To be livid with Talk Talk on behalf of my very elderly parents! (advice welcome)

[4c4good]

Dad 96, very frail, very poor health. Mum 80. Exhausted carer. I live an hour away and work fulltime.

They rely on their landline for essential things like making hospital appointments, social services issues and to contact people to fix things, as well of course to keep in touch with family and friends.

Three weeks ago, Mum reported interference on the line, and what seemed to be a crossed line. They were promised an engineer would call on the phone at a certain time. No-one called - no surprise.

Problems worsen. Line is intermittently unavailable, or incoming calls go straight to voicemail. Mum says she can't access voicemail though I am not 100% clear this is the case.

They now have no dial tone at all, and nothing has happened with Talk Talk. I have reported the problem and was told they wouldn't speak to me as I am not the account holder ( after keeping me waiting 20 minutes)

Meanwhile a series of mini disasters happens. Their loo breaks. There is a minor insurance issue with the car. This happens when they had intermittent service and incoming calls were somehow lost - the upshot being they had been flushing the loo with pails of water for several days until I intervened and got it sorted. Mum can just about receive and make calls but not retrieve messages - on her ancient pay as you go mobile after some tuition so they are now back in touch with the world -but in a haphazard way.

They have one of those emergency bleeper phone line alarm things and this equipment was checked by the provider on Monday and the engineer was sure this wasn't causing the problem.

Now I need to get this sorted with Talk Talk. I recall a thread on here where a Talk Talk community champion or some other interesting title came on and offered help and a link to some kind of complaints forum. I've been on the website and see there is a 'memembers area' (sic) - which I assume will need account info to register with, which I haven't got tonight. Well they are certainly tools, and can't even spell, let alone run a decent service.

Can anyone link me to that and/or provide any assistance?

How dare they treat my parents like this!

Talktalk were truly awful to my mother when my father died. She wanted nothing more than to change the name on the bill so she didn't get lots of mail with her deceased husband's name on. They couldn't even manage a basic request like that.

I see they haven't changed.

OP I really hope things are sorted out soon. I have a disabled mum living some distance away and I know how much you rely on the phone just to make sure things are okay.

If you're interested Mark I run a training and coaching company and I'd be happy to train you and your staff in great customer service at a reduced rate - since you're such a deserving cause and clearly in need of significant help.

That's a better response Helen. Do they have any comment to make on marvellous Mark? Is he a computer program?

Well done Helen and MNHQ. :)

OP, I do hope that your Dad is back to full health now. What a dreadful shambles.

Thinking of you and yours.

When we lived in Manchester, we stupidly chose TalkTalk as our service provider for our telephone and broadband needs.

For six weeks we had neither, for six weeks I tried in vein to talk to someone who spoke basic English and who could therefore understand me, and help.

For six weeks, we continued to pay for a service that we were unable to use, bound by T&C's we had agreed to.

I will NEVER, EVER go back to TalkTalk.

EVER.

I'd rather pay more money to a service provider who actually provide the service that I need.

However, in their defence, we have also had issues with BT, Wickes and Everest Windows. I always believed that if they were a big company, a household name, the best of the best (ahahahahaaaaaa) then the service would be second to none.

Nope. I thought of writing more letters, making more calls....

Something like this,

Dear Mr BT, Mr Wickes, and Mr Everest Windows,

I'm writing to inform you of my disappointment, upset and utter despair at your level of customer service or rather, shear lack of it. I understand that on occasion, problems can and do arise. What I will not accept is the lack of understanding, the rudeness and general ignorance I have been party to, since agreeing to pay you money for your service.

I trust that as time goes on, you will endeavour to rectify the problems that you 'valued customers' raise. And with a bit of luck, these small cogs in your big wheel, will remain in place, enabling you to stay in business.

However, I will not recommend your business or products to anyone.

Kind regards

Mouse

When I actually wanted to say -

Dear Mr BT, Wickes and Everest Windows,

You are all a big fat pile of shite and I hope you rot in hell.

Love and hugs,

Mouse

Good luck with resolving this 4c4.

Now that's more like it.
Was Mark actually from a rival company, trolling to drive customers away from Talk Talk?

Ah Marks back. He appeared on my thread about how crap TT are a few weeks ago. I have to say they sorted it - but I phoned them.

And also Mark DO NOT go on about fraud - it turns out my router hadn't arrived because the address I live at and have to confirm to prove who I am wasn't the one TT had on their system. Defies bloody belief.

OP YADNBU in any way shape or form. May I suggest you call the W London office, I'll PM you the name of the guy who I spoke to. I will not under any circumstances deal with any other person from TT other than this guy who managed to solve in 5 minutes what others couldn't in 5 months.

Nothing but
Mumsnet makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside though!

Bloody hell BOO, 5 months! Well done on sourcing the man with the power!

It's not the man with the power!! He just happened to have slipped through the interview process and they accidently employed someone with customer service skills.

