Hi folks,

Please can anyone give me the slightest idea what to do to resolve the situation with my phone? The story is as follows, quite complicated so bear with me………….

I used to pay Pipex Homecall for my line rental (£9.99) and free evening and weekend calls (£4.50) and Pipex for my broadband (£9.99). I was always billed separately as Pipex Homecall was an off-shoot of Pipex. Never had any problems at all and in retrospect, I probably should have left everything as it was. However, on 2nd June this year, Pipex offered me a package of retained broadband service plus free evening and weekend calls all for £4.99 but I would have to change my line rental back to BT. It sounded too good to be true and how that phrase has returned to haunt me during the following months!

I duly contacted BT to start paying them for line rental ONLY and cancelled my service from Pipex Homecall. BT were to take over my line on 30th July and good enough, they did. Simple so far? Hmmmm………….

I then discovered (after my first bill) that BT were charging me for calls. Then started my endless round of expensive 0871 calls to Pipex to find out what was happening. All the people I spoke to assured me that they would rectify the problem and that each of them had personally re-ordered the phone package. It seems they hadn’t.

I eventually received a letter from BT telling me that another company (presumably Pipex) were taking over my call charges as from October 13th. I rang Pipex again on October 15th just to check that indeed they had finally managed to set up my phone account only to be told that it had been cancelled on October 14th! Since BT’s letter in October they have not charged me for any calls and having rung them again, received their assurance that they are definitely not responsible for billing me for any calls now. Needless to say, Pipex aren’t billing me either.

After five months of getting nowhere I decided to throw in the towel and asked Pipex for a MAC code. It took eight days and two phone calls to get it but at least it arrived. I subsequently contacted Sky and ordered their Mid Broadband and Unlimited Skytalk packages and in just 4 working days have received three letters and the router and thought that at last, I would have everything sorted.

I logged into my Sky account just to check whether the “track your order” system worked. There were all the details of my broadband service and it’s progress and under Unlimited Skytalk there were the dreaded words “ You have cancelled your oreder and your request is being processed”. ARRRRGH!!!!! Of course I rang Sky and a very pleasant lad assured me that the order would be re-processed and indeed, it is showing on the website again.

I really fear that this is going to be a re-living of the last five months and I’m starting to think that this is probably down to BT in some way. Possibly Pipex weren’t really to blame. No-one is taking responsibility for charging me for phone calls and whilst it’s very nice not having to pay at present, I am sure that at some point in the future, I’ll receive a large bill or get cut off for non-payment. I have contacted BT only to be told that it is the responsibility of my new provider and they are the only ones who can deal with BT Wholesale to sort it out. Help!!!

Sorry for the lengthy post but I was hoping that maybe someone out there had suffered with the same problem and could advise me on how to resolve it.

Cheers

anniep

why do you think bt are responsible ???
you were a customer of pipex and they offered you
another deal that you accepted....did they ask you to
call bt or did you do that without them prompting you ?
if you rang bt and asked for them to takeover the
line you would be transfered back to bt as a bt customer
and so would be billed by them....which ever company
was to charge you for calls should contact bt not you

Yes, iniltous, Pipex did tell me that I needed to contact BT because I was paying my line rental to Pipex Homecall and had to have a BT line so that Pipex could take over my call charges.

The reason I think BT are at fault is because Pipex put my order through several times and each time were told that it had been cancelled. Now the same thing has happened with Sky and I have never personally cancelled anything so I can only assume something is going wrong between my provider(s) and BT Wholesale. BT Retail were perfectly well aware that they were only to take my line over, not my calls and the reason that they charged me for calls initially was an error on their behalf.

I know it's not my fault but I'm concerned that some company, God knows which, will at some time, present me with a huge bill or cut me off altogether. I was merely wondering whether anyone else had experienced the same problem and how they dealt with it.

anniep

Hmm... Why pipex asked you to contact BT is very strange indeed.. I would have thought that Pipex would do that all for you seeing as Pipex homecall was paying your line rental to BT & then passing the charge onto you...

