[*~Gemini~*]

I don't think anyone can actually do anything to help, I just really wanted to have a rant !

Our phone and BB contract began with BT on Tuesday 19th Feb after switching from Orange. The phone was working at 2am that morning, but as I write this, 2 days later, we STILL have no broadband connection.

We have called them, they gave us a temporary login to a wifi service which drops every few minutes and is slower than an arthritic dog. They promised it would be on by yesterday, nope, they GUARANTEED it would be on today by 6pm. It's 3pm but still nothing.

We are LIVID, I work from home and NEED an internet connection. Complaining to the call centre seems to be useless as they just apologise and promise it will be working the next day, is there anywhere else we can step this up to as we're now on the 3rd day with no internet..

[Hugh_]

I think BT have a help forum which some say is very useful, BT staff post there and responses are quick and they do get things sorted out. I don't have a link but might be worth a try.

Also if you signed up over the phone you can cancel the order but then I'm not sure how helpful that be.

[*~Gemini~*]

Thanks, Hugh, I found the BT forum and have posted there.

[dazb]

yes a very good forum it is too.

[*~Gemini~*]

They gave me a link to contact BT directly so that's what I did.

My husband called BT again just now, and guess what they said.. Yep, TOMORROW... again. Pathetic.

[noise747]

Why did you change from Orange? People change because they think the grass is greener and sometimes it is not. BT is a waste of space to be honest, talking to their Customer service is like talking to a brick wall most of the time, you do get the odd good one.

I think a lot of these larger ISp/telecom companies don't give a crap once they have got your money and got you into one of their long contracts.

I know the ISp I am with got long contracts, but if I have a problem they normally know about it before I do and get it fixed.
I did have a problem last night with disconnections, but that seemed to have been solved this morning and i did not have to do anything.

The more I hear about these large companies, BT, Talk Talk, sky and others the more I think i made the right choice to be where I am. sure i can't get super high speed of 40Mb/s on fibre, but at least 99.99% of the time I got a reliable connection and it is constantly around the 10 Mb/s mark like like my mates fibre on Plusnet that may be 20 one minute and 10 the next and now and again it may get up to about 50,

[neo_wales]

In fact its a tiny minority of customers who have problems such as the OP here. I left BT after problems with them but I won't slag them off because millions of people are happy with them and TT and Orange et al.

I do understand how frustrating no BB can be especially if you use it for business and hope the OP's issues are swiftly resolved.

[noise747]

Originally Posted by neo_wales

In fact its a tiny minority of customers who have problems such as the OP here. I left BT after problems with them but I won't slag them off because millions of people are happy with them and TT and Orange et al.

I do understand how frustrating no BB can be especially if you use it for business and hope the OP's issues are swiftly resolved.

It seems to be the thing with most large companies. when things are going right then they are ok, but get a problem and it is like jumping though bloody hoops. to be honest, I am getting fed up of being treated like dirt by companies who don't give a crap about their customers

[timboy]

Originally Posted by *~Gemini~*

I don't think anyone can actually do anything to help, I just really wanted to have a rant !

Our phone and BB contract began with BT on Tuesday 19th Feb after switching from Orange. The phone was working at 2am that morning, but as I write this, 2 days later, we STILL have no broadband connection.

We have called them, they gave us a temporary login to a wifi service which drops every few minutes and is slower than an arthritic dog. They promised it would be on by yesterday, nope, they GUARANTEED it would be on today by 6pm. It's 3pm but still nothing.

We are LIVID, I work from home and NEED an internet connection. Complaining to the call centre seems to be useless as they just apologise and promise it will be working the next day, is there anywhere else we can step this up to as we're now on the 3rd day with no internet..

As you work from home I presume it is a business line with faster response times that you have ordered?

[richardcdon]

Originally Posted by timboy

As you work from home I presume it is a business line with faster response times that you have ordered?

Lol of cause it won't be some "working from home" you don't have to. Just going off what I've read of other people

[timboy]

Originally Posted by richardcdon

Lol of cause it won't be some "working from home" you don't have to. Just going off what I've read of other people

I'm sorry but I can't really make out what you are trying to say there.

