Advantage Telecom offer - good or not??

teluwot

POyouail wrote: »

Yet another first time poster singing the praises of this outfit.

Oh Dear I am a first time poster, so I guess this view won't count but here goes. Had the cold call today from Advantage, very interesting, and didn't even get to the five year contract, but anyone who will not move without knowing about my bank details when that information is not required does not get my vote of confidence, reinforced here having done the obligatory Google!

macman

teluwot wrote: »

Oh Dear I am a first time poster, so I guess this view won't count but here goes. Had the cold call today from Advantage, very interesting, and didn't even get to the five year contract, but anyone who will not move without knowing about my bank details when that information is not required does not get my vote of confidence, reinforced here having done the obligatory Google!

Your view does count. But when a first-time poster makes such comments, their views are widely held to be influenced by some undeclared association to the company they are promoting.

teluwot

macman wrote: »

Your view does count. But when a first-time poster makes such comments, their views are widely held to be influenced by some undeclared association to the company they are promoting.

Point taken!

roly_p

Having agreed verbally to transfer to Advantage, but having since read the terms and conditions, I am in the process of trying to adhere to these terms by "cancelling within the transfer period". This morning I phoned and was informed that my number was not yet on their system so I could not cancel. This afternoon I was contacted by BT asking if it was OK to cancel my contract with them.
Had BT gone ahead without checking with me first, I have no doubt that Advantage would try to claim I cancelled outside the Transfer Period and so owed them £195. This cancellation fee is now lower than quoted in previous messages, but too much for me.
Also beware the phrase in their terms:
15. CHANGES TO THIS CONTRACT
15.1 Advantage Telecoms can change the Conditions (including the charges) at any time.
They only inform you of changes when you ask to be informed - so psychic customers will be ok.

roly_p

Follow-up to the above, re cancellation
I phoned them again this morning and asked to cancel, and they were very polite.
Switchboard put me straight through to someone who did try to persuade me not to cancel, but was very reasonable, accepted that I had made up my mind and gave me the required cancellation reference.
I still would not personally sign up for their terms, and am not happy about the way the initial approach was made in the guise of a call from BT Openreach, and ignoring our corporate TPS registration, but their customer service does actually seem to be above average and their charges are competitive, so all I would recommend is:
Do not verbally agree to a contract (with anyone) in a call initiated by the seller.
Instead go away, read the terms thoroughly and if it still seems like a good idea phone them and go for it.
Seems obvious, but if someone phones offering you something you were already considering in principal, it is all too easy to subconciously think that this is the kick you needed to get on with it. They will cover a few salient points of the contract you are agreeing to (the ones that make them look good), but the contract includes all the terms and conditions, and from the experiences of others cancellation before charges are incurred might not be straightforward.

Apex459

First time forum user aswell, however I most definately will NOT be singing the praises of this truely dreadful company.

We had a telephone call last year - they could save us money etc etc, anyway we signed up as were disgruntled with BT at the time who had been taking £130 out of our account for months for their broadband and phone - one phone call got this reduced to £33 - anyway still were not happy with them so we moved to Advantage Telecom.
Over the 8 months we were with them they never saved us any money and I recently phoned them to ask what I need to do (how much notice etc) as we are moving house. I was told there would be a cancellation fee of £239 or I woud have to pass their service onto our buyers to take over thus getting out of the fee! Their customer service technique is appalling, their staff extremely rude and forceful and in desperate need of some training, although I did speak to the complaints person and she was no better - so obviously an approach that is drummed into their staff from day one. They are threatening, abusive and completely unprofessional towards customers if they are not just ticking along and paying their bill.
We did go down the route of starting to make an official complaint, but the thought of having to keep dealing with these people put us off (as well as the 'lady' who deals with complaints telling us we would not get anywhere with it because we have been rude to them!!). BEWARE they do not record calls and if you have a complaint that you have raised with them before, you can bet they will not have any record of it.

To cut an extremely long story short we paid the severance fee and now have nothing to do with them , have a great deal elsewhere and are finally saving money - best of all we don't have to speak to these unbelievably rude individuals again.

Quite honestly I don't know how they get away with it.

macman

But you would have paid an ETC to any provider if you left after 8m, the minimum term contract is normally 12m, with few exceptions. If you were on an Advantage 5 year contract, you got out cheaply.

mkent

I am a small business owner and I saw this thread and thought id give some advice to warn people not to be foiled by this scam company as I almost did.

In January I was approached by a sales person called Steve who said he was from BT and I should be on a different tarriff because BT are 2 companies. I know one was BT retail and he pretended to be from the other company, he went into detail about how much I will save etc and I asked alot of questions. He told me he was new and he switched me over to a manager who convinced me to go for this other tariff. Then at the end of the call I was told I was switching to this advantage telecom. I wasnt told until that point that I was totally switching. The manager was nice and explained that they are a seperate company but they operate on the same network. I agreed to see the paperwork with some reluctance as I had to hand bank details over.

I recieved the paper work they want the line rental upfront, they then will up the charges over the years.

I called BT and explained and they tailored a much cheaper and better package because I threatened to leave. I advise anyone to ring BT and speak to them before you switch over to these. I also have been advised to speak to OFCOM about this companies bad practice.

mkent

kitti66 wrote: »

I have been with Advantage Telecoms coming up 8 months now and i can only say that they "do what they say they do". They have saved me a considerable amount already compared to what BT could do for my company.......

They were very customer orientated and courteous when i changed to them

Everyone is entitled to their opinion but do not knock them till you try them, only wish i had known about them sooner.

Having seen many of these posts i cant help but think its a director or a jobsworth employee trying to generate interest and revenue for the scam company which they work. If you have half an ounce of common sence or decency you will stop trying to bleed dry, good honest businesses that are already struggling during these difficult times!

sailor1003

I also received a call from this company (in spite of having TPS). Initially, they claimed to be part of BT. It only became clear as the call progressed that they were not. Foolishly, I did something I never do, agreed to the contract. Then I checked out the terms and conditions and realised it is not a 50% discount for the term of the contract, only for the first year. I rang their customers services number to cancel. I was told as it was a new contract, someone would have to ring me back. They didn't. An hour later, I rang again. Eventually, I was put through. Although I made clear from the start that I was calling to cancel, the response was "I believe you have some queries about your new contract?" I repeated that I was calling to cancel. I was asked why. When I tell the girl, she started making better offers to me. At that point, I told her I was calling to cancel, did not wish to discuss it and asked for a cancellation number. This I then received. In view of an earlier comment on the forum, I am now e-mailing them with this number to ensure that there is a record of the cancellation.