BT or Virgin - who's telling lies?

davidh71

Hi all,

A bit of a rant first to get to the point and make me feel better.

Last October we switched from BT to Virgin.

Virgin told us that they would arrange to take over the BT phone line, keeping our same number, and we would not have to do anything. This was a fairly painful process in itself as several new deadlines passed with no change, until eventually the BT line was dead and the number was on our Virgin line.

Fine - all sorted. Or at least that's what we thought.

Last month we recieved a bill from BT for the dead phone line with no phone number on it! We contacted them and they said there was a record of Virgin taking over the line, but they had not told them to cancel it so we still had to pay, even though the line was not active.

Naturally we contacted Virgin to complain and were told by them that there is an agreement with Ofcom between the major phone suppliers, under which BT should have cancelled the account.

OK - so another call to BT. This time though their story had changed completely. Now they were saying that they had no record of Virgin taking over the line or number and therefore we had always been with BT on the phone number. Despite telling them over and again that the BT phone line was dead and the new number worked on the Virgin line they just stuck to the same line in true 'Computer Says No' style.

On asking for Ofcoms contact details from BT I was told that they did not know them!
On asking to speak to a supervisor of Manager I was told that they had ALL gone home for the day at 5:55pm!

I send a written complaint in and this was fobbed off saying we should have contacted them ourselves, but not addressing the other problems or what Virgin had told us.

The next stage is obviously a complaint to Ofcom, but I am hoping someone more knowledgeable may be able to clear this up a little. Who should we believe - BT or Virgin!

We are no longer at the address as we moved not longer after switching the account (bad timing but was not foreseen!) which makes sorting this even harder.

Heinz

Ofcom do not deal with individual complaints. You will have to go through BT's complaints procedure and, eventually, get a 'deadlock' letter from them so that you can complain to Otelo.

macman

Was this a switch from BT to VM cable or to Virgin National (ADSL)?
If the former, then the new line installed is a cable line, it's not 'taken over' from BT.
Never ever rely on an incoming supplier to terminate your account with the outgoing supplier.

davidh71

Thank you. I presume Otelo is the link I found through the Ofcom site? I'm not sure whether what we have is classed as a Deadlock letter. We have a reply dismissing our complaint, stating that according to the terms of the account we should have notified them ourselves. However this contradicts Virgin as they are saying the agreement they have with Ofcom means the account should have been closed automatically.

Am a bit stuck between the two of them at the moment so feel Ofcom / Otelo is the only option.

davidh71

Was this a switch from BT to VM cable or to Virgin National (ADSL)?
If the former, then the new line installed is a cable line, it's not 'taken over' from BT.
Never ever rely on an incoming supplier to terminate your account with the outgoing supplier.

This may be the problem - it was a cable line. However Virgin took over the BT phone number and the BT line was dead at this time.

We were told on more than one occasion by Virgin that we did not have to do anything - they would cancel the BT account.