[azurro9]

I recently, on a spur of the moment thing, ordered BT vision as I have been stuck at home after being in hospital.
Before it arrived I changed my mind so I emailed them to say I wanted to cancel.
I could not call as I have just had throat surgery and I cant talk.
They never got back to me so the box arrived with a letter that said I could cancel the services within 8 days so I thought OK
I emailed them again and this time they emailed me back me back saying they couldn't cancel it and could I call them.
I emailed them to tell them I couldn't use the phone and this went on for 3 days with eventually someone emailing me to say I could cancel but I would be charged for the box and 12 month services.
I told them I had tried to cancel but they are having none of it and I have just got my BT bill with over £200 of BT vision charges and all I have to show for it is a freeview box.
I am still unable to talk properly.
I was so fed up I emailed the CEO but he never got back to me.
The letter gave me the impression I could cancel with no further charges but on closer inspection it is ambiguous but in any case I tried to cancel by email within a few days of ordering it so surely that means I have some rights to cancel?
Does anyone have any advice? I feel like I am being made a mug of and the not being able to talk to anyone is making it harder.
Cheers.

[headcovers]

I find posting on the BT Community threads about problems with BT Vision will bring forward a moderator who works for BT. They have been very helpful to people, myself included.

Sorry I can't offer any more specific support.

http://community.bt.com/t5/BT-Vision/bd-p/VOD

[azurro9]

Thanks for your reply. I appreciate your help.

[neilmur]

I have much sympathy for your plight. I have only a 2Mb broadband rate and was cold called by BT to take up BT vision and was miss sold on 2 counts. The one that you might be interested in is that I was not told during the call that I would be liable to a fine of £4 per month for cancelling the £6.99 per month package even though I cancelled within 10 days - the 10 day cancellation rule is for the box not the package that I signed up for so even though I don't have a box I still have to fork out for a service I can't receive! Con Number 1. Con 2 I was told that 2Mb was fine I questioned that during the cold call but was assured that 2Mb is fine. It is not. You need 1.6Mb for the on demand service and so I'm left with 400k for my broadband. That would be ok if the speed went back to 2Mb immediately I stopped watching on demand but as a technical support person told me the QAS they put on the line to give stable vision lasts for some hours after watching on demand so you're stuck with slow speed for several hours. If they tell you it's a fault on the line it's not it's a fault with their technology. You need a minimum of 3.6Mb if you are to be left with the government minimum of 2Mb broadband while watching on demand.
If you paid the £15 that I did for the box you don't have to pay £200 even if you are outwith the 10 days just keep the box as a door stop and cancel at the end of the 1st year cost = £15 + 12 x £6.99 = £99 only. I'm not sure what happens to the box at the end of the year but if it's yours you might be able to sell it on ebay.
I did try to cancel and my query was raised to the miss selling section who after nearly 2 weeks phoned & spoke to my wife (I was the one who was miss sold) She's very clued up and spent a long time going over the 2 cons but the guy at the other end was reading from a script and would not listen to references to con 2 and denied that I was miss sold under con 1. I phoned up the cancellation people myself and was told that the miss selling section had closed the case even though they hadn’t spoken to the original complainer. I asked to be put through to them I was told that there was no number for them and they couldn’t be contacted in that way! I ask you someone in BT who can’t accept incoming calls even from another dept in BT! So another miss selling complaint has been raised and I await a call from BT (probably in 2 weeks).
I’m not sure if this helps anyone but if you don’t have 3.6M don’t sign up to BT vision.
If you think that you can try it out to see if it works with your connection rate - you can’t. You will have to pay up even though it’s not fit for purpose.

[wwwebber]

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilmur

blah, blah , blah

A couple of things :-

You don't need 3.6meg to get BTVision you need 2meg and in that respect BT are correct and thus you havent been mis-sold, also the BTVision SHOULD release the QOS when you've stopped viewing VOD - this is how I thought it all worked

In conclusion - I don't think you have a case at all.

[neilmur]

Hi wwwebber,

Hands up if you would be happy paying BT £14.99 per month for a 400kb broadband speed? I thought not. That's what you're left with once BT vision uses up 1.6Mb of my 2Mb speed. No one in my house can use broadband if someone else is watching a BT vision film or an on-demand program. This was not explained to me so I was mis-sold. I would not have signed up to a service which cripples my broadband speed.

