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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to think that bt are absolutely shocking!

44 replies

kazza446 · 20/12/2013 21:49

We have recently cancelled our sky package and gone to bt for full tv, broadband & telephone package. This is our 3rd attempt to switch over, each time theyve cocked it up in the process. I was quite positive that it would be a success this time. We received confirmation email last night to say they would be here today between 8am - 1pm. Had to arrange a sitter to come over as my son was poorly and needed a doc apt this morning. By 12:30, still no sign so husband rang them to be informed the engineer had been held up but would be with us soon. Still no sign by 145, so again had to arrange a sitter to stay with my poorly son while I went to school for church service and to collect other 2 kids. Husband chased bt again at 3pm to be told no engineer would be with us today as the one due to come out to us was not qualified to do the work. The earliest they can now book us in is 30th Dec. Our sky is still working but will go off in next few days meaning its likely our kids will have no tv over Christmas. I am so mad!! Should I just cancel the package with bt? If this is pre-customer service I wouldn't like to think how we will be treated once signed into a contract. Incompetent Bar stewards!!

OP posts:

Ilovemydogandmydoglovesme · 21/12/2013 17:09

Well I would say that freesat suits us fine as we don't really watch an awful lot of tv. I can't see us ever paying to watch tv. Other than the licence obviously. I might pay fifty or sixty quid to sit on my arse watching tv when I'm too old and infirm to do much else!

CiderBomb · 21/12/2013 17:18

Nothing is ever BT's fault, they will never admit fault or liability for anything, ever. If your having a problem with your internet connection I can guarantee that it will either be the fault of your computer or interference from another signal rather than a problem their end.

One day my internet went off, I noticed that my own hub and every other hub in my area (there are at least five in my street) vanished from the settings on my IPad. Obviously it was a problem in the exchange, but instead of just saying that it my iPad, my fridge, my washing machine you name it.

Why won't they admit fault?

LuciusMalfoyisSmokingHot · 21/12/2013 17:32

Oh run like the wind from BT, i've moved from them to Plusnet and i've so glad i did, i had 2 homehubs go wrong in the space of a week.

Also if you cant get sky back, just keep you sky box connected and you'll get all the free to air channels, its not great, but you get a few channels and a couple of kids ones, and film 4, its what i do, because i cant get freeview.

BohemianGirl · 21/12/2013 17:32

Could be worse - could be TalkTalk who are utter wankers

LuciusMalfoyisSmokingHot · 21/12/2013 17:34

Ugh, i'd rather eat my own tits than go with TalkTalk!!!

CaptainTripps · 21/12/2013 17:37

When did BT get so bad and why?

They were THE telecommunications company when I was growing up. Everyone was with them and they were good (pre internet).

Surely with the advent of competition, they would strive to be better.

I hope someone important from BT reads this because, honestly, people think your company sucks.

julielong1957 · 21/12/2013 19:23

Run as far away from BT as you can.
I've been with them for about 2 years in my new home, was with them about 10 years prior to this.

In the last few months they have DOUBLED the cost of the services I receive (just line rental, anytime calls and broadband) taking me from about £23 a month to £50!

For the last 2 years my bill was set as a direct debit and was always taken on or after the 16th of each month.

Last month on the 9th I noticed some money missing from my bank account, called my bank who said it was a charge from them (my bank) for a direct debit that had tried to be taken but I had insufficient funds.
BT had tried to take the money for my bill a week early and I was the one that had to pay a fee for something they did.
I was not notified that they would be taking money earlier.

My broadband is always dropping out and often goes off for days at a time.

Having to talk to the people in the call centre in India who I can rarely understand just gets frustrating so I am working on changing over to sky.........BT are making this VERY difficult and refuse to give me the MAC code I need.

TheBrotherHoodOfSteel · 21/12/2013 20:59

BT is bloody awful! I would rather pay extra and stay with sky! Cancel now while you can and ring sky back and ask for their forgiveness!

WankingInAWinterWonderland · 21/12/2013 21:07

BT charged me 4 times last year saying I had cancelled my contract and are a nightmare to deal with, I am still with them but only because Sky was too slow expensive

lookatmybutt · 21/12/2013 21:40

When my DPils phone line went down it was off for eleven weeks. Every day we phoned we got a promise that it would be fixed by the end of the day and a profuse apology. We got told it was our cable, the cable outside, the cable in the road, roadworks on our road (there were none), roadworks on the main road (again, none), no traffic lights available in the whole county for the roadworks needed to rectify the fault, it went on and on. Then they said an engineer was at the house fixing it as we spoke. Um, well we're here and there's no engineer. Then they said he was in our road, just outside our house. We don't have a junction box in our road.

