Beware of BT Vision and Broadband dodgy practices

tb321

Hi

I just moved home and decided to shop around for a new broadband and digital TV provider (was with Virgin Media at my old place, but I thought the market must have moved on so I was keen to see what else was out there). So, on the Saturday that I moved in I thought I'd give BT a call to see what offers they had (I didn't have internet access yet, otherwise I would have just checked online). After the BT lady went through the various deals available to me, I explained that I wanted to do a bit more research before committing, but she insisted that I place the order then and there and said I could always cancel before the service was activated and even after it was activated I had 10 days to return the equipment if I was not satisfied with the service. She also said that they could activate my service by Wednesday as long I got the old tenant to disconnect his service by Monday.

This sounded like a good plan to me, so I went ahead on the basis of her advice and joined up on that Saturday, got the old tenant to disconnect on the Monday and was expecting to be connected by Wednesday. However, when I called up on Monday to double check that I would be connected within the next two days, they told me that I had been wrongly informed by the lady who sold me the package on Saturday and that in fact I would have to wait until the following Wednesday to be activated. This was annoying, but not the end of the world.

The next week, they sent the equipment to the wrong address - I had asked for it to go to my work address and they delivered it to my home address, but I was at work, so they left it with a neighbour I had never met - and it wasn't a good first impression when I rang their doorbell when I got home at 11pm to get my package (I was too excited about checking out my new TV service to wait until the next day to ask my package!). But still not the end of the world (and it was a nice excuse to meet the neighhours, I guess!).

So, i finally get it all set up and apart from the fact that BT Vision is nothing like the sales person described (it's basically like connecting your TV to the internet and watching BBC iPlayer), it was incredibly slow to the point that it kept buffering every few seconds - it is the most infuriating thing! However, they did say that it takes a few days for the speeds to settle, so I wasn't that upset as I expected it to eventually be fine. 4 days on it is only marginally better, and definitely not good enough to sit and watch and entire program from beginning to end without a buffering breaks - and frankly, I'd rather just plug my macbook into my TV and watch BBC iPlayer or 4oD than play all this money to BT for the same service.

Unsatisfied with the service, today I called up to check the process of returning my equipment within the 10 day period just in case the quality of the service didn't improve over the next few days. To my shock, i was told today that yes, I can return the equipment and I wont be charged for the equipment but I will still be charged for 18 months of using the broadband and TV service!!!! The original sales person totally misled me when she knew I wasn't willing to commit, and she made this 10 day period sound like it was a "cooling off" period when in actual fact it is not! She also misled me about getting my service up and running within a few days of placing the order - if that had actually happened, I would have been able to cancel the service within the 7 days of placing and that would have meant I would be within the compulsory 7 day cooling off period that BT has to offer customers who sign up online (the 7 days starts from the day you place the order) - so rather convenient for BT that they don't actually let you use the service until 7 days has passed!!!!!

I don't know whether the original sales person was getting paid a commission based on the number of people she signs up and so was motivated to deliberately mislead me, or whether she was just badly trained, but if I had checked these forums before believing the BT sales pitch, then I could have saved myself a lot of time and stress (and potentially a lot of money). This is quickly turning into a nightmare and I am beginning to wish I had just stuck with Virgin Media or called Sky!

I have submitted an official complaint, so hopefully I can reach a solution with BT without going to the Ombudsman - and if I do, I will definitely post here. But in the mean time, I would advise anyone considering BT's services to order online only after reading all the fine print! Or even better, consider a more reputable provider, with higher levels of integrity - such as Virgin Media, with whom I have had only good experiences in the 3 years I was a customer of theirs.

Please reply to this post if you have had a similar issue with BT - and let me know what the outcome was.

Thanks

Mark_In_Hampshire

BT Vision isn't really a Virgin Media cable TV alternative. That said, they do seem to be ploughing some cash into it, so I'm sure the range of things will improve.

I can't offer any advice with the contractual issues, however, it can take up to 10 days for the broadband speed to "settle" - during that time the equipment at the exchange is trying to determine what speed can be put down the phone line and remain stable. So it tends to be intermittent during that time.

If however it turns out that after the running in period, the connection is too slow for BT Vision (I think it needs 1.5Mbps) I don't see that they have any alternative but to refund, since they have supplied something which simply won't work if the broadband is too slow. And nobody including BT knows for certain whether it will be quick enough or not until you try.