BT Issue Update

An update, just for interest's sake.

14/08/2010 - Receive a letter detailing the hundreds of pounds of cancellation charges I can expect. The letter explains that I will no longer receive: Unlimited Weekend Plan, Phone Line, BT Privacy at Home.

However, the letter also states that I will contnue to receive Broadband - Infinity Option 2.

Clearly, this is not what I want; and I am well out of my minimum contract term for my phone line so shouldn't incur any charges for cancellation anyway.

Ring BT. Speak to unhelpful person who tells me that actually the charges aren't for my phone line being cancelled but my Broadband. I try to explain to this BT drone that the letter says something completely different and that this is not A Good Thing.

Whilst trying to explain that I do not wish to pay charges due to BT's failure to uphold their end of the contract I've entered into, the drone decides to put me through to another department without letting me finish speaking. Very polite.

I speak to Sarah in Customer Options. She explains yet again that the charges in the letter are clearly just random numbers made up by some BT computer and don't in any way relate to the truth. She tells me that BT Infinity Technical support are 'awaiting a call from me' and have been since 3rd August. First I've heard of it. Sarah assures me that they are the only people who will be able to determine whether or not I pay cancellation charges. Sounds a bit fishy for me, bearing in mind that they're the 'Technical support' team, but eventually I agree to her putting me through.

I end up in the queue for Broadband faults. Not having been told which option to press in the idiotic list of choices, none of which are 'If you are a dissatisfied customer who just wants nothing more to do with BT press x', I settle for option 1.

After waiting in the queue for a while, I finally get through to a foreign call centre. Up to this point, the only thing I would have said was positive about my experience was that all the call centres I'd dealt with seemed to be UK based. Not any more.

So, I try to explain the situation to Xavier, and try to get across that this is way above the level of first line telephone support. He can't see any notes suggesting they're expecting a call. Eventually, Xavier puts me through to the Infinity technical team, to a very nice guy called Geoff (or Jeff, I guess).

First off, Geoff or Jeff rings me back as I told him the line was very quiet. He rings back on my mobile and I can hear a reassuringly British voice very clearly.

Geoff or Jeff also can't see the note about waiting for a call from me. He sounds very sympathetic, and seems genuinely surprised that this problem has been ongoing for so long. Geoff is surprised that Customer Options think that his team are able to decide on cancellation charges being applied or not. This is not the case, he tells me; Customer Options would make that decision. Clearly, I'm being given the runaround now. It feels to me that BT are interested only in frustrating me so much that I either get bored and stop ringing, or die on hold. Geoff or Jeff sounds quite sensible, and offers to speak to the engineering team while I hold. I accept.

After a while Geoff or Jeff comes back and tells me that the best way to deal with things is to raise a fault, which the engineers will then have 48 hours to resolve. I'm concerned that this is yet another delay, when all I really want is just to get out of BT's evil clutches and back into the relative safety of slow broadband from Sky. However, Geoff or Jeff assures me that this is the best way to get the problem resolved, and that the engineers will only have 48 hours so things should be sorted by Monday. He also advises me that if things aren't sorted by Monday, I can ring them back directly.

All in all, another hour and a half of my life wasted on this. I'm now waiting to see if anything happens, which I'm sure it won't.

As of right now, 21hrs after raising the fault, nothing has changed:

BT. It's been a while.

So, it's years since my last post, but BT have this month plumbed the depths of ineptitude to such an extent that I have been galvanised into action.

Now, I thought British Gas were as bad as it got. Oh My God, British Gas are awful, but coming in a close second were BT. BT have now reached sufficient heights of dreadfulness in my experience to be level pegging.

I have previously told British Gas sales people (who still ring me from time to time) that if they were the last energy supplier on Earth I would rather huddle up in a warm pile of my own faeces than use their energy and put money into their shambolic organisation. BT are now nipping at their heels when it comes to scraping the barrel of sub-mediocrity.

So what's happened? Well, for those who don't like long reads, give up now. For those of you who are happy to be taken on a voyage of discovery of uselessness, please keep going.

So there I was on 21st July... and I thought, having checked availability, that it would be great fun to order Infinity Option 2. I was with Sky at 13Mbps/0.7Mbps and wanted to order Infinity JUST for better upload speed. Unlike most, I'm not interested in evelenty-billion Gbps downloads, I just want to be able to upload photos to my website more quickly. BT told me I could have estimated 19.5/7.7Mbps speeds, which sounded A-OK to me. I'm only a couple of hundred yards from the cabinet so I was happy.

So I placed an order online, then received a 'Confirmation email' which I assumed was confirming the details. So, there are three things that need to happen; Installation date confirmed, equipment delivered, and engineer arriving and delivering the product I have signed up for. A contract between me and BT, in which I pay £24.99 a month and BT give me my up-to 40Mbps/10Mbps connection.

Three things. Guess how many BT managed to make a hash of? Yep. All three.

