Is BT Broadband always this bad? (and I've only got as far as trying to order!)

drt406

I decided to move my broadband access from Pipex to BT (no LLU here, so my options were limited.) I ordered via Quidco to save £50. Everything seemed to be OK, activation was set for Dec 22 and my router arrived on time.

I called 0800 800 150 to see what I had to do next. ‘You probably won’t have to do anything. It should happen before midnight and you may not even notice it has happened.’ Surely I’ll lose broadband and have to change my access settings when Pipex switch me off, I asked? ‘Er – yes, you’ll have to do that, yes. But it’ll happen before midnight.’

Next morning – nothing had happened. I rang 0800 800 150. ‘Your order failed. I don’t know why. I have no further information. I’ll get someone from the back room (?) to investigate urgently. He’ll ring you back today.’

By 1700 no-one had rung. I rang 0800 800 150 again. I’ll try to describe the next two hours of phone calls briefly.

Spoke to a foreign call centre. Was put through to ‘management centre’ in Scotland. Woman didn’t recognise my address, phone number, order number or postcode. ‘Are you business?’ No, residential. ‘This is business. Ring 0800 100 3443’.

Rang that number. It doesn’t exist.

Rang 0800 800 150 . Foreign call centre. ‘Can’t explain. I’ll put you on hold and transfer you to a colleague.’ The colleague wasn’t impressed. He put me on hold while he reported the first agent for transferring me to him without his permission!! ‘You need a MAC code before you can transfer.’ I know. I’ve got one. I entered it on the order form. ‘Oh. But when does it expire?’ January. ‘Oh. I’ll put you on hold.’

Five minutes later. ‘My manager says he has cancelled this order. It’s the only way. You have to reorder. I’ll put you through to sales.’

Back to Scotland. ‘Did you order online? That could be the problem.’ Yes, I ordered online to get £50 through Quidco. Am I going to lose that now? ‘Can’t help with that I’m afraid. Sometimes ordering online causes anomalies. Do you want to order?’ OK. How do I know this order won’t fail too? ‘Because I’m going to make sure the order goes through.’ But the other order went through – I got the home hub sent to me. ‘Can’t do any more than that I’m afraid.’ How do you know the problem didn’t occur later in the process? ‘I don’t, all I can do is make sure this order goes through.’ Why didn’t anyone contact me to say the order had failed? ‘Didn’t they? I can only apologize.’

So I reordered. Activation (supposedly) 5 Jan. Unless the order fails again. And I’ve probably lost £50 of cashback. I’ve already got a really bad feeling about BT broadband....

BT_company_representative

Hello drt406,

That doesn't sound good at all; if you want I can check the order to make sure it's going through as scheduled? All you need to do is drop me an email (email address is against my profile) with your account number, MSE username and link to this thread.

Thanks,

Stephanie
BT Support

robt_2

To be honest you should cancel and go with someone cheaper and more efficient.

drt406

Thanks to 'Stephanie' from BT for trying to help. I'll update the thread with any developments (good or bad.)

boho_2

hm...interesting...

drt406

boho wrote: »

hm...interesting...

Why so? I'm intrigued!!

Phone call from BT retail - 'BT wholesale have committed to the order, switchover is definitely Jan 5.' Still no info as to why the first order 'failed', but I've been offered £50 credit if the Quidco cashback doesn't go through.

Let's see what happens on the 5th.

RJharrow

you are still in the first phase, wait once the connection is ok and everything is fine and when problems happen in the future (loss of connection, account related queries, etc) that's the 2nd phase of the problem, getting in touch with their customer service agents which takes ages, well, this was my experience, I hope it won't happen to you.....

delain

It's absolutely diabolical.

My mum had her order processed wrongly,. then they sent her ONE letter then disconnected her. She rang them (from a mobile:eek: to say why isn't it working and then they said it'd be back on in 24 hours after taking a big payment. after a week she called them again and told her she had asked for it to be cancelled, when she had not.

So they said she had to have a new order, new phone number, now they're sending her 2 lots of phone and internet bills, and wheni had it i had to reset the modem every time i opened the lappy.

Awful.

I've got Sky now and it's great!

drt406

Second time lucky - on Jan 5 broadband went off for 45 mins, then an automated call to say the switchover had happened. Five minutes to reconfigure my router and immediate success.

2.2Mb/s speed (max of 2Mb/s quoted) - not bad for 4.5km from the exchange. My feelings towards BT broadband are starting to improve... now to see about the possibly lost cashback!