Nobody HAS to have a business line for 'working from home' but it does rather negate their argument a bit when they complain about how important it is they have a phone/broadband connection for business reasons if they are paying a residential tariff.

[*MikeB*]

Originally Posted by noise747

Why did you change from Orange? People change because they think the grass is greener and sometimes it is not. BT is a waste of space to be honest, talking to their Customer service is like talking to a brick wall most of the time, you do get the odd good one.

I think a lot of these larger ISp/telecom companies don't give a crap once they have got your money and got you into one of their long contracts.

I know the ISp I am with got long contracts, but if I have a problem they normally know about it before I do and get it fixed.
I did have a problem last night with disconnections, but that seemed to have been solved this morning and i did not have to do anything.

The more I hear about these large companies, BT, Talk Talk, sky and others the more I think i made the right choice to be where I am. sure i can't get super high speed of 40Mb/s on fibre, but at least 99.99% of the time I got a reliable connection and it is constantly around the 10 Mb/s mark like like my mates fibre on Plusnet that may be 20 one minute and 10 the next and now and again it may get up to about 50,

Yawn, here we go again.

[noise747]

Originally Posted by *MikeB*

Yawn, here we go again.

Well you use two, no three services where customer service seems to go out of the window, unless 3 have improved over the last 5 years. Sky is slightly better, but only normally after screaming at them, saying that they did sort a friends broadband out pretty quick, without screaming at them.

I have found very few large companies where customer service is any good, even Vodafone customer service is about as much use as a bucket with a hole in.

Smaller companies have to keep the customers they have got which is why most of them, not all, but most go that little bit extra. Larger companies got price on their side and people will stick with them what ever because of that. I have seen it with my own eyes, people saying they will put up with it because it is cheap.

you wait when these larger companies have knocked out all the smaller ones and see the price zoom up, it have happened with supermarkets and it have happened with sky, they got no competition TV wise and keep putting the prices up. Bt is the same, very little competition and keep putting line rental up and everything else.

[SteveMcK]

Originally Posted by noise747

people will stick with them what ever because of that. I have seen it with my own eyes, people saying they will put up with it because it is cheap.

And that's exactly the problem. People are so convinced that they're being ripped off by everyone, and that they can always get what they want more cheaply somewhere else, that no-one wants to pay a fair price for anything.

Result: they pay for cheap domestic broadband, and complain when they don't get business-class service. They pay for cheap supermarket factory food, and are upset when their beef turns out to be mixed with horse. Pay for cheap Chinese electronics, and expect to get a B&O HiFi.

You get what you pay for, that hasn't changed in hundreds of years!

[Phil S]

Never had a problem with BT.

Fast, reliable service and if you contact customer services when your contract runs out and ask for a deal (or tell them you may leave) you will get one which brings their price way down.

[d'@ve]

Originally Posted by SteveMcK

Result: they pay for cheap domestic broadband, and complain when they don't get business-class service. They pay for cheap supermarket factory food, and are upset when their beef turns out to be mixed with horse. Pay for cheap Chinese electronics, and expect to get a B&O HiFi.

You get what you pay for, that hasn't changed in hundreds of years!

But there is a balance to be struck, unless continuous full-speed internet access is critical for a business. In my case, it isn't - so having had a 100% reliable fast fibre service for 12 months now, I am happy to take a chance and stick with BT even though if there ever is a fault, it may take a while to get it fixed. But hopefully, not the 4 months it took Sky to fix a broadband fault a few years ago.

So I'm happy to take the chance, stick with my fast BT fibre, and recall when I'm downloading at 74Mbps that ten years ago, I paid more than what I now pay, twice as much inflation adjusted, for a 512 kbps broadband service.

[neo_wales]

I'm still paying £20 a month less to talk talk than I did BT with my phone and line package and to date have had problems with them. The old saying 'you get what you pay for' is not always valid.

[James30]

I'm with a small ISP, do your research and don't just do what the lapdogs do and go for cheap.

