I have been with talk talk for several years, for both broadband and telephone services, including payment of line rental. I received a letter recently from talk talk saying that they were sorry to see me leaving for BT. I have never spoken to BT at all. I contacted Talk Talk and told them that I was not leaving, I also contacted BT likewise. This weekend any incoming calls are now met with the message 'this number is not recognised'. Outgoing calls are ok. BT deny any assistance, saying I am not a customer. Talk Talk say I should take it up with BT. Help! What can I do? I suspect that BT have interfered with the incoming calls because I told them that I was not transferring to them, and so they have cancelled the services which they did not provide in the first place

What number shows if you dial your mobile or ring 17070?

Hi Marina1

Sorry to read about the problems you have had, drop me a pm with your address and I shall check this out for you.

Stuart

How can BT 'cancel' a service which (in your own words) they weren't even providing?

Because Appleseed even if your with Talk Talk or any Telco other than Virgin its still BT that provide and maintain your line.

This is one of the pitfalls of leaving BT for your phone service, if anything goes wrong your Telco will deny all knowledge as they don't want to pay BT to send Engineers out and BT wont help you either because you are not officially a customer and if they do come out they will charge you an arm and a leg.

A friend of mine recently got cut off by Talk Talk by mistake it took nearly a month to get reconnected because Talk Talk refused to accept there was a problem at their end and BT said that the problem was for Talk Talk to sort out.

Righto Phil.

actually it's us who provide and maintain the line from the exchange to the house. The main issue where the different CP's (i.e bt/sky/talk talk) blame each other for any issue on the line is where you have your line rental with one CP (eg BT) and your b/band with another CP (eg Sky) and you start having problems with your b/band, because if the line tests o.k then obviously the voice supplier will not want to send us out as we may charge them, and the b/band supplier will not want to send us out as they have to pay also.

most b/band faults are usually an issue with the line (which the test system can't detect), and the hardest part is convincing the ISP to get us out. Most voice faults are also an issue with the line however by the time the line has degraded enough to knock the voice off the test system will 9/10 always pick up a fault and the CP will quite happily as for us to come and look at it.

Surely the broadband provider simply sends signals down a line, and who that line is rented from is no concern of theirs?
If a road surface has pot-holes in it I phone the council, not Ford, to report it?

the plot thickens...my incoming calls stopped working, but I could still make outgoing. I called Talk Talk, who are both my internet and landline provider (i pay line rental), who says that BT has slammed my line, and my old number is now cancelled. I call BT, who say that my old number is indeed not active, and that Talk Talk are at fault because they should have objected to the transfer. I call Talk Talk, and they say that they did object, twice, and that BT must have cancelled the objections. So why can I still ring out? Well, it turns out that BT think I am someone else! They think that they have acquired a new customer, who lives at a similar address, and given them a new number. Only problem is that the new number is the one I now have. They won't' give me details of that new customer, because of data protection. In summary, BT thought they were acquiring a new customer, but openreach or whoever sets these things up, have interfered with my line with Talk Talk. BT then repeatedly cancelled Talk Talk's objections to the transfer. Talk Talk have suggested that I approach BT and ask them to change the new number to my old number, and then they can acquire the new old number back again. This will take several weeks, and I will be charged by Talk Talk for a new line. The only problem with this suggestion is that BT won't speak to me because even though they have interfered with my line, cancelled my number, and given me another number, I am still not their customer, who lives at another address.

very true, but in the instance of the phoneline, even though you pay line rental to one provider, the isp still pays a little for the use of the MPF (metallic path). as most faults with the pair that affect the b/band can't be detected by the test system(usually high resistance) the voice provider will say it's working fine for what they are providing. hence they don't want to call us out and will fob you off to the ISP. the ISP will be reluctant to call us out as they are charged in advance(if the line is testing o.k) and depending on what is the cause of the issue they may be refunded or not. hence they will fob you back to the voice provider.

What has happended is someone has recently moved into a property with a similar address to yours, that person calls BT to takover the phone service, if the person said yes when BT asked 'is your address x,y,z ?' when in fact the address was yours,( rose street, rose crescent, rose avenue that sort of thing,) then your number (even though you pay line rental to TT) would have been taken over and renumbered, this would explain why you could make outgoing calls (those calls would actually be on the other persons account), but incoming calls wouldnt get through because your number does exist anymore,
Because you have no business relationship with BT, then its Talk Talk you need to speak to to sort this out, regardless of who is at fault ( no suprise TT and BT blame each other) The truth is the person who didnt know what their new address was so made a guess at it, is the real culprit.
If TT dont want to help then its a reflection on their customer service, you cannot realy blame BT CS as you were not one of their customers....
It shows how easy it is to sc*w up someones service after all this is probably an honest mistake but some malicious person could do exactly the same thing
This isnt realy a case of slamming, after all you were not made an unwilling customer of BT, also when it comes to genuine slamming, TT are more guilty than most, after all those people who knock on your door or stop you in the shopping centre only get paid if they sign you up, hence lots of people get signed up without consent

I had a similar situation to the op in February 2008. I was paying BT for line rental but using Talk talk as a cps provider.
I never did find out where the blame lay as both companies accused the other and nobody would tell me the truth of what had happened.
I stayed with Talk talk for another year but have now returned to BT for calls as well as rental.
IMO both companies are as bad as each other. 25 years after BT was privatised I think that very little 'progress' has been made in the telecoms field and what little has been is down to the improvements in the technology.

OP. I was in a similar position a couple of years ago when TT cut me off without warning. TT blamed BT and BT blamed TT. It cost a fortune to call both providers on a mobile to attempt to resolve. I was without a landline and the internet for 3 to 4 weeks and eventually TT agreed it was their fault and paid for my line connection back to BT.

Sorry, but I no longer have the contact names and numbers I used (the personel have probably changed anyway) but I think you need to get a high level name with a direct landline number. Once you get beyond the frontline troops at the call centre you should find you can get something done. Don't go over the top asking for compensation and stay professional even if you are tearing your hair out. I know its a bugger at the time but I still had the use of my mobile and TT paid a sum in resect of additional charges on that phone. The only thing was that in going back to BT I had to accept a new telephone number.

TT did ask if I wanted to go back to them but you can imagine my response.

Good luck.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8278806.stm

An interesting piece I saw earlier in the week not sure that any company is entirely above the practice though.