1) Installation date on my 'confirmation email' (cunning title that, designed to mislead!) was 29th July. After a couple of days I thought I'd check the online BT thing to see whether my order was progressing. Installation date online, 30th July. Rang BT to check which was right. Told 30th. Re-arranged my week again to ensure I could be at home.

2) Delivery of equipment. 'Confirmation email' confirmed that equipment would be delivered to the address I specified (at work, as there will be no-one at home). So, anyone care to guess where the equipment went? Yep. That's right. My home address; where a neighbour thankfully just happened to notice the postman and was able to take in the parcel for me. Brilliant.

3) Delivery. Now, this is where it gets complicated. Engineer was good, turning up on time, and establishing a connection. So, now remember what I ordered? Infinity Option 2... A contract between me and BT, in which I pay £24.99 a month and BT give me my up-to 40Mbps/10Mbps connection.

So, engineer runs the speedtest. 34Mbps down. Whoopdy do! 1.5Mbps up. Hang about, thats about 6Mbps shy of what I was hoping for. So I ask him to make sure everything's OK. He makes a phone call. Comes back and tells me that I've only got a 2Mbps service provisioned, but if I want more I can pay the extra £5 a month and have up to 10Mbps.

So, I explain that I've ordered the 40/10 service. He shows me the order on his laptop which confirms that Openreach have been asked to provision 40/2. BT are still showing me on Option 2 on their website, but I'm capped at 2Mbps.

I ring BT. They assure me that it won't be a problem to sort out, that I just have to wait until the order completes, then someone will make the speed change and call me back, no later than 'hopefully this evening (30/07) but no later than tomorrow morning (31/07). I get a text message confirming that this will happen, and giving me a number to ring to speak directly to the team dealing with the issue.

Afternoon of 31/07. No phone call. Still 2Mbps. Ring BT again on the special number. Get an answering maching message. Ring BT on 150. Listen to hold music. Speak to someone who is very apologetic but assures me that the issue will be resolved, can't understand why I couldn't speak to the other team, and offers to chase the issue.

4th August. Still 2Mbps. Ring BT. This time, the call centre operative finds a colleague who will hold to speak to the specialist team, and then ring me back when they know what's going on. Hear back that the team are dealing with it, but it will take 7 DAYS to make what I am certain is a simple software switch happen. Told that the issue will DEFINITELY be sorted by 10th August.

Worth mentioning that by this time, I have already been charged my first month's fee. £24.99. So I'm already paying for a service I'm not receiving. A service which BT are CONTRACTED to provide.

So, I get a text message at 20:58 on 4th August which says (copied from phone) "Message from BT Order Management - This is confirmation that our specialist team are dealing with your recent enquiry and will contact you before 8pm on Friday 6th August at the latest. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused by this but be assured we are dealing with your enquiry"

Notice that. 8pm Friday 6th August "at the latest". Fast forward to Friday 6th August at 8pm. Guess what? No phone call.

So, I ring again and once again I'm told things will be sorted by 10th. Not happy, but I agree to wait until then. I am given the order number so I can track things online.

10th August. Arrive home from work at 6pm eager to try out my new superfast broadband. Oh, what's this? Still 2Mbps. Reset router/modem. Still 2Mbps. Run speedtester.bt.com for about the millionth time. Line profile still 2000Kbps. Check online. Order is showing as COMPLETED.

Ring BT. Apologised to again. Don't want apologies, want the service I'm paying for. Operatives 'can't understand' why the order's closed but not fulfilled. I don't care.

Tell BT that I want the issue resolved within 24hrs or they can cancel the contract as I'm not being provided with what I'm paying for... remember... A contract between me and BT, in which I pay £24.99 a month and BT give me my up-to 40Mbps/10Mbps connection. I have already paid my £24.99.

Operative comes back to tell me that the order people don't really understand either. Can't resolve it in 24hours. Not even 48. Or 72. I'm told that there's 'nothing they can do' except make we wait another 7 DAYS until 17th (when I'm quite sure nothing will get done once again). I tell the operative not to bother as I'm not interested any more, and he gives me a number for cancellations.

Ring BT again, and I ask to cancel my broadbamd. Explain why when asked. Operative then tells me I 'can't cancel yet as there's an outstanding order'. Yep. That's right, the order I asked the previous operative not to bother with. It's been placed and should complete on 17th.

Tell operative that she should cancel the order then cancel my broadband. She advises me that she can't just do that, as it will take 24hrs for the order (which I asked not to be placed, remember) to be completed as cancelled. After that, I HAVE TO RING BT BACK. Me. I have to chase the useless bunch or incompetents. Operative then offers to give me a MAC code instead so I can just place an order with another provider to migrate away.

So I ring Sky, and ask them if I might please be allowed to come back. And while I'm about it, can I take Sky line rental too so I don't have to keep paying BT?

Well done BT/Openreach. Now you've lost out on everything. No line rental, no call charges, no broadband. Result.

You're welcome to your stupid Home Hub back as well. It's waiting for you to come and collect it.