When they asked you to go back to BT & take their £4.99 deal I'm guessing it would just be LLU Broadband & Carrier Preselect telephone?

It looks as if BT has put a tag on your line. Typical BT!

As to who is billing you.. I think it might be BT even though they're saying their not.

Pipex asked you to call BT to return your line rental
business to BT so they Pipex could offer you a better deal
on your calls ?, sounds odd, dont you think ?
You state BT should have known you were to use Pipex
for your calls, but why ?, when a CPS (carrier pre select)
company wins a customer for their calls business they
issue the order to BT not the end user, this is at the
CPS industrys behest, after all they dont want BT to
try and talk the end user out of switching, using
inducements/discounts etc., so when you called BT they
would have started you on a new contract for line and
calls, so far from it being BT's fault, they could have
held you to term and charged you for breaking your
contract when you moved to Sky,
Sorry if this sounds like me having a go at you (I'm not)
but I do think your anger is somewhat misplaced

I think it's because Pipex Homecall used to cahrge line rental and calls.

Pipex have had a change around (now Tiscali), and i think they are seperate from Pipex Homecall (and so can't get involved). You can't even order Pipex broadband any more!!

What they wanted was for the OP to change his line rental back to BT. This would be under a new 12 month contract, but would be for option 1 only (so you can still move your calls to someone else).

Once done, Pipex would apply to take the calls over (but not the line rental), but were unable, because BT presumably have some sort of tag on the line.

At the end of the day, it looks like BT's error, as everyone who has tried to take over the calls on the line, gets the order cancelled, coincidence, i think not.

but the op states they did get contacted by bt stating
they were losing the calls business to a cps provider
in the period between bt providing line/calls and pipex issuing
the order for cps then bt are entitled to charge for those calls, its
not bts fault for the delay in pipex ordering cps
if the op is now having trouble moving to sky, is this
because the op is trying to move line rental to sky in
which case there is still the 12 month contract the op
entered into when they called bt to transfer back
from pipex, or is it because pipex are trying to hold onto
the op because presumably they consider the op entered
into a contract for calls with them...the 'tag' on the line
could be for either reason
my point is that you assume bt is responsible without
any real proof.....if bt state that they are not the
company that are charging for the op's calls now then
what more can they do ???, anyway if the op gets a bill
for this disputed period, then they will know who the
company providing calls was, and anyway i presume the op
isnt disputing that they are responsible for paying for calls
that they made

First of all, thank you sodafountain for understanding exactly what has been happening to me and why I think BT are responsible. Secondly, Iniltous, do you work for BT by any chance????

Things have changed again now after a letter from Sky telling me that BT have told them that my line is incompatible with SkyTalk. They told me that I needed to contact BT and ask them to take over my calls again so that they could then take them over from BT.

After two days of VERY lengthy calls to BT and being put through to practically every department they have, I was told that another company (they won't say who but I know it's Tiscali/Pipex) is definitely billing me for calls and that I'm just on the equivalent Option 1 with them. They also say that there should be no reason why Sky cannot take the calls but Sky insist they can't. BT say that Sky just want them to do their work for them. I seem to be caught in a war between two/three companies.

The upshot is, I'm going back to BT for their Anytime package which gives me free calls day or night for £4.95 per month as opposed to Sky's £5 per month. Wow, 5p! After 12 months I should be able to change (should I wish) to any other company without all these problems.

The good news is that my Sky broadband seems to be working O.K. so far, so that's a blessing. I suppose the moral to this tale is don't try to save yourself money by mixing and matching companies and if it aint broke, don't try and fix it.

AnnieP

My suggestion would be to speak to BT and ask for your CPS / whole sale order number.. This sound look something like abc123AB..... This should be proof that you have taken your calls to another provider..... Also if you dial 150 from your line, who do you get through to?? If you are not with BT, you should not get BT...x