You thought wrong if you thought that the QOS would be released immediately. When I spoke to someone at technical support they said that it would take a few hours to clear and that they could do nothing about it and did nothing about it. I stopped watching an on-demand program at 7pm and my speed was 400kb 1/2 hour after watching. By 11pm my speed was still struggling to get up to 1.5Mb. You could contact technical support for yourself and let us know how you get on. NB they will probably not admit to it the first time you call and fob you off as they did me. It wasn't until I contacted them for the 3rd time about my slow broadband speed hours after watching on-demand that someone was prepared to admit that it took hours for the QOS to clear. He was amazingly candid about it as if everyone knew that and I shouldn't be surprised! He could do nothing and did do nothing to fix the problem.

I would really like to ditch Sky and use BT vision but I can't put up with my broadband speed being crippled for hours at a time.

You do need 3.6Mb = 1.6Mb for BT vision + 2Mb for broadband (the government's minimum standard)

In conclusion, if you don't have at least 3.6Mb speed don't sign up for BT vision, I do have a case.

Please let us know how you get on with technical support.

Neil

[wwwebber]

BTVision uses approx 1.5meg of your bandwidth for VOD programming. You obviously have a 2meg line. Did you really expect to still be able use the full 2meg whilst watching VOD ??, surely you deduced this yourself in advance ??

Also, a 400kb line is still very much useable for surfing the net - unless you download, share or stream online constantly.

I'm also still sceptical about the QOS not being released after you've finished watching VOD - I'd like someone elses opinion here.

Who did you speak to ? was it the BT Broadband helpdesk or the BTVision helpdesk ?.

Lastly, your 3.6meg statement is utterly untrue I'm afriad - as has been pointed out here by monay other forum members.

[neilmur]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wwwebber

BTVision uses approx 1.5meg of your bandwidth for VOD programming. You obviously have a 2meg line. Did you really expect to still be able use the full 2meg whilst watching VOD ??, surely you deduced this yourself in advance ??

No but I didn't think that I had anything to lose as the cold seller said that I could try it for 10 days & return if not happy. I, like you, did not know about the QOS stayng on the line for hours after watching on demand

Quote:

Originally Posted by wwwebber

Also, a 400kb line is still very much useable for surfing the net - unless you download, share or stream online constantly.

Now you're having a laugh! why do BT etc boast 8Mb speeds and South Korea have a core structure of 100Mb if 400k is perfectly good? I think that you've been reading the BT cold seller's manual. It's not even good enough to check my webmail.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wwwebber

I'm also still sceptical about the QOS not being released after you've finished watching VOD - I'd like someone elses opinion here.

BT vision. Maybe you don't have the dubious pleasure of being 3 miles from the exchange, at the end of the line with a 2Mb speed. An engineer spent 2 hours in my house tweeking things & putting a plate on my phone socket to get the speed from 320kb to 2Mb. Line signal attenuation is a complicated thing wwwebber.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wwwebber

Who did you speak to ? was it the BT Broadband helpdesk or the BTVision helpdesk ?.

BT vision. Maybe you don't have the dubious pleasure of being 3 miles from the exchange, at the end of the line with a 2Mb speed. An engineer spent 2 hours in my house tweeking things & putting a plate on my phone socket to get the speed from 320kb to 2Mb. Line signal attenuation is a complicated thing wwwebber.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wwwebber

Lastly, your 3.6meg statement is utterly untrue I'm afriad - as has been pointed out here by monay other forum members.

No it's not!

---

Last edited by neilmur : 24-06-2010 at 00:13. Reason: quote error

[andyf94]

where has all this rot about needing 3.6MB for BTVision come from??? It's utter drivel.

If you consider you need 2MB of bandwith for browsing dodgy sites or whatever it is you do as well as watching BTVision at the same time, that's your choice. It's not a requirement of BTVision, it's YOUR requirement. Which is absolutely fine by the way, but please don't mis-represent the requirements of BTVision against your own

[wwwebber]

Quote:

Originally Posted by andyf94

where has all this rot about needing 3.6MB for BTVision come from??? It's utter drivel.

If you consider you need 2MB of bandwith for browsing dodgy sites or whatever it is you do as well as watching BTVision at the same time, that's your choice. It's not a requirement of BTVision, it's YOUR requirement. Which is absolutely fine by the way, but please don't mis-represent the requirements of BTVision against your own

You're wasting your time. He's already gone off in huff and taken his ball home . You see - he's right and numerous knowledgeable long time BTVision users are wrong

[scotty2808]

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilmur

Now you're having a laugh! why do BT etc boast 8Mb speeds and South Korea have a core structure of 100Mb if 400k is perfectly good? I think that you've been reading the BT cold seller's manual. It's not even good enough to check my webmail.

