Openreach - slow to fix

ella2ethan1

I am hoping someone can tell me where to go next or who to complain too!

On the 16th Feb a drunk driver hit the telegraph pole that supplied our fibre broadband, as it was leaning into the road they took it down the same day. Open reach did not notify Sky who we are with, we did that ourselves. After 3 weeks they finally put up the telegraph pole but have still not connected the fibre ( they did finally install the part this week that the fibre goes through)

When we phone sky who then phone open reach they say something will happen within 2 days and then nothing does. Who can we escalate this too so it can finally is fixed.

My son works from home 3 days a week and had to stay in a hotel the first week as we live in Birmingham and he works in London, and we have all had to buy more data. I know we are entitled to the compensation of £9.80 a day but that is nothing to what we have paid out.

Keep_pedalling

Sounds like you need business BB rather than domestic. If it was that vital you should be paying for a service that comes with 4G back-up. You are not entitled to be compensated for any consequential losses.

ella2ethan1

No I don't need business broadband and I am not worried about the compensation I want and need my broadband fixed along with my neighbours. But thank you for your comment even if you did not comment on what I asked for.

400ixl

Your contract is with Sky that is who you complain to. You do not have a contract with OpenReach.

If it doesn't get resolved you can take it to the ombudsman.

The daily compensation is to allow you to put a temporary measure in place. How are your costs for data higher than the compensation?

Penguin_

You could ask them to refund you for the data you have had to purchase, as long as you have receipts I don't think that's an unreasonable request.

But that's about it really.

littleboo

"Who can we escalate this too so it can finally is fixed." Sky, they are your provider.

QrizB

ella2ethan1 said:

When we phone sky who then phone open reach they say something will happen within 2 days and then nothing does. Who can we escalate this too so it can finally is fixed.

As above:

400ixl said:

Your contract is with Sky that is who you complain to. You do not have a contract with OpenReach.

Sky have a complaints process and you need to follow it.

ella2ethan1 said:

... and we have all had to buy more data. I know we are entitled to the compensation of £9.80 a day but that is nothing to what we have paid out.

You can buy a whole-house 4G wifi router for less than £40. An example would be this https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/295566456668 - ZTE MF286D, my son has this exact one, it served a 6-person student flat perfectly well (other than at about 4pm when the local secondary school kicked out and all the pupils stood at the bus stop across the street trying to watch YouTube and saturated the local cell tower).

Add a £15/month unlimited SIM and you should be good to go.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cheap-mobile-finder/sim-only/

iniltous

Why would Openreach notify Sky that a pole was damaged in an RTA ? , you contact your provider if your service isn’t working , Sky advise OR if the indications are the OR infrastructure is at fault , you seem to have that part a little backwards , OR make the pole safe , that doesn’t matter if there are 30 working services on the pole or none, the immediate concern is for the safety of the public .

Once you advise Sky , and they advise OR (chances are in this case OR already know the problem) , the clock starts , as well as you entitled to compensation from Sky , Sky are entitled to compensation from OR , so OR are  incentivised to repair as quickly as possible , if the repair has taken a relatively long time there will be a reason , you don’t know what that reason is .

As stated , it’s Skys job to keep you in the loop , and chase Openreach if the estimated time to repair has been exceeded, as with all these things , you don’t have any contractual relationship with Openreach , they owe you nothing in way of explanation etc. but they do owe that to Sky …..I’d suggest you ask Sky why it’s taking so long , they obviously can ask Openreach if they don’t already know , and then let you know what the reason is 

Lorian

Too late now but if you see a damaged pole you can contact the openreach dedicated damage and hazard team on 0800 023 2023 option 1-  it's one of the rare occasions openreach will listen directly to the general public and would typically start physical repairs quicker. Still need to report fault with ISP of course.