Plusnet step change for the worse - new £50 visit fee if you are not careful

buglawton · 25 May 2015 at 7:02AM

I've had to deal with Plusnet a number of times to get Openreach to deal with line problems. Up to now it's been OK for me to manage the tech side of testing and making arrangements as I'm an authorised name on 2 accounts - on one the main acct holder is sometimes abroad in another time zone and with the other the main acct holder is disabled and usually unable to deal with phone calls.

Me managing the accts has been to Plusnet's great benefit as
a) I get to chose the ISP and selected Plusnet and
b) I've yet to switch either account away after quite some loyal time now.

Now all of a sudden Plusnet is insisting that before an appointment can be booked for an Openreach visit, they must speak with the principle account holder. This just isn't going to work well. Then, after the visit appointment was confirmed the reason for this new rule has become clear: if you rearrange your appointment less than 48 hours in advance, there's a new £50 fee!. So of course the main account who will be direct debited needs to agree to the fee, hence the new rule about who books.

Now, Plusnet may be passing on a new Openreach condition and cost to customers, or they've just invented a new stealth cash raising ruse.

Which is it and which other ISPs have the same rule?

Retrogamer · 25 May 2015 at 10:34AM

When an Openreach engineer goes out on the agreed date and time slot if no one is available to grant them access, then they charge the ISP.
It happened very often with the ISPs i've worked with and it's not a viable way to run a business absorbing thousands of pounds weekly due to customer's deciding to go out and not inform them.

You're right with the charges part, that would normally have to be agreed with the account holder as you can imagine the outcome if they were charged £50 unexpectedly due to someone else making decisions on their behalf.

ISP's have always been charged for missed appointments but with proffit margins dwindling it's likely plusnet have decided that they're no longer going to absorb the charges for when their customer's go out and don't inform them.

I'm sure some other ISPs won't pass the charges on but i'm not sure who they are.

brewerdave · 25 May 2015 at 10:57AM

I'm sure that this isn't a new charge - I can remember cases before ,discussed on the Plusnet forums, where a householder has been charged £50 when the BT Openreach engineer reports a failed visit. Frequently the householder has disputed the charge because they say that the engineer has not attempted to call. As far as I'm aware the BTO man is supposed to furnish proof that he has attempted visit eg photo of the front door.

I have been told by an experienced BTO man that some of his colleagues have reported an unsuccessful visit simply because they haven't had time to cover all their calls within the working day!!:(

Plusnet_company_representative · 25 May 2015 at 12:37PM

Hi there,

Sorry for any concern or confusion here, however the engineers fee isn't something new we've started charging recently. The actual cost to us is significantly more (over double) the £50 we pass on, and if there is any doubt that the engineer visited we can dispute this on the customers behalf.

Chris

buglawton · 25 May 2015 at 10:40PM

Sorry not buying this without a better explanation.

A failed visit is one thing, but a £50 charge if you just rearrange in advance a visit to fix an Openreach fault is a whole different thing. Let's just say that this IS something new from Plusnet. One could have argued for £25 and 24 hours being fair, with existing and new customers being given fair warning of this change to Ts and Cs. But £50 and 48 hours?

Also no solution to the new 'principle account holder is the only one who can OK repair visits' issue? What's the point in having secondary authorised account holders at all then?

Plusnet_company_representative · 26 May 2015 at 10:17AM

The 48 hours window is the timeframe prior to an appointment Openreach give us to rearrange this, anytime after this and the change may not be accepted and we'd get charged for the appointment failing.

Secondary contact details are there for support queries, initial fault raising etc. Anything that requires payment or alteration to the contract should be dealt with by the account holder.

Hope this helps to explain.

Chris

Retrogamer · 26 May 2015 at 11:41AM

Plusnet_company_representative wrote: »

The 48 hours window is the timeframe prior to an appointment Openreach give us to rearrange this, anytime after this and the change may not be accepted and we'd get charged for the appointment failing.

Secondary contact details are there for support queries, initial fault raising etc. Anything that requires payment or alteration to the contract should be dealt with by the account holder.

Hope this helps to explain.

Chris

Hi Chris.

Do you use the Openreach portal to change appointment times, or eCo?

Plusnet_company_representative · 26 May 2015 at 12:03PM

Depends on what service the appointment is for really! Eco+ for broadband, fibre etc and a B2B gateway in to Openreach for WLR, that's the top level summary really. Obviously SIM orders need both appointments to line up and there are some other ones that need matching/in a certain order.

Chris

buglawton · 26 May 2015 at 3:41PM

If the fault turns out to be an in-property connections issue then I'm fine with paying a clearly set out fee.

But this one is a most likely a line fault. The £50 charge I was warned of in in the appointment confirmation text is for re-booking the appointment in advance if needed.

The text goes at follows:
Your engineer appointment has been booked for DD/MM/2015 between 8am and 1pm. Please call us if you need to re-arrange, please note a charge of £50 will apply if this appointment is changed within 48 hours of the scheduled time.

Can you post the link to the Plusnet Ts and Cs page where this £50 charge for re-arranging an appointment later then 48 hours before a service visit is explained? i'd also be curious to know when this came into effect.

And do you have a link to the page with other types of charge that you mention are set out?

brewerdave · 27 May 2015 at 7:11AM

I posted this on Plusnet fora yesterday; I was referred to this thread:-
http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,139734.0.html

In my view the connection of the £50 charge with the 48 hour notice period for changes, is not very clear:( plus the situation with weekends hasn't been answered satisfactorily ie does a Monday appointment have to be rearranged the previous Wednesday ??:)

duchy · 27 May 2015 at 7:34AM

Simple solution - Vote with your feet

As Plusnet say it isn't a new charge to them just one they have now chosen to pass on -plus there's nothing that says that a non account holder can't book an appointment in OFCOM regs provided DPA (with password acting as account holder's permission to speak for them) is passed. Plenty of other ISPs -find one that suits your particular needs for account access.

(I book OR appointments for customers every day -I make sure internal causes are ruled out prior to the visit and have never had a legitimate charge back from OR- and I am astounded at some of the stories I hear from customers about how other ISPs charge for visits)

Plusnet step change for the worse - new £50 visit fee if you are not careful

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