Engineer fee if I cancel after cooling off period?

wheatie1986

Hey everyone

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can offer - long time reader, first time poster :j

I came home last night to find that my Sky telephone had no dial tone, and as a direct result, no internet. I spent a long time on the phone to Sky this morning to find out I have to have an engineer come over and take a look. Because I am “out of contract” they wanted to charge me £49.95 for the privilege of taking a day off work for an engineer to fix their problem…. However, if I re-contracted for 12 months, I’d get the visit for free (whoopee!)

I felt really uncomfortable renewing over the phone, as it felt I was being “tricked” into doing so, to avoid the charge. As I’ve used MSE for a few other things, I knew about the cooling-off period, and have had it confirmed I am indeed entitled to a 31 day cooling-off period.

Therefore, my question is: Can I have the engineer come over, fix the problem, and then cancel the new 12 month contract? Or, will Sky then charge me for the engineer fee?

Marcio45

Try to ring again a couple more times as a different advisor might agree to something different. If they dont change their tone tell them you want to cancel because they are not supplying you with a service. The fee you pay monthly should include the maintenance of the phone line. If the problem ends up being on your premises you might then be charged.

Enterprise_1701C

If it is a line fault then they should call out the supplier to sort it out, in this case the line supplier will be BT. Unfortunately you have to go through Sky to get it done, ring again on the fault line and report it as a fault. It will be BT that fixes it.

To check if it is a line fault, assuming you have a "split" master socket, unscrew the base of the socket and VERY carefully remove it by pulling it, inside is a test socket. Plug your phone into that and see if there is a dial tone, if there is not then it is a line fault, if there is then it is an internal wiring fault. If it is a line fault then if it was purely a BT line then there would be no charge. I suspect sky just thought they would try to pressure you to renew.

Apologies if I am wrong, I know BT procedure but not sky.

teddysmum

Have they done a line test from their end ?

iniltous

Sounds like sharp practice , if your phone line is faulty and the fault is on Openreach's side of the master socket the repair is 'free' by OR but obviously until Sky ask OR to check, OR don't know about your problem, ..sounds like what you have been offered is a Sky engineer visit to check and if faulty on what Openreach are responsible for , they will 'pass' the fault onto Openreach, Sky are trying to get you to recommit to a new minimum term or pay £50 for the Sky engineer to do what you can easily do yourself, prove the fault 'inside' or 'outside' your home.
Find your master socket and remove the bottom section to reveal the test socket, plug a known working phone in here, if you have dial tone and can make calls the problem is within your home and not OR's problem so it's then up to you to either use Sky to fix the internal problem, (pay £50, or renew contract) or fix it yourself , or use someone other than Sky like an independent 'engineer'
If you have no dial tone at the test point, call Sky, tell them that you have no dial tone at the test point and you want them to get OR to look at the problem
If you use Sky to localise the problem for you , either internal ( your problem) or external (OR problem) then yes they will hold you to term if you take the 'free' Sky visit, they will say you had a service valued at £50 for free in return for renewing your minimum term
So in summary, Sky have not reported your problem to OR , are in effect going to charge you ( either money or contract renewal ) for checking at the demarcation point between you and Openreach, if the fault is 'outside' then they will pass it to OR, and this is something that is 'free' and something you could do yourself..

wheatie1986

Hi all

Thanks so much for all of your responses, it's really helpful! We tested the test socket on the initial call, and there was no dial tone - so I'm sure that the fault is their end. Furthermore, they have said that it is indeed an Openreach engineer coming out to look at the problem, so I'm sure they're passing on the cost to me. At the moment, I have (begrudgingly!) re-contracted, though I fully intend to cancel during my cooling off period. My only "fear" is that I will then be stung with the £50 fee - which I totally agree, I don't think I should be paying for anyway...

The engineer is coming over tomorrow, so fingers crossed!