EE phone network useless for a year

acarter1970

Hello.

So my phone network has not been working properly for a year. Contacted provider EE multiple times and have about twenty call recordings from customer service reps who have each confirmed my account is not right. Voicemail not working. No service for weeks at a time. Keep having to reset it at their end. Multiple free boosts applied to account at the same time when there should only be one at a time. Cannot even port my number as they cannot give me a pac code.

It really is a joke. Even their investigations have not resulted in anything being done.

Now they just ignore me because they don't know what else to do.

I believe I can claim for damages as per the consumer rights act 2015, namely the digital content part of it as it relates to access to a network, as EE are liable for not having a fit for purpose operation and not doing anything to fix it for a year. Basically I can easily prove they are incompetent and liable.

I'd be claiming for missing trips trains etc as could not access my tickets, cost of phonecalls on Skype as could not access the network to make calls that way, lost opportunity when bank failed to contact me to check transactions on my account and left my card locked all weekend.

Wondering if anyone has any legal advice on the above course of action? Or is anyone has had similar issues with EE?

voluted

You would have a duty to mitigate your losses and I'm not sure you've done that (or done it very well.)

I'd be claiming for missing trips trains etc as could not access my tickets

There is free WiFi practically everywhere, and if you knew you were having issues, the sensible thing to do here would be to make sure you have the tickets on the device before you set off. Honestly, you'd be wise to make sure the tickets were on the device before you left even if you were not having issues. You never know.

cost of phonecalls on Skype as could not access the network to make calls that way

This seems fair enough, although personally, I'd perhaps have asked for a PAYG SIM that they could add credit to as and when needs be. Keeps you from having to try to claim back from them.

lost opportunity when bank failed to contact me to check transactions on my account and left my card locked all weekend.

I'm surprised the bank's fraud team isn't available at weekends. Even then, you could have easily missed their call and been out of luck anyway. You really need to have a backup for this eventuality. Cards can and do get locked, often without a call from the bank (in my experience with several of them.) What "opportunity" was lost here?

Have you tried approaching EE for some sort of compensation? If so have you escalated the complaint? This doesn't seem like a trivial issue and frankly even for trivial issues it is easier to give the customer some go-away money than it is to get into a protracted fight with them so I'd be very surprised if they've just given you the middle finger.

brianposter

Have you ever been told by EE that your connection is OK or has been fixed ?

PHK

acarter1970 said:

Hello.

So my phone network has not been working properly for a year. Contacted provider EE multiple times and have about twenty call recordings from customer service reps who have each confirmed my account is not right. Voicemail not working. No service for weeks at a time. Keep having to reset it at their end. Multiple free boosts applied to account at the same time when there should only be one at a time. Cannot even port my number as they cannot give me a pac code.

It really is a joke. Even their investigations have not resulted in anything being done.

Now they just ignore me because they don't know what else to do.

I believe I can claim for damages as per the consumer rights act 2015, namely the digital content part of it as it relates to access to a network, as EE are liable for not having a fit for purpose operation and not doing anything to fix it for a year. Basically I can easily prove they are incompetent and liable.

I'd be claiming for missing trips trains etc as could not access my tickets, cost of phonecalls on Skype as could not access the network to make calls that way, lost opportunity when bank failed to contact me to check transactions on my account and left my card locked all weekend.

Wondering if anyone has any legal advice on the above course of action? Or is anyone has had similar issues with EE?

You shouldn’t get legal advice from a public forum. It’s a discussion forum about consumer rights. 

Posters can offer their view of consumer rights but you shouldn’t rely on it. 

acarter1970

brianposter said:

Have you ever been told by EE that your connection is OK or has been fixed ?

Yes they said was fixed - it was not.

acarter1970

You shouldn’t get legal advice from a public forum. It’s a discussion forum about consumer rights. 

Posters can offer their view of consumer rights but you shouldn’t rely on it. 

I am much more looking for advice on my consumer rights.

acarter1970

voluted said:

You would have a duty to mitigate your losses and I'm not sure you've done that (or done it very well.)

I'd be claiming for missing trips trains etc as could not access my tickets

There is free WiFi practically everywhere, and if you knew you were having issues, the sensible thing to do here would be to make sure you have the tickets on the device before you set off. Honestly, you'd be wise to make sure the tickets were on the device before you left even if you were not having issues. You never know.

cost of phonecalls on Skype as could not access the network to make calls that way

This seems fair enough, although personally, I'd perhaps have asked for a PAYG SIM that they could add credit to as and when needs be. Keeps you from having to try to claim back from them.

lost opportunity when bank failed to contact me to check transactions on my account and left my card locked all weekend.

I'm surprised the bank's fraud team isn't available at weekends. Even then, you could have easily missed their call and been out of luck anyway. You really need to have a backup for this eventuality. Cards can and do get locked, often without a call from the bank (in my experience with several of them.) What "opportunity" was lost here?

Have you tried approaching EE for some sort of compensation? If so have you escalated the complaint? This doesn't seem like a trivial issue and frankly even for trivial issues it is easier to give the customer some go-away money than it is to get into a protracted fight with them so I'd be very surprised if they've just given you the middle finger.

I missed their call precisely because of no network access though. Nope their fraud team are not available Saturday night or early Sunday which is when this impacted me.

brianposter

acarter1970 said:

brianposter said:

Have you ever been told by EE that your connection is OK or has been fixed ?

Yes they said was fixed - it was not.

So that gives you a start date for "automatic compensation" which might prove useful in negotiations.

I had a problem with EE voicemail where my record on their computer system had to be amended, which took about an hour on the phone, so maybe your problem is simply finding someone who knows what to do. If phoning repeatedly does not find someone, a formal complaint or emailing Allison.Kirkby@bt.com should add some pressure.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

EE is owned by BT, if you Google CEO email and use the email contact there for BT you'll get a text to say someone will call and one of their higher levels of CS will contact you, they tend to be pretty good in terms of offering customer service. 

I'm not sure you can claim for train tickets as there must be a work around for that, what loss did you suffer with the bank card? Skype possibly but as someone else said pay as you go sim.

If you speak to BT I'd focus on getting any outstanding issues fixed and pushing for a bit of goodwill rather than focusing on the things mentioned