BT to Talk Talk - war is hell!

mellowmarsh

If you're thinking of leaving BT for Talk Talk, the following may be helpful, I'm sorry it's a bit long but make a nice cup of tea and bear with me!

I've recently 'migrated' from BT to Talk Talk. Talk Talk gave me a broadband go-live date around the end of August. Which was OK as I have (or had) a BT Broadband account I'd keep running until then. But on July 19th I found had no internet connection at all.

I spent the best part of that day on the phone to what is laughingly known as BT's 'technical support' talking to a succession of lovely people somewhere in India who had me tear apart my computer network looking for a fault that they were convinced was at my end. After two and a half hours of this, including much ping-pong-ing between departments they said they needed to 'look into it further' and would ring me right back but they didn't, so I rang them again.

Every call a gets a BT case number but without telling me they had closed my case adding a note, "It's not our problem - it's the customer's broadband router that's faulty". The router's tech support disagreed - running diagnostics on the router revealed that my password and username were simply not being accepted by BT. I call BT again but after waiting for 40 minutes I've had enough and call it a day.

Next day, internet still dead, I ring BT again and now, finally, they tell me the reason I can't connect is very simple - I don't have an BT account anymore, I've been disconnected!

It seems that now I've migrated to Talk Talk and it is Talk Talk that own the line and, according to BT it's ALL Talk Talk's fault! Even though I'm paid up with BT until August 31 for broadband there's "nothing they can do so it's sorry, Talk to Talk Talk because BT ain't listening! And… THEY HANG UP ON ME!

I ring Talk Talk - they say, yes my Talk Talk Broadband will go live in 3 days time. The explain that 'by law' Talk Talk have to give users a 3 day 'cooling off' period from the date they take over the line before they can connect me. To ensure there is no loss of service, BT should not have switched me off until 8th August! They reckon BT are deliberately being difficult because they are losing so many customers to other cheaper ISPs!

Talk Talk aren't blameless - they should have given 10 days notice before the Broadband go-live date, but they didn't. And BT say Talk Talk switched me off and Talk Talk say that's a lie it's BT who switched me off etc.. etc..

So I was without internet connection for 5 days and I work on-line from home so that was fun. On Monday was able to connect with Talk Talk broadband and it's been running smoothly ever since. BT (spit!) tell me I'll see a refund on my next bill - and I better had!

Oh and one other thing... a month ago I rang BT to ask for my MAC code (the migration code needed by Talk Talk so I wouldn't suffer any loss of service, HA!), The BT flunky tried to talk me out of leaving, giving me the usual guff about how BT offer superior service etc.. but then, I suppose just to throw a spanner in the works, he adds "Oh and you realise that you WILL be paying an extra £10 per month to Talk Talk because they can't offer free broadband in your area?". Which wasn't true at all, but of course it plants the seed of doubt, the sneaky devils!

Well there appears to be a vicious war raging between BT and Talk Talk and BT are playing dirty and it seems we are collateral damage! So is it just me? Has anyone else been shot by both sides?

PabloNeruda

Sorry to hear about your problems. I also made the switch from BT phone and Orange Broadband, to the Talk Talk phone + broadband package. In fact I went live on broadband only 3 days ago. No probs whatsoever for me. Applied online, they did the switch for me, never had any interruption to the phone service. Then emailed Orange for a MAC code, sent it to Talk Talk. They sent the start-up pack, and bingo, Talk Talk broadband.

josieb_2

Ha Im glad to see that someone else has had a problem with bt to talktalk I had a similar problem with my phone and had no outgoings for three weeks and it was a nightmare to sort out and it went just the same way with bt being MOST unhelpful. I am thinking of going talktalk broadband as I have no internet connection having suffered at the hands of e7. but am afraid of loosing my phone again. Where we live we will have to pay the ten pounds and talktalk said it will take 6-8 weeks to connect me as demand is so high. I am having to drive over to a friend some miles away to use her broadband so can only get on line at the weekend. most put out!!!! and very sick of it..

asandwhen

I went live with talktalk broadband in May - since then I have had 7 phone calls from BT asking why I left and if I want to go back to them - the last chap I spoke to even said to me that they would pay my cancelation charge to go back to them - I just tell them how happy I am with talk talk.

