BT charged £123 for an engineer to call!!

ahrimaniac

Eh? Y'know, this is becoming a really common thing on these boards at the moment. People have posted constructive, helpful comments - both on your side of the argument and BT's. This should help you prepare for calling them up and trying to sort it out. But it is a discussion forum, and thusly, people will discuss! Don't be discouraged but you shouldn't expect people to blindly agree with you. What's the point?

djohn2002uk

Shopkeepers_Delight wrote:

The bill is not itemised no, just says one off charge? Not to worry I am sure I will sort it.

Would just like to add I am a newbie and thank you all for your response.

I did search forum beforehand to see if there was anything here to help to no avail. As for comments like above its put me off posting.

Cheers

My post was not meant to put you off posting, but, as ahrimaniac says, the idea of a discussion forum is that you post, and if it's a query, then you must expect answers for and against, or why ask?.
Your first words were "Please help" so it's no good just getting replies that lead you to believe that you have a cast iron case for having the bill quashed when in all honesty you haven't a leg to stand on. Except, maybe, as I said earlier, via a goodwill gesture from BT.

hammy_the_hammer

i can only imagine that lightning had hit your area and damaged the 3 sky modems. if it is lightning your house insurance may cover you . i also note that you don't object to sky billing you for fixing the problem

clark1982

smudger1964 wrote:

There doesnt seem to be a national charging policy with bt faults I called them out to a faulty line but it turned out to be my phone at fault he was here about 5 minutes the charge was £55 .I was told however there would be a charge if it wasnt bts fault so the £123 seems a lot perhaps they charge per minute or part thereof

there is a national pricing process... Call Out: £55.00 exc vat
£64.63 Inc vat...per hour or part hour: £60.00 exc vat.....
£70.50 Inc vat...min charge 1hr. Therefor min charge Inc vat for 1 hour or part hour is £135.13... Charging for faults is mentioned in the terms & cond's for residentala telephone service, so regardless if you were advised or not, but hve a right to raise the charge!

pricing details at http://www.serviceview.bt.com/list/current/docs/Misc.boo/1393.htm

Shopkeepers_Delight

To be honest I did mind Sky charging!! But at least they ran few a few things like trying a different cable etc before they said it was the box and advised me immediately of the charges, which is my point with BT, they didn't.

The sky engineer was here 3 hours and did an excellent job for £99 and improved our service as we had upgraded to Sky+, the BT engineer was about 15 minutes and when he left the problem was unsolved.?

Have changed my mind about posting, you are all so helpful and it is indeed helpful seeing both sides of the story, of course you'll all be interested in how I get on with this (have a bad feeling i'm gonna have to cough up).

Out of interest would telewest or NTL charge to fix a problem?
Not changing over though as Sky+ is brilliant and I need the damn BT line!!

Oh woe.

Browntoa

he may have only been at your place for 15 minutes but may have spent an hour before testing beside the road etc, then came to you

stiffnuts69

dont need a bt line for sky it can be ntl/telewest

Shopkeepers_Delight

Really!!!

Thats good news will have to look into this.

I have Sky Talk though, that may be affected and just gone onto £5.00 a month unlimited.

At least a cancellation threat will be justified if I use Telewest as a weapon.

Altarf

Shopkeepers_Delight wrote:

So peeps am I stupid and this charge is stated somewhere and I've missed it, or are BT at fault??

It is in their price list:
http://www.serviceview.bt.com/list/current/docs/Misc.boo/1393.htm

BT also have quite a lot of information about dealing with faults on their website

http://www2.bt.com/static/i/microsite/help_and_tips/faults/overview.html

which includes the standard advice of unplug everything from the phone line, including non-BT extensions, and plug a known working phone into the main socket. Then see if there is any noise on the line.

If BT did not advise you that they would charge if they found that there was nothing wrong with their line and the problem was your end, then I would dispute the charge. However I suspect that they work to a script which mentions that there is a charge, just not how much it is and they can probably produce a recording proving it.

Shopkeepers_Delight

BT rang earlier this afternoon and I don't have to pay....................yipee!!!!

The charge of £123 wasn't even mine but somehow winged its way to me and had been put onto my account!!

But...........my charges were even more, yes MORE, £55 call out charge and £115 for every hour or part there of for the time the engineer was here!!?
However, because I wasn't advised of any charges at any time on the call or by the engineer all of this will be REMOVED......... they must've listened to the call or looked on MSE!

All this and I didn't even have to beg, I am soooooo chuffed, they were brillilant, as two faced as I may be I will now stay with them for another 25 years.

Excellent. One happy BT customer.