South Korea's infrastructure has been government supported. Either through subsidy or cash to build it. In the UK BT have received no funding to help support upgrading the network.

Bit harsh when there is not a level playing field for comparison Neil.

[neilmur]

Quote:

Originally Posted by andyf94

where has all this rot about needing 3.6MB for BTVision come from??? It's utter drivel.

If you consider you need 2MB of bandwith for browsing dodgy sites or whatever it is you do as well as watching BTVision at the same time, that's your choice. It's not a requirement of BTVision, it's YOUR requirement. Which is absolutely fine by the way, but please don't mis-represent the requirements of BTVision against your own

Where do you get the idea that I might need 2Mb to browse dodgy web sites? Is there some correlation between the dodgyness and the speed that you need to browse them? You obviously have more experience of dodgy web sites than me. Or perhaps you’re implying that because I have 2Mb of speed I must be using all that speed for dodgy browsing. I’ve just had a letter through my door saying that BT are rolling out 20Mb speeds nationwide. If all that someone does with 2Mb is to browse dodgy sites what kind of deviants would want 20Mb and as for the South Korean’s what kind of nation would want 100Mb speed?

You guys really are barking.

NB I did report your post for libel but the forum moderators are spineless and have done nothing about it.

I really am off this time (& taking my ball with me). If a newbe reads this post, be warned any criticism of BT will not be tolerated and feel free to say what you like about anyone the moderators are AWOL.

[wwwebber]

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilmur

Where do you get the idea that I might need 2Mb to browse dodgy web sites? Is there some correlation between the dodgyness and the speed that you need to browse them? You obviously have more experience of dodgy web sites than me. Or perhaps you’re implying that because I have 2Mb of speed I must be using all that speed for dodgy browsing. I’ve just had a letter through my door saying that BT are rolling out 20Mb speeds nationwide. If all that someone does with 2Mb is to browse dodgy sites what kind of deviants would want 20Mb and as for the South Korean’s what kind of nation would want 100Mb speed?

You guys really are barking.

NB I did report your post for libel but the forum moderators are spineless and have done nothing about it.

I really am off this time (& taking my ball with me). If a newbe reads this post, be warned any criticism of BT will not be tolerated and feel free to say what you like about anyone the moderators are AWOL.

Breathtaking arragance

There's a reason why the mods wont do anything - it's because YOU'RE WRONG !!

[jim_uk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by azurro9

I recently, on a spur of the moment thing, ordered BT vision as I have been stuck at home after being in hospital.
Before it arrived I changed my mind so I emailed them to say I wanted to cancel.
I could not call as I have just had throat surgery and I cant talk.
They never got back to me so the box arrived with a letter that said I could cancel the services within 8 days so I thought OK
I emailed them again and this time they emailed me back me back saying they couldn't cancel it and could I call them.
I emailed them to tell them I couldn't use the phone and this went on for 3 days with eventually someone emailing me to say I could cancel but I would be charged for the box and 12 month services.
I told them I had tried to cancel but they are having none of it and I have just got my BT bill with over £200 of BT vision charges and all I have to show for it is a freeview box.
I am still unable to talk properly.
I was so fed up I emailed the CEO but he never got back to me.
The letter gave me the impression I could cancel with no further charges but on closer inspection it is ambiguous but in any case I tried to cancel by email within a few days of ordering it so surely that means I have some rights to cancel?
Does anyone have any advice? I feel like I am being made a mug of and the not being able to talk to anyone is making it harder.
Cheers.

You should contact trading standards, these days BT are a cowboy outfit and they can't be trusted.

[wwwebber]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jim_uk

You should contact trading standards, these days BT are a cowboy outfit and they can't be trusted.

Compared to what ?

[andyf94]

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilmur

NB I did report your post for libel but the forum moderators are spineless and have done nothing about it.

I really am off this time (& taking my ball with me). If a newbe reads this post, be warned any criticism of BT will not be tolerated and feel free to say what you like about anyone the moderators are AWOL.

Listen mate, no one on here minds people criticism. When you've got a grevience it's only right that you get the opportunity to air it, we know that BT staff monitor whats going on on these threads, so there is a real benefit in complaining if you've got a problem.

