I've just spent 45 minutes on hold....same message playing over and over again.

How on earth can they get away with his? 0800 or not, this is inexcusable!

I phoned last Wednesday to activate a BT line thats in my new residence. All fine, all it needs is me to sign up...or so I thought.

At the end of the telephone call I get the customer services agent telling me there's a problem setting up the account, something to do with Friends and Family not being set up correctly? Pass... But anyway, I was then told this would take four to eight days to fix and that before the line could be activated.

I said this was unacceptable as I was getting Sky installed and as they need a BT line, I can't afford to wait I said. I was then given an 0800 number to dial to get through to someone who would be able to speed this up for me.

Can I get through? Can i ruddy hell. I've tried every day but after all those attempts at getting through and being on hold for that amount of time, I'm really at the end of my tether.

Can anyone help? A special phone number perhaps? Wishful thinking probably I know.

Thanks

Why not write them a letter of complaint?

Sky are hardly likely to come knocking on your door "why isn't this line connected?"

So I doubt it matters.

Just wait till you have a problem:

Day One (10.30pm) I phone BT (100), navigate through buttons to report fault - on hold for 20 minutes. Then answered by someone who tells me that as the line had only been installed a month ago, I was a new customer and I would be transferred to another department. On hold for 10 minutes and cut off.
11.15pm - Since I could still make outgoing calls, I logged on to the BT website to log the fault (no incoming calls). Got all the way through to the end to get a message. "We are sorry but faults cannot be reported through bt.com at the moment please call 0800 xxxxxx)
11.20pm - Called the 0800 number - again navigated buttons - again on hold for 15 miutes before being told (yet again) that I was a new customer and had to be transferred. By this time I was less than amused. I was however polite enough to relate my problems calmly and was offered either to be transferred now (and take my chances) or to be called back in the morning on my mobile. For the sake of my sanity I opted for option 2.

Day Two 8.45am - Got a call from what I suspect was an Indian call centre. "Good Morning, This is Rajesh - Is this Mr xxxx". When I replied in the affirmative I was asked if the fault had been cleared. I explained that as I could not receive incoming calls I would have to use the mobile to check and could he call back in 5 minutes. He agreed, I checked the line (surprise, surprise still not getting through). He did call back and was rather taken aback that the fault was still present. He assured me that Openreach would be informed and that I would get a text message from them regarding a visit from the engineer. Significant silence from BT for the rest of the day.

Day Three 11.00am - I get a call from the Openreach engineer explaning that there was a bit of a mystery and that he would be round in 20 minutes. He duly appeared and luckily it was the same engineer that had installed the line a few weeks earlier. He explained that my number was shown as being mapped to another number at the exchange. He did some checking for me and discovered that I had allegedly contacted BT to ask for a number change. Needless to say I had done no such thing.

I was left with the option of either trying to reverse the mess and get my old number back with no guarantee of a timescale or having to constanly chase BT or accept the new number and notify all of our friends and relations of a second new number in less than a month.

Oh and to add insult to injury when the fault was reported the incoming calls were supposed to be diverted to my mobile - but they reversed 2 digits when they took it down

Yes being back with BT is great fun

Oh reading this brought back my memories of 2 weeks ago - spent more time in the local phone box on hold than I did in my flat ! - And they used to tell you an order number etc and they didnt so when my phone line didnt work even tho they said it did couldnt go through to faults as had no ref/phone number so spent a further week in the phone box - finally all sorted now but think most of September was spent in the delightful phone box !!

Hopefully that's not a chilling vision of things to come!

I hope so for you aswell - it went from one extreme to the other had no phone line yet being charged for it to having 2 phone lines because of the homehub top package gives u another line - and I rang then to complain and got told dont worry someone will ring u back within 3 days yeh ok luckily I didnt hold my breath otherwise would be a slighty off colour and not breathing right now lol - Good Luck !

Dontcha just love BT!! Only 15 mins on hold... well get YOU !!! Don't think i ever spent less than an hour.

I won't go into details but they pretty much got everything wrong.. including my new address...

Still the upside is they seem to have lost my broadband account, connected it and have never billed me!

There does seem to be some light at the end of this tunnel.

BBC Watchdog last night seems to have saved me. I complained off to that address they gave out for BT complaints and I've been told I'll be activated by 5pm tomorrow...

Fingers not yet crossed!!

I was one of those that had no info regarding the new line install date - they just turned up and did it.
Still can't get through to customer service though

for anyone who missed it


http://www.bt.com/newcustomer

BBC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/consumer/tv_and...20071010.shtml

hmm,

The other side of the coin:

Recently went back to BT. NO problem getting to sales line.

Engineer booked for day requested. Phoned 15 minutes before arrival, arrived on time, no problems.

Order BT Broadband Option 3. Requested date was booked. Confirmation letter arrived 3 days before, equipment delivered 12.30pm on appointed day. Received text message to say line activated, set up homehub, 4.9Mb/sec solid after 12 hours and no problems till recently (see below).

Slight hiccup with BT Vision order - the lost it. But re=ordered and equipment arrived on time and was up and running in less than 30 minutes, again no problems since apart from the EPG issue which now seems to be fine after peiple started reporting it rather than just coming on here and whingeing about it.

Tuesday was very wet and windy. About 4.00pm analogue line went very noisy and dropped, Then BB bounced.

reported fault - no problem getting through. Line checked, fault probably on BT side, engineer booked for following PM, no access required. I added notes to the call to say that my drop cable and overhead were very old an probably needed replacement. 2pm next day Openreach phone me to say they agree but want to replace line all the way from pole to master socket, so need access,

2 hours later I get recorded phone call from BT asking me to ring to book appt. I called, not too much delay getting through. They were very sorry that the earliest they coudl come was between 8.30 and 12.00 the next morning (note it's now 4.00pm).

8.10 next morning engineer calls to say he is in the area and can be with me in 10 minutes - and he is.

2 hours later I have a nice new line, very neatly installed, all rubbish cleared away, debris vacuumed up and all working as before.

The break was in the drop cable outside - insulation had perished and wire corroded (BB can sometime work on 1 leg!)

Also recently had to activate line in Care Home for my mother. Again, no problems at all, even in getting them to send bills etc to me. And yesterday no problem closing down old line either.

Excellent service, really cannot fault them.

If you're a new customer and you're awaiting activation or have a billing enquiry, the only number that can actually help you is 0800 022 3089, but the wait times can be over an hour at the moment. Other advisors have to transfer you because all of the new customers are on a completely seperate system now, as per equivalence of input laws laid down by Ofcom.

I fount that out the hard way although after 3 weeks I have never managed to get through to anyone on that number, but using this web addy got a resonse in under 24hrs...
http://www.bt.com/newcustomer

I understand why BT have done this but what I can't understand is why they don't tell us new customers - they know it's hard to get through to them.

Well, all worked out fine in the end. BT line activated on Friday just in time for the Sky engineers today.

Fantastic but not something I want to repeat any time soon!