No O2 service for a month (Advice needed)

OhItsTroy

Hi all, this is a long story so please bear with me. I need some advice as to what I am entitled to as a consumer. Thank you in advance for your time!

I had been on a pay monthly sim contract until the end of August with O2. At the end of August I purchased a new O2 pay monthly contract through a 3rd party. Upon receiving the new phone I contacted O2 to migrate my existing number to the new contract.

The following day, after realising the number had not migrated over I phoned O2 (I still had service at this point). They told me there was a technical issue on their end where both numbers were still in service, and that this would be resolved by their engineers as a matter of urgency within the next few days. The following day I lost service completely (unable to use data, receive/make calls or texts and in the left corner showing "Emergency calls only".

I waited a number of days to see whether the issue would fix itself, resetting my phone etc with no success.

I received an email on 7th Sept saying "We’re still looking into it and are sorry it's not been sorted yet. We're doing our best and will be back in touch soon with an update. Thank you for bearing with us."

Because I can't do anything from my phone, on (roughly) 10th Sept I resort to contacting them via live chat while on my lunch hour at work (this is frustrating in itself as it takes around 30mins to actually get to the right department in the first place). I was told to restart my phone and make sure my sim card was the right way round etc. Didn't get anywhere within the hour lunch break I had.

12th Sept - Get through to a supervisor after 40 mins on live chat again and make it clear I want to make a complaint due to this ongoing issue. They advise me they will need my sim card number to further help me with this and offer September's bill for free as compensation (to which I was happy with at the time).

Around 14th Sept - Contacted O2 again through live chat. Gave them my sim card number and confirmed my sim card did not work in another phone. Told they would pass to a core engineer to look into, and be in contact with me next week.

20th Sept - Contact again via Live Chat and request an update. Part of the transcript from the chat:
O2: This is with our back office team as services on the number have been requested to be reprovisioned so the number can be refreshed on the network. There were some provisioning errors. This has been sent to the team today who will reprovison the number and we shall then retest with yourself.
TROY: When will all that be done by? And how will you retest with me if you can't get hold of me?
O2: We have an alternative number on the Incident XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX290?
TROY: That was the temporary number on my new sim
TROY: I am uncontactable due to this issue which is why it is such a problem
O2: Unsure how long it would take it as it has been sent to be reprovisioned today. once done a reboot of the device would be needed.
I then supply them with a different contact number and confirm that the engineers work on weekends.

25th Sept - I chase again as I STILL have had no contact from O2. See below for partial transcript:
O2: Thanks again for your patience- I have looked at the case which is hand with the support teams to rectify this issue for you- I do apologise for the delay. I have placed an urgent chase on this for you.
TROY: Thank you do you know the time frame for this
O2: Unfortunately we don't have a timeframe but the case is up for review tomorrow, if we have further updates then we will certainly let you know.

26th Sept - I call O2 as I'm still yet to have an update. I'm promised a call back tomorrow and offered October's bill as compensation. I make it clear I'll accept that initially but once this is over I want to know how they plan on compensating me for the inconvenience.

27th Sept - They try calling my partners phone while she is at work so leave a voicemail and advise they will try calling again on Sunday.

30th Sept - I'm back on live chat to them, see below:
O2: Someone tried calling on 27/09/19 and then again today but on both occasions they couldn't get through on both numbers XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX061 - XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX543
O2: As no contact was made on 2 separate occasions the case has now been closed.
O2: Troy I can re raise another case for you and then advise them of the case that has been closed so we can continue investigating the fault.
TROY: I don't know why people keep closing the case when the matter isn't resolved. What was the update they were planning on telling me?
O2: We got a response from our team that the fault should now be resolved. We sent you a resolution sms message and I can see you replied back advising the fault is not fixed. We then have to call you to discuss the fault further
O2: unfortunately we couldn't get through to you
TROY: Well they were never going to get through on XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX061 because the whole issue is that I dont have service on my phone
I'm then told it will be up to another 5 working days before I get an update.

1st Oct - I phone O2 again. For the first time I think I'm speaking to someone who actually cares and wants to take ownership over the issue. Confirms the old incident was closed as they couldn't contact me and said to expect a call back from him within the next 5 days as jt was being sent back over to the engineers.

8th Oct - I give them as much opportunity as possible to contact me before close of business today. Call them at 20:50 and request an update, mention I was expecting one on Sunday at the latest. The advisor tells me someone will give me a call tomorrow. I tell him that I no longer trust that anything will happen due to constant broken deadlines and that this is an issue that has been going on for over a month and request to speak to a manager. I'm then left on hold for 15 mins before the call is disconnected on their side and no longer able to call back as the lines closed.

If you are still reading this then thank you so much for taking the time.
My questions are these; a) there does not seem to have been a complaint procedure followed as I never received a formal response despite making it clear I wanted to raise one - is this normal? what kind of compensation should I reasonably expect/accept?

TLDR: No service for a month. Poor communication and broken deadlines. Need further advice on how to proceed.

Many thanks :mad:

DUTR

OhItsTroy wrote: »

Hi all, this is a long story so please bear with me. I need some advice as to what I am entitled to as a consumer. Thank you in advance for your time!

[snip]

If you are still reading this then thank you so much for taking the time.
My questions are these; a) there does not seem to have been a complaint procedure followed as I never received a formal response despite making it clear I wanted to raise one - is this normal? what kind of compensation should I reasonably expect/accept?

TLDR: No service for a month. Poor communication and broken deadlines. Need further advice on how to proceed.

Many thanks :mad:

Compensation? 1/30th of the monthly tariff per day of the contract tariff.

OhItsTroy

DUTR wrote: »

Compensation? 1/30th of the monthly tariff per day of the contract tariff.

I hardly think a refund is adequate in these circumstances

stragglebod

Why ever not?

JJ_Egan

Ask for £30 for inconveniance .
Want more then quantify your actual losses .

macman

You may feel that way, but there is no SLA on a consumer mobile contract, so a credit for the downtime is all they need to offer you. You might get a small credit on a goodwill basis if you ask nicely, but no more than say £20.
If you have suffered actual material loss as a result of the loss of service, then you need to quantify it. But, since you are asking 'how much should I expect', that rather indicates that you haven't.

mobilejunkie

I've had a couple of compensation payments without asking and for a less drastic loss of use. I didn't have to ask - they offered and it was a fair amount (though hasn't solved the actual issues, which they have been extremely poor at doing.

Wait and see when they deal with your complaint, once made. I wouldn't specify an amount.