BT said no charge - but did anyway

pyroliske

Just want some advice please. We moved into our rented house a few months ago, and noticed that there was no telephone socket, but there was a line coming in. We were told that the previous tenant had removed the socket, but that the landlady would replace it. This was done and we were told it was working. We were able to make outgoing calls but no one had our new number so we did not receive any calls.

When our broadband was not connected on the advised day, I called BT the following morning and handed them over to my partner as I had to go to work. They carried out tests with my partner and after several calls to and fro it was discovered that they hadn't actually switched it on, and it would take another couple of days. We were not happy with this and I called BT to complain. Whilst I went round the merry-go-round of being passed from one department to another, someone from the faults department had text my partner as she had tried to call the landline but it was not receiving incoming calls. My partner called her back and she advised that they were sending an engineer the following day. She told my partner that she was wording the notes so that we would not be charged for the callout. The engineer came out and replaced the box which was not wired in correctly and he was surprised we had been able to make any calls.

Last week I received my phone bill with a nice Xmas present of £185 callout charge on it. After a couple of calls to BT (during which I was told to get my landlady to pay it) I was told that my partner was advised of the charge and agreed to it and the engineer coming out, that there were no notes saying that we would not be charged as it was a tick box to say charge and she had ticked it. I know that my partner did not agree to the charge as we knew we would not pay for any fault and would have to speak to the landlady first to see if she would pay, as we knew any fault was not our responsibilty as we did not put in the socket.

Anyway BT won't budge, and our landlady will not pay as we did not pre-agree it with her, and she wants us to fight BT all the way. We are caught between a rock and a hard place.

olly300

To be honest you are legally responsible for paying for the socket not the landlady.

There is no reason why anyone would remove a phone socket unless it was out of spite. The reason being is that it's the tenant's responsibility to put in a phone line not the landlord's and if the tenant was peed of with paying they would remove it so the landlord didn't benefit from it.

pyroliske

olly300 wrote: »

To be honest you are legally responsible for paying for the socket not the landlady.

There is no reason why anyone would remove a phone socket unless it was out of spite. The reason being is that it's the tenant's responsibility to put in a phone line not the landlord's and if the tenant was peed of with paying they would remove it so the landlord didn't benefit from it.

Sorry I don't see how this answers my query? The telephone line was in the house when the landlady bought it in 2006 we didn't ask her to install a new line, only to put a socket on, if she had said no we would have paid to have one installed ourselves. Ultimately the only reason we had to have an engineer out was because the landlady got someone who didn't know how to install a telephone socket correctly (her father) and I don't see how that is our responsibility. The previous tenant cut the socket off to stop her children using the phone line - thats what we were told, and we were told that the landlady would get a new socket put on before we moved in, which fair enough she did, but even at the most basic you would expect to be able make and receive calls. However the BT engineer said the socket was a complete botch job (his words) and he couldn't understand how we were even able to make outgoing calls. And actually the landlady is legally responsible for the socket due to the fact that she agreed to put a new one in and then didn't install it correctly forcing us to have an engineer to correct the faulty installation. If she had said she wouldn't put in a new socket and we still wanted one then it would be our responsibilty to pay for an engineer it to install a new socket. As the socket was in the house when the previous tenant moved in and was subsequently damaged by her then surely the landlady should have retained some of the bond as it states in the lease terms that any damages to items in the house are to be paid for by the tenant? It was part of the fixtures and fittings of the house when she moved in after all.

Anyway to put your mind at rest we have told her that we will pay the bill, but she is still on our case to fight BT.

My issue is that BT told us they wouldn't charge us for the engineer and then charged us anyway, not why the previous tenant removed the socket.

espresso

pyroliske wrote: »

My issue is that BT told us they wouldn't charge us for the engineer and then charged us anyway, not why the previous tenant removed the socket.

BT always charge if they need to visit and do any work. Your landlady should not have interfered with the BT master socket but that's history now. You called BT so you have to pay for the rectification work.

Buzby

The reason for the call out was not due to an y fault on BTs network or connection - but the misguided assistance from a third party. If you wanted to push it, point out to the landlady that you were billed this amount due to the erroneous installation arranged by her - she may feel morally obliged to repay you.

Either way, you're really no worse off - if she had done nothing, BT would have to be paid for reinstalling the socket, and the whilst the previous tenant should not have removed it, you can see his point if he paid for the install of a new line, why should he pass it on at no cost? (Even though he was wrong for doing what he did).

BT are not to blame here.

pyroliske

So basically what everyone is saying is that even though BT told us they wouldn't charge us for the callout, it's ok for them to charge us anyway? That doesn't seem very fair to me.

We have tried to get the landlady to pay it but she keeps changing her mind and saying she can't afford it, she offers to pay one minute and then says her partner won't have it the next, but she keeps phoning us randomly and goes on and on at us to write to BT so that they will refund us. Basically it appears that she will only pay us if she is guaranteed to get the money back from BT.