Origin Broadband - any good

Mister_G

I joined them in September last year on a negotiated fixed upfront 18 month deal that was unbeatable at the time. The changeover from Plusnet was overnight, so no downtime at all.

So far they have been fine. I'm on their 38Mb fibre service and its been totally reliable with no throttling or speed reduction at any time. I had to contact them once in the early days, and the phone was answered within a couple of rings.

However, looking at this forum, there now appears to be a few people who have not had such a good experience. I suspect that, like Plusnet, they may be becoming a victim of their own success.

anneliese123

I am currently with Talk Talk , they are not brilliant for Customer Service , doesn't seem Origin are much better by majority of comments , who do you go to ?

Mister_G

I think that it's probably true what many others have said on here - you get what you pay for!

The likes of A&A and Zen are good, but relatively expensive.

frank777

topcashback.co.uk are paying £40.25 cashback for joining Origin Broadband - Line + Broadband Product - via their website subject to terms and conditions

anneliese123

Thank you for that

Donotdealwithorigin

Hi, I'm new to the forum and my username has been inspired by my experience with this company and the fact that their deals are being highlighted as "good value" by MSE.

I tried to give the link to the broadband page on MSE, but as I'm new, I'm not allowed to make a link to the place that runs this.

If it was a one-off piece of poor service, I'm not one to moan on forums, however from signing up these people have been frankly the worst company I have ever dealt with. From the start, all I got was a payment receipt, no contract or details, so I rang up and was flippantly told not to worry, it would "turn up". Still nothing and despite another couple of calls, no joy, so I cancelled by email (you can only send a message on their homepage and you DON'T get sent a copy, so they are free to deny all knowledge of your contact, copy and paste for your records, beware). The on-line chat function has been completely ignored too every time I tried to use it. In my message, I asked to cancel in the statutory period but asked that service be continued until I moved. By this time the service was set up and kept falling over and giving speeds of 10% of advertised. Constant calls to the technical team to be told to constantly reset the modem, to re-install it etc etc all whilst there was obviously a problem. Every time I asked to be transferred to customer services, the phone wasn't answered. The line would not test on the BT Wholesale site and it directs you to approach your ISP, Origin as there was a problem. Finally, with nothing back on my cancellation and constant problems, I emailed the Chief Exec oliver.bryssau@origin-broadband.co.uk.

From the email, someone rang me stating that Mr Bryssau had asked them to ring to discuss the issues. I stated that I had cancelled in the cooling off period and at first the man on the phone denied that they had received this, but later in the call told me exactly what date I had emailed in, which is completely disingenuous. Despite his offer to resolve the issues and get a named manager from the Technical Dept, put everything on an email to me with contact numbers for him, a phone call from him subsequently to check all sorted out, I said he can fix things as I have paid for service but I still wanted to cancel because of no faith nor trust in Origin. Surprise surprise, he never called back, the man from Technical didn't ring but someone else did who seemed to know nothing of the issues and didn't deal with anything, except send an engineer round with 2 hours notice when I wasn't in. But guess what, the "Welcome to Origin" email showed up, over six weeks after I cancelled. What a joke.

So despite two more emails to Mr Bryssau, nothing resolved with them, so I moved to Plusnet, advising Origin what I was doing and I had cancelled in the cooling off notice etc etc. Again, nothing. On receiving a bill after I left, I finally got through to customer services after a half hour wait and spoke to someone who recited the company mantra to not let me leave unless I paid silly amounts of money, putting me on hold for 10 minutes every time he went to check on something that was right in front of him. I complained and was put through to "Mac", a manager, who then stated that I had to ring and speak to someone to cancel, I asked where that was in the T&Cs of a contract that I only received 2 months after I signed up. He couldn't answer, surprisingly! Anyhow that was two weeks or more ago and despite a 48 hour promise of resolving this and speaking to the Chief Exec, I stand ignored again and am awaiting the letter telling me I haven't paid.

So, if you want to deal with these very shady people, an organisation rotten from the top to the bottom, who might just end up tarnishing your credit rating, will waste a great deal of your time, not provide even a fraction of what might be called Fibre Broadband, customer service or have any sense of living up to their promises, I wish you luck, you're going to need it.

[Deleted User]

I asked them about a usage monitor and they never responded (chat via their website). Also never responded via Twitter. As a new customer you would think that they would be interested in attracting new business obviously not.

teddysmum

Sending an email via a company's website does not always work and that is why I tend not to use them.

Sometimes you get a message saying that the email could not be sent , but there have been a few instances where I have 'sent' one of these messages and the company did not receive it. ( There was no need for them to pretend not to receive the message, as it was an enquiry about a product.)

bristolleedsfan

frank777 wrote: »

topcashback.co.uk are paying £40.25 cashback for joining Origin Broadband - Line + Broadband Product - via their website subject to terms and conditions

Mine was rejected 4 Months after paying 12 Months upfront

Donotdealwithorigin

Hi teddysmum,

If they don't give an email contact, don't answer the customer service phone and don't hook up on the instant chat, that's the only option you have. I understand it's not usually the best option by far, however to deny receiving the message and then quote me the date I sent it later in the call when all I said was it was sent in the cooling off period.....? Why would they lie? (He says, tongue firmly in cheek)

The only person you can directly email and get a record is the Chief Exec and I would encourage everyone who is at odds with Origin to use it.