fact that they don’t seem able or willing to address the issue with Openreach, which we are clearly not alone in, reading many other posts, is also very much in plusnet's court.
All the way through, when either mum or i spoke to customer service they would just say there had been a delay and the order was either being referred to the order updates team and/or the supplier team – yet none of these people actually seem to do anything; they certainly can’t give you any actual facts – just saying it’s delayed is not an adequate answer – we worked that one out for ourselves! There needs to be some serious effort made in giving the call centre people the ability to escalate issues and that when an order is more than 24 hours past expected or there is a reported problem with it that it is automatically escalated and proactively dealt with. The escalation team need to [be able to] actually do something ie, have some teeth to deal with outsourced suppliers and proactively communicate with their customers in these cases. It’s not rocket science.
As a member of Which? I am also disappointed that their endorsement of plusnet as a recommended provider appears to now be misplaced. As is my personal recommendation of plusnet as having significantly better service that TalkTalk – I thought that it would be impossible for anyone to be worse than them but I seem to have been proven wrong, unfortunately.
HOW WRONG CAN YOU BE?
Order placed 16/6/13 to transfer on 1/7/13 (phone expected first then broadband up to a day or so later they said). Line was checked during order process and found to be working and all fine.
30/6/13 broadband ceased, 1/7/13 phone ceased
Out of the blue an Openreach engineer appears 1/7/13 pm saying there’s a problem with the line he needs to fix – he fiddles about with the main socket then says it’s the exchange; he has to go there to fix something
2/7/13 (still no phone or bb), informed by engineer that he couldn’t fix the exchange, something needs replacing – the only information my mum is getting is when she phones plusnet on payg mobile so at sig cost to herself as there is no proactive updates coming to her
3/7/13 late afternoon phone starts working – still no broadband, nor updates to inform us of the problem/status
4/7/13 message received saying that BT need to change something in the exchange and it will be up to 5 working days to fix (by this time mum’s had not bb for 5 days already). I phoned to see if I could find out more detail – mum’s elderly, not tech savvy – distinct lack of detail from plusnet cs they just repeat things that are clearly logged on their system such as – our suppliers have to do fix something and it’ll be 5 working days. Why are plusnet not being provided with specific information? Why has it taken a further 2 days for Openreach to start the process of fixing the exchange when the engineer noted it on 1st/2nd July?? Why do plusnet not question the vagueness and complete lack of service from Openreach?? Do they not have SLA’s in their contracts – they are paying BT for the use of their lines, this includes that servicing/repairs happens surely?? This is the nature of contracts; does BT just think that as they have a monopoly they can get away with anything, like network rail??? Or is plusnet just unable to negotiate a proper contract or just unwilling to do anything about it and uncaring about their customers that they think this is acceptable?
9/7/13 – no news, yes this is the full 5 working days after the order was placed for the exchange repairs and still we have heard nothing from plusnet. So mum calls up and is told that the order can’t go through (in fact it has been cancelled!) because she has a business line – this was news to us, we’ve lived in the house since 1977 with one domestic line and the same number. My mum put plusnet straight.
10/7/13 – mum was called and told that as it’s a problem with the line in the house an engineer needs to call to fix it, the earliest appointment is 22/7/13 –yes I did say the twenty second of July! And plusnet claim that there’s nothing they can do about this!!! So it’ll be over 3 weeks without broadband (assuming that this appointment happens and the engineer can do whatever they seem to think the problem is – I come back to the question though, if the phone and broadband worked with another provider for years, why all of a sudden doesn’t it work now; if we had not looked to change provider it appears all would have continued on as it was – working. Yet no one is able to actually say why the transfer of provider has meant this big hoo-ha and allegedly identified problems in the exchange – if there were really problems then surely the broadband would have stopped working whilst with TalkTalk. No one has answered this fundamental question.
So here we are, 2 weeks after they were supposed to be transferred to a company that prides itself (and is not backwards in coming forwards in advertising this) on service and I can honestly say that I have very rarely had worse service. Though some of the issues are not directly within plusnet’s direct control (ie they don't own the actual phone lines) the distinct lack of communication, particularly when there is a problem with an order is. The fact that they don’t seem able or willing to address the issue with Openreach, which we are clearly not alone in, reading many other posts, is also very much in plusnet's court.
All the way through, when either mum or i spoke to customer service they would just say there had been a delay and the order was either being referred to the order updates team and/or the supplier team – yet none of these people actually seem to do anything; they certainly can’t give you any actual facts – just saying it’s delayed is not an adequate answer – we worked that one out for ourselves! There needs to be some serious effort made in giving the call centre people the ability to escalate issues and that when an order is more than 24 hours past expected or there is a reported problem with it that it is automatically escalated and proactively dealt with. The escalation team need to [be able to] actually do something ie, have some teeth to deal with outsourced suppliers and proactively communicate with their customers in these cases. It’s not rocket science.
As a member of Which? I am also disappointed that their endorsement of plusnet as a recommended provider appears to now be misplaced. As is my personal recommendation of plusnet as having significantly better service that TalkTalk – I thought that it would be impossible for anyone to be worse than them but I seem to have been proven wrong, unfortunately.
Really sorry to read about this issue, Chris is away from work at the moment so I've just looked into this.
I can see an update on ticket 71469626 to show that we're hoping to have this all resolved later today for you.
Adam
I can see an update on ticket 71469626 to show that we're hoping to have this all resolved later today for you.
Adam
Quote Day 29 and still nothing!
I'm surprised as the notes on the account indicate that this resolved. I'm not able to go into great detail just as your not the account holder or an authorissed user, we can add you as one if you need to support your parents in the future by the way.
I'm sorry if you feel that we've not communicated with you in the meantime but to be fair I can see that efforts to contact the account holders have been made on a number of occasions.
Please let us know if there's anything further you need help with.
Adam