Talktalk Engineer fine for changing time & nightmare

kodakfish

Some may not agree but I think it's abysmal. For the last few weeks. have had intermittent connection drops and reducing speed along with interference on phone calls. I ran multiple system checks via talktalk website - which resulted in the message no fault - check home set up click this link [I had already gone through all standard checks/fixes]. No link to contact CS. Finally got fed up and used their contact us form. Since then no further contact until today. about 9:50 am I got text to say engineer booked for date and time agreed 11:14 I received a text saying I had an email with the details.
SWtrange thing is with poor internet connection the email didn't get to me till about 13:30 - engineer booked for 8-13 tomorrow. If I wasn't about they would fine me £65, but I could change it as long as I contacted them 1 working day in advance. So I rang [as my partner is do to have cancer tests in hospital tomorrow and is supposed to be shielding].
I was informed repeatedly that I was too late and was aware that changes had to be made by 12pm the day before and it could only be changed if I agreed to pay the £65 fine. I was told I had agreed to the appointment so I was responsible. I gave up. But thought I'd tried twitter. here I was told the same thing [CS seems to have been hobbled by head office ]. On twitter the cs agent told me that even though the system sent me in a loop [without any contact options], it had been picked up in back office and a fault identified. Apparently it is SOP in this case to book an engineer with no input from customer. Allegedly this speeds up the repair as people  are always at home and no one works or has appointments. So have an option pay £65 OR cancel Oncology appointment. How is it legal to apply a penalty/fine when insufficient notice given? I didn't even know I had entered in to a contract to have an engineer visit. Yes I do want my connection fixed [ probably again due to crumbling cables]

PennyForThem_2

Your partner's health is more important,I would have thought.  Cancel the appointment but write a formal letter of complaint setting out clearly with times and dates and names if possible what occurred.  Your complaint is (I think) that it is SOP to book a time for engineer visit if a fault is identified without consulting customer first.  

iniltous

If the ‘engineer’ was an Openreach engineer, before the ISP ( TT,BT,Sky etc) can book the OR visit they have to confirm awareness of potential charges , and if they don’t agree to this potential, then an engineer visit isn’t arranged , this shouldn't be done by just sending a text , as there is no way to know if the conditions have been accepted.
Was the ‘engineer’ going to be an OR one, as TT also use their own ‘bright spark’ type contractors and can pretty much use whatever processes they like, but it seems dodgy that they can sent a communication just before the appointment stating if the date/time is  no good , cancel it before a deadline, when that deadline is already past, again the problem doing it by text, email or letter is the ISP may know when they sent it but don’t know when you read it.
As already said , challenge the charge they may waive it, but TBH ,if it was going to be TT and not OR that was cancelled,  they only check inside your house, if the problem is external then OR are needed anyway, and if it’s ‘internal’ then why haven’t you looked at those things yourself ?, if it’s external problem , then you shouldn’t be charged anyway , (although your charge is not for being home to let them in) but if it’s external ( and OR ) they may not even need to visit your home, simply fixing the external problem wherever it is , externally , not needing for you to even be home, although TBF, if OR give an appointment it’s expected for you to be in, just in case they do need access.
Did you ever do the checks to eliminate any internal issues and effectively prove the fault to the external Openreach network ?