TalkTalk Customer Poll

MSE_Martin

TalkTalk’s broadband package is a clear winner on price (see Cheapest Home Phones article) yet when it launched 18 months ago, it hit the headlines by not being able to deliver in terms of good customer service. Since then however, feedback has improved (see previous TalkTalk poll).

So, how do you rate it now? Which of the above choices is closest to your view?

This is a poll to gauge the standard of customer service given by TalkTalk; please only vote if you are an existing customer.

MrsTinks

Slightly late activating the BB but ok they prewarned us about that.
Later we had connection problems, then phone died completely, then more connection problems and utterly useless tech support. I have never in my life had to suffer the lack of competence I did when speaking to the indian call centres. Trying to make them understand the problem was with THEIR equipment NOT my router or my computer/laptops... ARGH!!!
Left long before my 12 months were up. Now with Madasafish... not had ANY problems since! Fingers crossed!

Diane60

Ordered 1st August, landline switched within 10 days. No problems. BB router arrived but had to chase up for connection date. (18th Aug). Installed by my own geek nephew and have had no problems so far, customer services were helpful when contacted. Couldn't beleive how easy it was. Am i just lucky or is it too early to judge?

aytch

All went very smoothly, but luckily I had enough knowledge to utilise a wireless router when there settings / instructions were minimal. Unfortunately my local exchange is not yet able to give me the free broadband, but £10 a month is a good deal.:T

wishiwasarichgirl

i voted nightmare initially, as my broadband constantly cut out, spent about 2 hrs on the phone to them, they sent me 3 different modems for everytime i spoke to one of the terrible scripted indian call centres. eventually spoke to tech support in scotland, nice bloke sorted it all out in about 10 mins, had absolutely no probs since (joined 1 year ago) And it's cheap! :j

agrawaldeepak

I was given the offer of Broadband at Sainsbury. I told the representative that my 1 yr contract with Toucan is still not finished. The rep said nobody can bind you on a contract for more than 3 month and got me to signed the deal.

Toucan charged me £70 as early cancellation and when I call TalkTalk, they keep transferring me and I have to hold and repeat whole story again and again and have to hang up at last.

They stopped updating my online statement from june and whenever I call them, they say they cant access my account and they will let me know later. But they never call back.

I have sent a last email to them, if they wont do anything, I am going to report it to Ofcom.

--Tony--

6 months of problems with my calling features, packs of LIES from the Indian call centre:

"I will investigate and call you back" - Never happens
"I will escalate and get a supervisor to call" - Never happens
"I will raise a complaint" Never happens, no record

I can't even make them raise a complaint, you really wont get any worse service when things go wrong, they just don't know what to do!

I have spent literally hundreds of hours trying to resolve my problems.

Their normal solution is to turn of all my services and reset them which has been done dozens of time and never solves the problem but normally ends up with me having no broadband and no phone line for 2-4 hours without warning.

Dont touch them!

jeffdavies

Initial problems (Spring 2007) with first of all a constant ringing sound on the phone instead of pulsating, then no phone, then no broadband. So, in desperation, I emailed the head guy, Charles Dunstone who fair play replied personally to me within a few hours 'on a weekend' and sorted the matter out the next day, on a Sunday when normally, no one works!!!
A special Network team was dispatched to the exchange in Llanelli, Wales on a Sunday...They discovered a faulty network switch and replaced it with an hour...Can't fault that really!

Now, I just get the occasional dropped connections which are always remedied by re booting the router. All in all, a great package and a brilliant price. I keep getting phone calls and letters from BT asking me to come back to them when my 18 month contract ends but hey, as usual, they are only prepared to give 'little' incentives and do not go 'all the way' as TalkTalk have done. I mean, I phone Romania and other countries regularly and it's free, can't see BT offering that sort of service!!!

Talktalk have taken a massive gamble and now, it seems to be paying off. I wish them the best of luck, long may they remain in business:-)

fluffyduck_3

Awful initial experience. Modem came without the software and I had to repeatedly ask them to send it. When it eventually came there were continuous problems in setting the broadband up. The Indian call centre was next to useless - often difficult to understand and after providing me with an "answer" to the problem left me to get on with it. Each time this "answer" didn't work and I would have to recontact them . I then had to go through the whole rigmarole again - they obviously have a set list of steps that, in theory, ensure that the set-up occurs and no matter how many time you call them they insist on going through every step again - even if you inform them that you have already done so several times without success. Eventually it got though to them that they were being no help and agreed to get the British tech support people to contact me - which they did and within a reasonable period the problem was worked out and the Broadband became opaerational.
Since then the system has generally worked well and I'm more than happy with it.
However, with growing frequency, I've found that I have periods when I cannot access Talk Talk at all - the connection will goes as far as the "verification stage" and then states that the connection cannot be made. It will then be several hours (often well over 24) before I can access the Internet and my E-mails. I contacted Talk Talk who claimed that the problem lay with me - lack of filters, the phone connections with my home or a virus are the suggested reasons for the problem and they gave instructions to follow. I followed them to the letter but none of these suggested reasons for the problem proved valid. It appears to me that this is a problem at their end (oversubscription and overuse at certain times?) as the problem occurs on an irregular basis whilst at other times the service works perfectly. Friends who also have Talk Talk also seem to experience this problem. I don't know if subscribers with other Broadband suppliers suffer this problem.
All in all, however, though extremely irritating I am learning to live with the problem.

MarkyMarkD

It was a bit slow to get the broadband switched over, but once working it's been pretty good.

To summarise:

(1) It's very cheap.
(2) The broadband's very fast compared to what I was used to, and paying more for.
(3) BUT the broadband disconnects a LOT more than I'm used to - say two or three times in 24 hours, and then sometimes takes a minute to reconnect.
(4) And the phone call quality is pretty poor - lots of background type noises.

For me, the cost savings more than justify the issues raised.

andy_roobarb

FluffyDuck, your experience sounds exactly like mine with Virgin. Slow or non-existent connections at busy times. Customer services insisting it was an equipment problem. I finally got round to switching to a decent ISP (Zen) and have 10 times the speed and no connection problems since (except a few which /were/ caused by my router, easily cured by unplugging it and plugging it in again)
Don't learn to live with the problem. Pay that bit extra to take the stress out of your life. Whether you choose Zen or Madasafish as recommended above, decent support and uptime is worth the extra. Really.