What would be fair compensation in this circumstance?

[AudTheDeepMinded]

Sorry for the lengthy essay to follow:
Our broadband provider, with no warning or reason, disconnected our broadband and home phone last Friday afternoon. Unfortunately this was the worst possible timing as four out of five of us (incl three primary aged children) were covid positive and stuck in the house.
The following day the fifth member of the household also tested positive, meaning none of us were able to leave the house. Neither of the adults have a smartphone and we were therefore unable to access online shopping, entertainment, home-schooling resources, my emails for my self-employed business or long distance learning resources for a course I am doing. I was also unable to participate in a scheduled Zoom interview for a university place.
I have spent over four hours chasing to get this resolved and the customer service has been very poor. I have been told three different stories as to what has happened and why, and have been told that the engineer was coming out but wouldn't need to come in. Then I was told that the engineer had been cancelled as they could not come in. Then I was told there was no fault but a background issue. I've been promised update calls that have never materialised and have spoken to at least five different people.
Finally, fingers crossed, someone competent is on the case and the broadband will be reconnected on Monday. It has been an extremely trying time with three primary aged children and we have had to rely on phoning friends to act as personal shoppers at their inconvenience.. The person now resolving things has mentioned that once the service has been reinstated I will be entitled to compensation. What is a realistic amount to expect in this situation?

Are you paying for business broadband? I ask because I WFH and lost broadband for 3 months after a house move - total nightmare - but because I didn’t pay for the official business broadband package it wasn’t even entertained as a case that needed immediate attention. That was with BT.

@MoonlightFancy No. I'm a sole trader and have never thought the volume of my business merited the cost of a special package and protection. But it's not just the business issues it has caused, it was the inability to access the online learning for the children, or any entertainment for them, or shopping, or my distance learning course material. I mentioned that we were unable to access Online shopping and were isolating and was told to call my local supermarket. Totally unable to google a bloody number of course!

You need a smart phone then as a back up. I’d recommend a second hand handset on a pay and go sim.

You still wouldn’t be able to homeschool off it though.

Can you use your 11 year old's smartphone?

@TheRealityCheque

Can you use your 11 year old's smartphone?

You must know something I do not?

I’ll eat my hat if you get any monetary compensation. We moved into a new build flat where hyperoptic was supposed to be installed throughout. The box was there waiting all you had to do was connect. Perfect we thought.

It was not perfect. The wiring done personally by hyperoptic was wrong in our flat so it wasn’t connected at all. We’d already started our direct debit and no internet. It took over a month to fix it! Obviously we both had access to our phones which are smart phones but data runs out fast. I’m lucky I have unlimited but my flat mate literally had 2GB data and had to keep buying more. I think she went through around £50 of extra data. They wouldn’t refund her.

I was a uni student doing my MA at the time and had no wifi to do my assignments, for a month! I tried to hotspot it to my phone but connection was weak. It was a literal nightmare. Because the wifi installation was dodgy apparently it mean that even if we cancelled with hyperoptic, the full installation would have to be done by a different provider instead.

We ended up getting the next 3 months of the wifi for free.

How are you posting on Mumsnet with no internet or smartphone?

Oh sorry I saw about the mini hun

Hub...

That'll be enough for your work emails and basic resources for school

I also only think we got three months for free because 1) it took about 40 days to fix and 2) we had to facilitate their specialists coming out around 7 times and drilling/rewiring before they realised what was wrong also.

@girlmom21

How are you posting on Mumsnet with no internet or smartphone?

Alright Miss Marple! Yes, the mini hub has now allowed limited service. However we are still massively inconvenienced and my question revolves around what would be fair compensation in these circumstances.

The contract will set out the compensation you are entitled to. You’re unlikely to get more.

I think in this day and age it is prudent to have a smart phone. They dont cost the earth, me and my 2 teenagers have iphone SEs and pay £6 a month for the data and £10 a month for the phone (although 2 of them are now paid off so only paying for the data).
There many reasons why its a good idea:
broad band issue - as you have now found out.
electric blackout - again a mobile will be useful in an emergency.
when out and about - looking up a shops closing time, directions, anwering an urgent email, finding account details, not having to carry loads of loyalty cards as they are all saved on your phone, able to see where kids are when they are teens, we went to yo sushi and covid means you know have to order on your phone, looking up a taxi number, looking up bus timetable, paying for on street parking through the app, cancelling your bank card because you just realised you lost your wallet, taking photos so don't have to carry a separate camera, etc etc - now a lot of these things can be done without a phone but not nearly as quickly or easily. and if your time is so 'valuable' then surely you would want to take advntage of something which would cut down on the amoount of time you would have to spend faffing or trying to find out something!

Sounds exactly the same. I think it was to do with the migration to Digital Voice. The having to chase and badger and repeat yourself and then start all over again with a new person the following day is unreal. Sympathy to you.

Yes we were expecting to be switched to Digital Voice the day we lost service and expecting a new landline phone too as part of the deal. The switch over was delayed but by then they had already switched off the current landline. The lady on the phone told me they have also run out of phones for the offer so I presumed they got far more people switching than they anticipated but I doubt I will ever know as they refuse to answer such questions other than to say it's not a simple as just switching the old landline back on.

If you rely on the internet THAT much I think you need to take some personal responsibility in the fact you don’t have up to date devices offering alternative ways of connection. I understand it’s frustrating when it goes down but expecting it to never fault is unrealistic.

@BurntO

If you rely on the internet THAT much I think you need to take some personal responsibility in the fact you don’t have up to date devices offering alternative ways of connection. I understand it’s frustrating when it goes down but expecting it to never fault is unrealistic.

Sort of fair point. But ordinarily we wouldn't have Covid and the children would not be home and I would be able to shop and use internet in a cafe or the library.

If that's how you talk to people trying to help you, it's no wonder it's taking so long.

Manners cost nothing.

@CorrBlimeyGG

If that's how you talk to people trying to help you, it's no wonder it's taking so long.

Manners cost nothing.

No offense intended. Your post came after several implying I must be lying about not having a smart phone and that I should have one (no shit Sherlock) and very few that actually answered the question I had asked about compensation. Sarcasm aside, you must see how utterly inadequate the phone would be compared to full broadband that I am currently being billed for but not receiving?

Fair compensation would be a refund of the days you were without service. Anything else is a consequential loss.

What figure are you expecting? I worked in complaints for a large company for 5 years. You’ll probably find that the person you deal with has a limit of what they can offer for what they consider ‘distress and inconvenience’. If you go in with a figure and justify it, you might be lucky. Otherwise I’d expect maybe £100. But bear in mind, the person you deal with will be more likely to offer a higher amount if you’re polite rather than going off the deep end.

@Guineapiggiesmalls thank you. The person I am now dealing with has been consistently helpful after a run of several who were, erm, not! I have been polite throughout but fairly robust about my dissatisfaction on occasions.

I would mention the unhelpful people when it comes to discussing compensation. Repeat phone calls, especially those that resulted in a delay in sorting the issue, have obviously caused an inconvenience. It sounds petty, but recognising how helpful the person you’re dealing with now is will likely go a long way. Obviously the company can’t control your circumstances, but it sounds like it couldn’t have happened at a worse time and therefore your inconvenience will obviously be greater than that of someone say who is out at work all day.

Do you pay for a Business broadband or Residential broadband connection?

That would affect how fast your provider would fix it & compensation