Really, do they exist BOO? What, like a real person, with a real voice and everything? Not reading from a script either?

Unless, 'I'm really sorry, you are right that information shouldn't have been relayed to you as we don't do that. The reason the DD wasn't changed is because we have the wrong address (had noticed when I confirmed) and you shouldn't have been told it had been done. Here have 2 months free line rental and another faster router free' is on the script.

I always say to TalkTalk "Well, whenever anything goes wrong with my mobile phone service the provider is only too happy to credit me a month's rental" but it falls on stony ground with TalkTalk

Well look at that! A response incredibly similar to tiktok's model suggestion

Ok folks - I have emailed MNHQ with all the details Helen asked for.

I'm still fuming - and anxious as I haven't got through to them at all this evening.

A family-friendly company?

Don't make me laugh. Even if it's fixed first thing tomorrow, my parents have free line rental for the rest of their lives, I'll not believe that one.

I imagine 'Mark' probably is a troll from a rival company -that would explain a lot about how far this industry seems to have sunk.

I should also have said ( as I did on my email) a big thank you to MNHQ for intervening.

I will be providing regualr updates ( subject to my own wavering internet connection that is)

Ah Mark, you name checked me so I'll respond.

Is it not FRAUD to call people at home, offer a new tarif, hear them say quite clearly NO THANKS and again state firmly to your salesperson DO NOT CHANGE MY TARIF, yet send them a confirmation letter a week later detailing their tariff change and locking them in for a further year with your shite company, stating they have a 7 day cooling off period, when we all know distance selling has a 12 day cooling off period??? What if they had been away, would they have been stuck with you for another 12 months?????

So, on the basis that i was trying to help someone who was sick of your firm, rather than letting them be sucked in by your shit customer service, you can take your accusation of FRAUD and shove it up your smug fraudulent arse.

If i ever sent an email like your posts here, representing my company I'd be fired on he spot. Speaks bloody volumes that you're their face to Market! Imagine what the rest of them are like!!

Thank fuck I stick to BT.

Lovin' the new message sent to mumsnet and relayed here by Helen :)

And yes - they have more or less copied my 'this is how it's done' model letter - hilarious!

I think this thread has done some good.

Mark - actually only two people mentioned posing as parents but you seemed to have gone on and on and on about it. Quite over the top really to harp on.

You should have taken more action on OP's behalf and had a more heart felt response to the difficulties. Your post sounded like just another crap automated robot response when you could have been a knight in shining armour!

Great news! It's fixed. And I am impressed with how it's been dealt with, I have to say. It's a shame this couldn't have happened sooner, and that one has to resort to a public forum to get it sorted, but it does seem that once the right people are on the case, things happen fast and properly.

Thanks to MNHQ also.

Glad to hear it is fixed. I think with Talk Talk you only get action by shouting it from the roof tops etc!

Hope your parents are ok today

We had nothing but problems from talk talk, numerous calls etc. We had interference on the line, got passed around the call centre from pillar to post speaking to people clearly reading from a script.
They took out direct debits without stating they were in writing, we had problems and told they would bill us for an engineer to come out to us (a service sky doesn't charge for). We ended up with three engineer call outs, one from bt who confirmed it was the router not the line (the talk talk person missed this and suggested we open up our router whilst he was on the phone.
Anyway, we called sky after getting nowhere at all with talk talk who billed us huge amounts when they previous said they would send out the engineers free of charge, again we tried to contact them via phone and got nowhere again and actually found call staff very rude and actually messing about at their desks with friends whilst on the line to us, sky took over with no further contact with talk talk and we got a new number.

We contacted talk talk via email and told them they were in breach of contact, we would not be paying for the engineer visits and we were up to date with any outstanding bills. Very very poor customer service IMO, the worst I have ever had the pleasure of dealing with, that talk talk email still sounds like a generic one, it's good they're going to get their fingers out of their arses for at least one customer even if the incentive was very bad publicity on a high traffic forum.

can I just flag up the wonderfulness that is The Utility Warehouse

I have a crush on every single one of their (UK) customer service people . Opened account in Dec, few teething probs with broadband and a line going down at the BT end - but they sorted it quickly and rang me back when they said they would and dealt with a legacy bill from the previous account holder and treat me like an intelligent human being - I am their loyal customer for life!

oh and yes it is the case that for everyone you introduce to them you get money off your own bill - but you would need my account no. for that to happen (don't think their magicness will extend to knowing catsrus is actually member xxxxx [hgrin]) so this recommendation is totally without any benefit to me and based solely on experiences of customer services (i.e. not whether YOU would actually save money by using them!) believe me, these people have clearly been trained by the best of MN trainers!

Pinkappleby - if TT are saying your mum rang them to agree to the contract being extended, you should be able to request a transcript of the call. The insurance company I work for charge £10 for this, but if TT are lying to you and there is no such call then you'll find out.