Mis Sold BT infinity

s4nup

Hi
Wondering if someone could lend some advice...

Last year i was with O2 broadband, who were giving me a great service. I was on a consistent 8.5mb connection, with hardly any downtime and no issues (1 issue ever raised was they were port blocking my VPN, and within 2 days, thay had unblocked it).

In July I received a Cold call from BT asking if i wanted to move. They advised that they had a special offer of 3 months discounted broadband and an unlimited plan for £25. I was paying O2 £15 so i said no initially, however they countered that it was scheduled that in 3 months (Septemberish) BT Infinity would be rolled out in my area, and that i could upgrade to that with no additional charges when it rolled out. To me this was the deal clincher. I questioned them a few times and they said it would be in september and was on their map. I checked the website and it confirmed on the telephone number checker AND on the interactive map for Sept 2011. Great.

I signed up, cancelled my BB with O2 and jumped ship.

I experienced a few problems with BT with speed issues (where it had dropped 2 months after the "training period" to 210kbps!!
This was resolved, but I was left with a 5mb connection at best. There seemed nothing i could do, and i've just lived with it (i guess i'm fortunate, there are people that just about get a 1mb connection!)

anyway back to the saga with infinity. end of september came and went...checked online...the date had changed to November. Rang BT and they said, these things happen and its been moved because of issues out of their control. I didn't kick up a fuss, I could see the end in sight. November came and went, date changed to december. same story from bt. In February I rang BT to find out if they had a date and it was confirmed at the end of march (the guy went and spoke to someone in provisioning). Great i thought...1 more month.

Yesterday, i rang bt and it was confirmed that my area had been activated in September, and there were people in my area (Hatch End) that were on Fibre, Unfortunately the cabinet that my line goes to was not upgraded and there are now no plans to upgrade it yet. no-one knows if or when it will be and i'm now stuck in a 18month contract (due to end on December 22nd) for a service that i am paying more for on a slower download speed.

I rang BT to voice my frustrations and they said that to cancel my contract i would have to fork out £200 to teminate early.

Is there anything i can do. who else can i speak to?

sorry for the essay, wanted to present the full situation.

thanks

spike7451

They don't actually 'upgrade' the cabinet your existing phoneline connects to as such apart from fitting a new Krone bank.
They site a new cabinet where the fibre optic cable connects into next to your existing cabinet & run a jumper wire from your connection to the new 'E' side krone bank in your cabinet,the krone strip connects thru to the new cabinet via a copper multi pair drop cable.
BT told me I have Infinity in my area as well,but to date,the only Infinity cabinets are in the town itself..

s4nup

spike7451 wrote: »

They don't actually 'upgrade' the cabinet your existing phoneline connects to as such apart from fitting a new Krone bank.
They site a new cabinet where the fibre optic cable connects into next to your existing cabinet & run a jumper wire from your connection to the new 'E' side krone bank in your cabinet,the krone strip connects thru to the new cabinet via a copper multi pair drop cable.
BT told me I have Infinity in my area as well,but to date,the only Infinity cabinets are in the town itself..

Yes, this i understand...didn't clarify in my post. Either way they are not plonking another Krone bank near the cabinet in the near future...do i have grounds to cancel my contract early or am i being hopeful?

spike7451

s4nup wrote: »

Yes, this i understand...didn't clarify in my post. Either way they are not plonking another Krone bank near the cabinet in the near future...do i have grounds to cancel my contract early or am i being hopeful?

I'd say yes as you signed up for Infinity & got something not ordered,added to they didn't tell you it wasn't available.It'd be a bit like buying a Mercedes & ending up with a Ford...I take it they (bt) didn't come & fit some new kit to your master socket in your home when/before it was activated?...

visidigi

s4nup wrote: »

Yes, this i understand...didn't clarify in my post. Either way they are not plonking another Krone bank near the cabinet in the near future...do i have grounds to cancel my contract early or am i being hopeful?

got what they said originally in writing?

s4nup

spike7451 wrote: »

I'd say yes as you signed up for Infinity & got something not ordered,added to they didn't tell you it wasn't available.It'd be a bit like buying a Mercedes & ending up with a Ford...I take it they (bt) didn't come & fit some new kit to your master socket in your home when/before it was activated?...

Not on initial install. they said that that would all happen when (not if!) the infinity installation would take place. I've spoken to customer services and they are not budging...keep spouting the £200 that i will owe them. who should i speak to / escalate this to?

Thanks

s4nup

This is the problem...its all done over the phone...i may have "chat" transcripts somewhere (i usually save them) but i'm not sure if on this ocassion this was initially done via chat...

s4nup

i'm sure this is one of the occasions that they would be able to use the "recorded" conversations that they use for "training and quality" purposes?

System

The next problem is that two independent parts of the BT group are involved. BT Retail would be selling you the broadband but Openreach are responsible for the policy & installation of FTTC.

BT Retail are a customer of Openreach and do not dictate what Openreach do.

The sales rep should really have put a caveat on the sale of Infinity because he can not guarantee what a third party (Openreach) would do

s4nup

!!!!!! wrote: »

The next problem is that two independent parts of the BT group are involved. BT Retail would be selling you the broadband but Openreach are responsible for the policy & installation of FTTC.

BT Retail are a customer of Openreach and do not dictate what Openreach do.

The sales rep should really have put a caveat on the sale of Infinity because he can not guarantee what a third party (Openreach) would do

This i agree with, and its only because i've been investigating this thoroughly that i now know the relationship between openreach and retail.
General Joe Public is obviously not aware that there are all these entities that need to speak to each other, and it seems that as long as BT are getting sales (by promising things such as fibre connections) then theyre fine with that.

i'm not sure who to speak to, to resolve this as customer services just keep saying "£200 please!"

spike7451

Put your phone number into the link below & it'll tell you if Infinity's available;

https://www.btwholesale.com/pages/static/Community/Broadband_Community/Coverage/ADSL_Availibility_Checker.html#

OP,How much are you paying BT for your broadband compared to the normal broadband that they have supplied you?...I'd be mightily pished if I was paying for a service I wasn't getting & over the odds for the service I am getting...