BUT, when you start making outlandish claims that are not based on fact (like BT Vision requires a 3.6MB connection speed) you should expect regular contributors on here to point out the error of your ways. (It was easily apparent from your posts you were making a few incorrect assumptions (I'm trying to be really kind here).

When others pointed those out you got a bit arsey, instead of taking on what was being said to you, so you've only yourself to blame.

We all get a good kicking on here from time to time..it's part of the fun. One suggestion, if your skins that thin don't go making crazy statements presenting them as pseudo-fact, you'll find that there are quite a few people on here only too willing to put you right

It's an open forum full of useful info so why not stick around, you'll learn a thing or two - and let's face it, you could do with some help

[brynner]

Quote:

Originally Posted by azurro9

I recently, on a spur of the moment thing, ordered BT vision as I have been stuck at home after being in hospital.
Before it arrived I changed my mind so I emailed them to say I wanted to cancel.
I could not call as I have just had throat surgery and I cant talk.
They never got back to me so the box arrived with a letter that said I could cancel the services within 8 days so I thought OK
I emailed them again and this time they emailed me back me back saying they couldn't cancel it and could I call them.
I emailed them to tell them I couldn't use the phone and this went on for 3 days with eventually someone emailing me to say I could cancel but I would be charged for the box and 12 month services.
I told them I had tried to cancel but they are having none of it and I have just got my BT bill with over £200 of BT vision charges and all I have to show for it is a freeview box.
I am still unable to talk properly.
I was so fed up I emailed the CEO but he never got back to me.
The letter gave me the impression I could cancel with no further charges but on closer inspection it is ambiguous but in any case I tried to cancel by email within a few days of ordering it so surely that means I have some rights to cancel?
Does anyone have any advice? I feel like I am being made a mug of and the not being able to talk to anyone is making it harder.
Cheers.

While my experience is not the same as yours, it may be of help ... then again it may not, who knows ... I had a lot of problems with the billing side of BT Vision, they just couldnt get it right, charging me for VOD I never had, cutting me off for no reason, not taking payments, it was all a mess - everytime I called I had to repeat the story again as I was constantly told "theres no record of you ever having a problem", and even though I was promised return calls nobody ever bothered.

I persevered for about 6 months then finally snapped and threatened them with the press if the account was not closed with no comeback to me - very shortly after I received a call apologising for the poor service, confirming cancellation in writing, with full refund of any monies spent, which arrived as a cheque with a covering apology letter about a week later.

All I can say is that while it may not work for you, threatening BT with the front page of The Sun worked wonders for me.

A shame, as I actually loved the Vision technology, it was just the billing system and customer service that failed me.

[bob187]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brynner

threatening BT with the front page of The Sun worked wonders for me.

Unless you're Katie Price, I don't think they'd be that interested.....

[downstage]

We've had very similar problems to neilmur. We were told by the salesperson that the whole BT package (Vision, broadband and phone) would work fine in our flat, but it seems that our line speed isn't good enough for acceptable use of the services. The on demand services regularly don't work, even when we're not using the broadband, so effectively we're paying all of this for what we'd be getting on Freeview. The "broadband" is so bad that I often have to switch to using my Vodafone mobile broadband to connect through the mobile network, which in theory should be much slower. I've run BT's speedtester on our line and the results are far short of the acceptable range.

In reality though I know that these things happen; some places just don't have great speeds (although you'd have thought a city suburb would be fine...). What really irritates me is that customer services and the technical teams keep giving us different stories to avoid cancellation of the contract. Nine times out of ten we're told our line speed just isn't good enough, and are told we're within our rights to cancel with no termination fee because we're not getting the service we pay for. But then, curiously, when we do go to cancel they say that they can see no notes to that effect from the dozens of calls we've made.

After a lot of patience, taking down the name of everybody we've spoken to and requesting call backs from managers, we do finally seem to be making some progress as they have agreed to cancel our service at no cost, although we still have to wait for an engineer to come to verify that there isn't a fault that can be rectified. I've spent so so many hours over the last months on the phone to them and have taken days off work to wait for equipment or engineers or return calls that have never arrived. That is what has bothered me.

[BT Support]

Hi Downstage,

I am sorry to hear of the problems you have had with your Vision service and Broadband. I would like to take a look at this for you. Please could you email me your BT account details, along with a link to this thread? My email address is btcare@bt.com

Thanks

Paddy,