Ms-Money-Penny

asandwhen wrote:

I went live with talktalk broadband in May - since then I have had 7 phone calls from BT asking why I left and if I want to go back to them - the last chap I spoke to even said to me that they would pay my cancelation charge to go back to them - I just tell them how happy I am with talk talk.

You lucky thing - i wish BT would phone me and tell me that

DonnyDave

mellowmarsh wrote:

Talk Talk aren't blameless - they should have given 10 days notice before the Broadband go-live date, but they didn't. And BT say Talk Talk switched me off and Talk Talk say that's a lie it's BT who switched me off etc.. etc..

So I was without internet connection for 5 days and I work on-line from home so that was fun. On Monday was able to connect with Talk Talk broadband and it's been running smoothly ever since. BT (spit!) tell me I'll see a refund on my next bill - and I better had!

I have no first hand knowledge of how it works, but it would be logical to assume that the old provider ceases service when the new provider has the MAC. If you don't use your MAC then it will expire; you won't be disconnected.

It strikes me that the error could be with either party, so I don't know why you believe Talk Talk that it is BT's fault.

I think that either:

• Talk Talk requested ceasure of the old provider on the correct date and BT cut off the service before that date, in which case it's BT's fault, or;
• Talk Talk requested that the old provider ceases service too early, in which case it's Talk Talk's fault.

So how do you know that it's BT's fault?

hurricanewyn

We had exactly the same problem. It took 6 hours in total of speaking to the different sections in BT to finally be told we'd been disconnected and then when we phoned Talk Talk we just had a recorded message saying "All our agents are busy, please try later" and were cut off. 24 times over 3 evenings!! To be honest I don't know who's at fault, but neither were especially helpful - we were just left wishing we'd never moved.

cannylass_2

had very similar problem when we switched from bt to talk talk. no broadband for a couple of days before talk talk went live, as bt withdrew service!!!

mellowmarsh

DonnyDave wrote:

I have no first hand knowledge of how it works, but it would be logical to assume that the old provider ceases service when the new provider has the MAC. If you don't use your MAC then it will expire; you won't be disconnected.

It strikes me that the error could be with either party, so I don't know why you believe Talk Talk that it is BT's fault.

I think that either:

• Talk Talk requested ceasure of the old provider on the correct date and BT cut off the service before that date, in which case it's BT's fault, or;
• Talk Talk requested that the old provider ceases service too early, in which case it's Talk Talk's fault.

So how do you know that it's BT's fault?

Yes I agree it's definately one of those! But this is the problem, who do you believe?

Talk Talk say one thing, BT say another.

As I've said TT are not entirely blameless, but when I got through to the TT tech support I found them to be very clear and helpful. Whereas BT were stunningly useless and denigrated TT at every opportunity.

So yes I'm cross with BT because I've paid a lot of money for an appalling service. They wasted my time, putting me through two days of frustrating phone calls, giving misinformation and being economical with the truth!

And I pity the poor sod at BT who gets the job of ringing me to ask why I left!

clark1982

Sorry But I feel the need to correct you all! If you are leaving a ISP (BT) to take up service with another ISP (talktalk), the complete migration is done by the gaining ISP (talktalk). BT only issue you with a migration code, by doing so, this DOES NOT put a cease date on your broadband service. Your gaining ISP, with the MAC code, then arrange to cease and transfer your broadband with BT Wholesale (bt wholesale are the company all ISP's buy their Broadband from). So if your Broadband has been ceased early, your gaining ISP is at fault as they control the swap over with Bt Wholesale. BT's not at fault. Get your facts right folks!

mellowmarsh

Thanks for that, nice and bold too! You finish your post with "Get your facts right folks!" well of course the lack of ANY facts at all from these dreadful companies is a huge part of the problem. Getting the FACT from BT that my account with them had been closed on the day the connection died would have been nice! So in my opinon both BT and Talk Talk screwed up but it was BT's 'can't give a damn' attitude and general mind-numbing incompetence that caused me the most distress.