BT Broadband Problems

Dave2012_2

Hello, I see on a few people have had issues with BT's customer 'services.' I've tried to get option 2 phone and broadband with little success. They've managed to give us phone but not broadband (although we have received the modem). Their call centre is, well, let's just say it is lacking organisation, internal communication, and anyone willing to take responsibility for a problem.

My general question is, what are people's experiences with delays to activating their broadband relative to the date when BT said it would be activated?

Briefly, this has been my experience:
*Nov 18th: order placed, activation due Nov. 24th
*Nov 25th: No phone, no BB, but modem arrived. Called CS, apparently they cancelled our order because we didn't reply to an email sent to our BT account which they had not activated . Re-ordered due to activate Dec. 4th
*Dec 4th: Phone but no BB. Called CS. Was told BB would be on by 8.15pm. It wasn't. Called again. Told it would def be on within 24h.
*Dec 5th: No BB. Called again. Passed through three departments before being put on hold for 20minutes and then cut-off.
:mad:
*Dec 6th, 9am: Called again. Was told engineer was assigned and would ring me shortly. No-one called.
*Dec 6th, 3pm: Called again. Was told BB would be on in 24h but no guarantee. Not satisfied - been told this too much already. Called back, asked to speak to manager to lodge complaint but instead put through to BB support who put me on hold for 20minutes and then cut me off.
:mad::mad:

I'd like to stress I have been nothing if not courteous and polite and didn't once lose my temper. Having been on the dark side myself I don't believe that ever gets you anywhere. So now I've sent an extended version of the above via their web-based complaints form and tagged 3 demands on the end essentially: (1) want a cast-iron activation date (2) want a named person to talk to at BT who won't shirk responsibility (3) written apology and threatened further action upon failure to comply.

It amuses me that in the BT BB troubleshooting it says wait until 8pm to call the helpline but when you do all you get is passed around, put on hold and eventually told to call back tomorrow because they can't do anything.

It's not like we can dump them and go with anyone else either (I think, but PLEASE tell me if I'm wrong!) as we didn't have a telephone account to start with (necessary to switch to talktalk etc.) and our lease states we are not allowed to make alterations to the exterior of the building (i.e. put a cable box/sat dish on the wall).

Any suggestions? I've given up hope of trying to reach anyone on the phone who will actually do anything.

Finally, I know there are one or two good call centres out there, but the whole BT system is fundamentally flawed. Apparently no-one there is empowered to do anything, and certainly won't sort an issue out cross-departments. Jobs/calls are always brushed off to other places who (in two instances wth me) ended up being sent back to the same person that I originally spoke to!

Here's a thought - let's ban all call centres and re-employ the staff in magical places called 'shops' where they can deal with people one-to-one and are allowed to take some responsibility.

Thankyou for you time, suggestions, and calming thoughts
Dave

merlinormartin

Hi Dave i'am sorry to hear about the treatment you have recieved from BT firstly id like to say iv been with BT for the past 4 years and have never had any problems . within this time they changed my service to a new address (hassle free) and refunded some money because my connection was lost for a few days.
If i was in your sistuation i make an official complaint to BT
http://bt.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/bt.cfg/php/enduser/cci/bt_afdpage.php?p_sid=N5q8ACoi&cat_lvl1=770&p_cv=1.770&p_cats=770

If that fails to get results i would take your complaint to the office and telecomuncations onbudsman
http://www.otelo.org.uk/content.php?pageID=100

good luck!

Dave2012_2

Hi, thanks for the reply!
I figured I was probably being unlucky. The broadband came on late last night, so the tech issue's resolved.:beer:

I did lodge an official complaint that was principally about the customer service experience. It just really gets to me when I get the impression I'm being brushed off or messed around, and cutting me off is just out of order. I can accept once being a mistake.... all as outlined above. Anyway, if they were having difficulties setting up the line all they had to do was pick up the phone and call me, I'd have understood and been fine with it!:rolleyes:

Still, we finally got broadband at full speed. Weirdly, we didn't get the free anti-virus/spyware etc. that's supposed to come with option 2. I couldn't find an option to download it on the website they say to download from. I may have missed it, did yours come with it on CD?
I'm not too fussed about that though because I've installed spybot/ad-aware/AVG/zonealarm in the meantime.

Cheers,
Dave