My ISP has been good, in the last four years i've only had an hours down time and that was due to the BT line being offline.

I get a constant 6mbps which is the highest in my area at the moment.

For £19 a month it's good. UK based 24/7 call centre.

[noise747]

Originally Posted by SteveMcK

And that's exactly the problem. People are so convinced that they're being ripped off by everyone, and that they can always get what they want more cheaply somewhere else, that no-one wants to pay a fair price for anything.

Don't get me wrong, if I can find something at a lower price that does what I want then I go for it, sometimes i do get my fingers burnt. sometimes we are being ripped off.

Result: they pay for cheap domestic broadband, and complain when they don't get business-class service.

Even so the service should work, I see the problem a mate of mine is having with his Plusnet fibre at the moment, it might be cheap, but the hassle. Ok he always seems to have problems, when he was on ADSL with Mad as a fish he had problems.

But yes, being cheap is fine until something goes wrong and it seems even if the Customer service is based in this country they can still be naff,

They pay for cheap supermarket factory food, and are upset when their beef turns out to be mixed with horse.

Different thing really, if it said horse meat on the label it would not be so much of a problem.

Pay for cheap Chinese electronics, and expect to get a B&O HiFi.

B&O is not that great to be honest, over priced and I bet they are made in china these days. In fact even most expensive stuff no doubt got cheap Chinese electronics in them. cheaper stuff just got even cheaper Chinese electronics in them, like my Huawei phone.

You get what you pay for, that hasn't changed in hundreds of years!

Most of the time yes, now and again you can get something good at a good price, just not very often.

[noise747]

Originally Posted by d'@ve

But there is a balance to be struck, unless continuous full-speed internet access is critical for a business. In my case, it isn't - so having had a 100% reliable fast fibre service for 12 months now, I am happy to take a chance and stick with BT even though if there ever is a fault, it may take a while to get it fixed. But hopefully, not the 4 months it took Sky to fix a broadband fault a few years ago.

So I'm happy to take the chance, stick with my fast BT fibre, and recall when I'm downloading at 74Mbps that ten years ago, I paid more than what I now pay, twice as much inflation adjusted, for a 512 kbps broadband service.

But BT is not really cheap anyway, they have always been more expensive than others, ok they are a bit better priced than they used to be, sadly they are still useless when anything goes wrong and that includes Bt openreach as well.

When i had the chance to get away from BT, it was a dream come true, sure it may cost a bit more and I may not get the high speed you get, even with fibre I would not get that anyway, but at least I know that if something goes wrong, I got less chance of having to jump through hoops to get it sorted.

TBH, the 512 connection while it was slower than what we got now seemed to be more reliable. The problem was, trying to get more and more out of the old copper lines, that was never made for data anyway and a lot of them are falling apart.

I will stay as I am i think, until i am 100% sure that BT FTTC system is reliable.

[Simon Rodgers]

I can speak from experience, BT suck at internet. They should switch to telephones.

[VisionMan1]

Originally Posted by Simon Rodgers

I can speak from experience, BT suck at internet. They should switch to telephones.

No Simon. They suck for you.

[noise747]

Originally Posted by Simon Rodgers

I can speak from experience, BT suck at internet. They should switch to telephones.

They are not very good at that either, certainly not when something goes wrong.

[tellyadict]

When I had a fault with my box I had a new one sent out and fitted by an engineer within 24 hours.
Internet virtually never goes down and is a speed of around 47meg and unlimited download.

I do wish they would have 100% UK call centres as trying to discuss complex billing is really tricky but it's no issue for run of the mill issues I must admit.

[*~Gemini~*]

Sorry,I didn't realise this thread was still going. Our broadband was finally connected on Friday. BT called us on Sunday with an apology and gave us a small credit on our first bill.

I do work from home, it's not a full time job and no it's not a business line. If you're really interested I do graphic design and if I can't upload my work I don't get paid, so it was a concern to me.

We switched from Orange because my husband wanted to take advantage of the Openzone connections when he is away from home which is quite often.

I hope that answers everyone's questions and thanks for the replies