BeFibre FlexiMonth – 2 month installation delay – can I expect compensation?

jc535

Hi all,

I began a FlexiMonth rolling monthly contract with no minimum term with BeFibre (150Mbps) in September. I chose BeFibre as they were the only provider offering no contract deals in my area. I am having some issues with the service.

I will explain in more detail below; however, in short, BeFibre have so far failed to install my equipment in my home and it has now been 59 days since I began my Agreement with them. I am wondering what my options are and so I now post here seeking advice. Please skip to the end if you do not wish to read my (unfortunately extensive) account of BeFibre’s failure to so far install my equipment.

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I began my Agreement with BeFibre on 3rd September 2024 and they promptly confirmed an install date of 13th September. Prior to the install date, a Fibre Heroes engineer called me to discuss the installation. He informed me that he had was at my address to survey it and had identified that work would need to be done by the civils team to route a duct from the pavement to my house, and thus my home installation appointment would need to be postponed. As it happened, this same engineer had been to survey my neighbour’s address the week before as they had also begun a similar contract with BeFibre. Since my house is surrounded by concrete unlike my neighbour’s house, the engineer suggested that both of our equipment be installed via my neighbour’s garden. My neighbour kindly agreed to this (verbally), and the engineer then informed me that he had made a written request for the civils team to do this.

I heard nothing more on the matter until I spoke to my neighbour on 20th September and I was told that the civils team had installed my neighbour’s duct under their garden, but there was no sign of mine. I called BeFibre the same day asking why my equipment had not been installed as planned and was told that they could not help, and that I would need to email the installations team. I emailed them as instructed and, other than a couple of emails from them saying that they would ‘ask the network for clarity’, I have to date received no satisfactory response from this department.

On 8th October, I received an email from a different department (the support team) telling me that they require permission for dig work on my property. I replied the same day, essentially repeating what I had said in my 20th September email about the original agreement to install via my neighbour’s garden. I received a response on 15th October saying that they have tried to reach out to my neighbour to obtain permission for me to use their garden but had not had a response, so they asked if I could speak with them. I spoke to my neighbour again on 17th October, and they told me that they were still happy for my equipment to be installed via their garden as planned and had sent an email to BeFibre confirming this, though no one had recently been in contact with them contrary to BeFibre’s claim. After several more phone calls and emails from my neighbour and me, on 18th October, BeFibre finally confirmed that they had my neighbour’s permission and that they had raised the matter with the network for a civil date.

On 22nd October, I received an unexpected visit from another Fibre Heroes engineer (not the civils team) who had arrived with all his gear hoping to install my home equipment. I had not been informed that any appointment had been scheduled. As with the previous engineer, he quickly discovered that civils work would be needed first. My neighbour was also present, and we informed the engineer that we had already agreed to carry out the work via my neighbour’s garden. The engineer, who had driven over an hour to get here, assured me that he would make some calls to get the civils team to set a date for the work as a priority.

I then heard nothing more until I called BeFibre again yesterday, 31st October. I discovered that they had still not raised this matter with the civils team. They assured me that would now do so and would update me as soon as possible.

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I would like to ask if anyone has been in a similar situation and if there is anything else I can do to expedite this installation. I seem to be going around in circles with BeFibre and only making progress extremely slowly, if at all. It appears that there are serious communication issues between departments, as demonstrated by the fact that a second engineer was sent to my address needlessly, with no prior warning. It is also very frustrating that BeFibre never seem to make progress using their own initiative; progress only seems to be made after I spend hours of my own time calling and writing to them and putting to the test the good favour of my neighbour after being forced to hassle them with requests for further permissions that BeFibre should already have had record of.

Also, should I have any expectation of compensation for this significant delay in service? To confirm, I am on a monthly contract and no money has as yet been taken from my account by BeFibre, so I fear that I might not have the same protections as those with fixed-term contracts. I am also aware that BeFibre are not in Ofcom’s automatic compensation scheme. However, my neighbour (fixed-term contract) has informed me that since they were also delayed (though not for as long as me), after requesting compensation they were awarded a few months’ broadband at a discounted cost.

I have not had any broadband for nearly 2 months now and so I am getting quite desperate for resolution. Any guidance in this matter would be very much appreciated. Thank you.

iniltous

If the provider isn’t a member of the Ofcom compensation scheme, then any offer will be discretionary , and obviously they are under no obligation to make an offer at all , I’m unfamiliar with this company, so they could be a network and ISP , basically they use only their own network, or may be a client on another company’s network ….obviously if they are a network and ISP , they can’t deflect blame to their supplier , but even if they use a third party network, the responsibility still rests with them if they are failing to supply what they promised.

TBH , the only real reason not to  be a member of the Ofcom compensation scheme  can only really be for one reason , that is they have no confidence in themselves or their ability to satisfy orders within the timescales they commit to  , ( without regularly invoking compulsory compensation payments  ) , so presumably they consider the probability of having to pay out regularly is too high , to voluntarily join this scheme ( hence they don't agree to be a member of it , it’s not compulsory to be a member ) that in itself speaks volumes, or put another way why does any provider volunteer to become a  member  of that Ofcom scheme, presumably they have more confidence in themselves than this outfit .

jc535

Many thanks for your response. It seems the best I could probably do is just try to ask nicely over the phone for compensation. I think you are spot on regarding their choice not to join Ofcom. It's just a shame that they are the only broadband company in my area offering no-contract deals.