Are you me? I'd think you are except I did actually have a junction box that they never even mentioned.

My internet went out every day for about 7 months. A few times it was out for a week. It ran like shit all the time if it ran at all.

I also had an invisible engineer! He even fixed my connection with his ethereal powers - though unfortunately in the alternate dimension he was obviously inhabiting.

In the end they sent some sort of weird PC doctor out, but my PC was fine.

He was so odd, he deleted my desktop picture of Alexander Skarsgaard, fiddled with my settings and icons so I couldn't find anything or work out what he's done for ages.

I came home just in time to stop him deleting all my Sims 2 games.

He was sort of like some weird PC stalker.

My internet was still fucked afterwards and my PC still ran the same as it did before.

I switched to Virgin.

Original poster

kazza446 · 21/12/2013 22:01

Oh sh*te, now I really am worried. No one appears to have a good word to say about them. Been to visit my dad today and he's just been shafted over by them too!! He has spent a week trying to cancel his order but had no luck at all. He's having problems with his internet and has been reassured its not st the exchange and will charge him £95 just to come out and inspect. He already has his phone line with them and they have upped his bill without informing him. They have offered him a free upgrade but its not arrived and he has been charged for it. I think a groveling call to sky may be in order!.

OP posts:

Trinpy · 21/12/2013 22:01

Only bad experiences of bt here as well. We had to turn the broadband off everytime we wanted to use the phone because the interference on the line was so bad. Called bt many times to complain about it, nothing ever changed - they did manage to flog us a new phone though (which made no difference). We always lost internet during peak times, so we could never watch netflix/mumsnet in the evenings.

I am a bit worried after reading this thread though. We've recently switched to Talktalk and so far no problems - interference on phone is gone and broadband is really good, plus we get youview which is a bonus. Cheaper than bt too. Not had to deal with customer service though so maybe thats where the catch is?

LuciusMalfoyisSmokingHot · 21/12/2013 22:50

Trinpy Customer services in the downside to TalkTalk, thats why i'd never go back, i hope you dont have to deal with them that often.

Ilovemydogandmydoglovesme · 21/12/2013 22:50

lookatmybutt I'm willing to bet there are thousands of us with the same experience.

florascotia · 22/12/2013 18:58

We live about 12 km from the nearest BT exchange. BT refuse to upgrade the necessary cables so that our village and neighbouring hamlets can get terrestrial broadband. There is no wireless reception - or mobile phone reception - in the area. Am sending this on expensive satellite broadband that is very vulnerable to bad weather; in rural north Scotland we get a lot of that.

EVEN SO, every month BT sends us junk mail urging us to switch to their BT broadband. Although we have not a hope in hell of getting it. And, unless they do sometime to upgrade their cabling, we never will have.

I have complained. They say that it is too difficult/expensive to sort out their mailing list. (But surely it could be very, very simply done, by postcode... What sort of confidence does this give anyone in the rest of their operation? )

If the junk mail continues into next year, I am thinking of charging them for wasting my time.

florascotia · 22/12/2013 19:03

Something, not sometime, obviously - goodness knows what happened there.

Oblomov · 22/12/2013 19:08

I had EXACTLY the same thing. Drove me mad. So angry with by I was. Back with sky.

SaggyOldClothCatPuss · 22/12/2013 19:24

I'm with Sky. For 2 years nearly, BT repeatedly told me that our apalling phone line and pathetic excuse for broadband were caused by a fault inside our house and not their problem, whilst taking our money for nothing. Sky rang to cold call us, heard about the problem and sent out an engineer who discovered that the problem was knackered wiring in the junction box, over a mile away and fixed it on the spot.
I will NEVER go back to BT.

KenAdams · 22/12/2013 19:24

They were great for me. The engineer showed up 5 days after we moved which was brilliant. Never had a problem with them.

Oh, and Sky told me I could get "free internet " as part of a package, then told me they don't provide it in my area when they turned up to install, despite selling it to me in the shopping centre across the road, so I cancelled the whole thing. They then told me they were taking £250 out of my account so I rang and queried it and they told me it was a mistake, but took it anyway and then took 6 weeks to get it back to me.

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