Is this BT charge unreasonable?

mrsyardbroom

BT have made a one off charge of £129.99 for an engineer to fix a problem with our phone. The first engioneer who came out thought he'd fixed the problem and it was outside the house. When the problem continued BT said it would cost £129.99 for an engineer to fix a problem inside the house but free if it was outside. I told them I couldn't afford to pay it but I would like an engineer to check the outside wiring again as it had previously been down to a fault outside our property. I kept telling them that I wouldn't be able to pay if the fault was inside.
The engineer that came checked outside and said everything was fine. When she wanted to check inside I said I couldn't afford the charge but she assured me I wouldn't have to pay. She found a fault in the original installation caused by a BT engineer. This was fixed, the phone was fine and the engineer said I wouldn't have to pay as it was their fault.
I have now discovered that BT has charged £129.99 for this call out and my monthly payments have doubled to pay for it. Any ideas as to what I can do? I can't get through to them on the phone and they don't ring back if I request a call back.

Enterprise_1701C

They always try to charge.

Do you have any extension sockets in the house, or do you have just one socket?

You say she found a fault, where was that fault? If it was a fault in an extension or internal cabling then it counts as chargeable

It is always worth remembering that if you have telecom problems that are not line problems, there are independent telecom engineer around that can deal with it.

mrsyardbroom

The fault was with the installation to the main socket. We do have an extension but the engineer said that in her opinion it was down to a faulty BT installation. She thought that when the phone was installed a cable was nicked and this later caused our problems. I did manage to contact BT via their online chat and they eventually rang me. They are going to get back to me within the next couple of days. The person who dealt with said he will escalate this as a complaint. He listened to the original call and said if he was the customer he would have been confused by the information given. He did say that the BT person dealing with the fault clearly said that I wouldn't be charged and that I had said I wouldn't be able to pay a call out charge. In his opinion BT were at fault so hopefully I'll get a refund.

AndyPK

No its not reasonable unless you have damaged the wiring/box
or the extension has caused the fault

boatman

BT's responsibility stops at the main master socket in your house, sounds like it was between outside and the master socket, in which case its their problem. Keep fighting, write to them:
https://bt.custhelp.com/app/contact_email/c/5642,5647

mrsyardbroom

I think that if I was told I wouldn't be charged and then I am charged that isn't reasonable whether the fault is inside or outside the house. The person I spoke to has evidence of the conversation so I'm hopeful of getting a refund.