Is compensation available or not ?

AndyP1957

2011 we moved to our current home and after a few months noticed speeds started slowing. BT arranged for an engineer and he confirmed house wiring was fine but could find nothing wrong.

This continued to happen for the next few years and eventually we changed to Plusnet - same problems, so eventually because we wanted BT Sport at a good price we went back to BT

These problems have continued to raise their heads for the next 8 years, with numerous engineer visits and on several occasions false information about repairs externally being actioned which subsequent ones said were lies.

The latest complaint however saw an engineer visit who was quite competent and diligent with his checking. In time he identified the start of an external problem to pursue.  Our line in is underground and for years we have asked them to do an overhead line with no luck as we felt damage had to be underground.

The engineer identified the main trunk cable up the main road, and it should contain 100 pairs of wires for connection and 100 pairs as spares. Testing it he identified that our home was the only one connected to this batch of cabling, and the fault could be anywhere. The cables had been in over 50 years, so the other 99 must have been changed over at differing times.

He said it was an Openreach problem and after checking his manager said they would install a new overhead line, connected to where he did not know as the two poles by our home were full.

Whilst checking the engineer identified that the speed was below 21mbs (?) when in fact contract was 23. He said BT would owe us compensation for not meeting the guaranteed minimum speed.

Are we eligible for compensation and if so how far back in time should they go, as the fault has been constantly there and reported frequently as mentioned.

Neil_Jones

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-and-broadband/service-quality/automatic-compensation-need-know - earliest date listed here is April 2019.

You're not going to get compensation for legacy faults especially since you've moved provider twice in the meantime.  You may be if it was totally out for two days but this sounds like it isn't the case.

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-and-broadband/coverage-and-speeds/broadband-speeds-code-practice suggests "If you think your broadband is slower than it should be, contact your provider to diagnose the problem. If the problem lies within their network, and they can’t fix it within 30 days, they must offer you the right to exit your contract without being penalised."

This is not the same as compensation.