Never use Talk Talk

[Ryoko]

I've been on the net for many years, I was with Freeserve to start back in the 56k days, then Nildram, all was good until Talk Talk bought Nildram, first up they changed my username wiithout telling me, took a long expensive phone call to sort that out and get my new ID they should have told me about in writing.

Then they stopped taking payments from my credit card, took two expensive phone calls to sort that out seems they only accept DD now but didn't feel like telling anyone that in advance.

Now I find my email account (free account with x amount of storage) that I had with Nildram has been shut down once again without a fucking word.

If anyone out there was even remotely thinking of going with Talk Talk don't they are fucking arseholes.

They told me it would take 12 days for them to send a letter to me, when I asked why, I was told she didn't know, as she wasn't trained in that
I cancelled the DD and changed companies!
They haven't bothered me since.

Netto, you're very lucky they haven't bothered you since. We escaped as soon as our 18 month contract with them expired. They phoned me almost hourly to beg us to come back They are one of the worst companies I've ever bad to deal with. Beaten only by fucking car phone warehouse.

Been with them for years and never had any problems ! Home phone and Internet.

Awful problems with TalkTalk, we now use broadband from O2. They have major problems with anything to do with taking payment and their telephone support is a script read to you by someone very far away.

There have been a lot of problems reported about TalkTalk, so Imisssleepingin you're perhaps one of the minority.

TalkTalk has taken over a number of other ISPs over the years and integrating billing systems has been a major issue, plus reports of DDs continuing to come out of ex-customer accounts long after cancelling, and problems getting cash refunded (though I suspect pushing the bank might get it back).

From memory, Pipex, Tiscali and even AOL (UK) customers have been absorbed into TalkTalk.

OFCOM had them as one of the most complained about providers last year. *> LINK

Been with Tiscali for years, now talk talk (with broadband, phone, tv etc) and never had any problems, even when moving house they had us up and running the same day.

Just watch out if you ever leave that they aren't still billing you for months!

We have just killed our contract with them - DH was thinking about switching to try and get faster broadband (though I think it's actually our ancient cheap and tacky router that is the issue coz others on same street have lightning fast internet through them) so emailed them to find out when our renewal date was. Yes, that's right, you have to contact them to find out, it's not on your account or anything.

So anyway, they phone us up in response and it turns out the contract will finish in something like 4 days. They never sent us a letter informing us that it was coming up for renewal, and DH was so peeved about this that on the spot he told them to end the contract. So we'll now be without internet soon until our new company gets us set up.

We've not had any other issues with them except that when we merged (used to be with Tiscali) our internet went from being unlimited to a limited contract for the same price. Don't recall being informed of that either.

It also takes 20mins to convince them that their deceased customer will not be using their account in the future...does not want a discounted price and cannot confirm their password...

Well I've given up due to the fact I emailed them asking what the hell happened to my email account and got a reply saying dear mr xxxx (so they knew who I was/the email is from that particular customer (my BF pays it).

We can't answer you question without the following information
the email account address that is connected with the account (clearly they know this or they wouldn't have replied with my BFs name).
my Talk Talk phone number, don't have a talk talk phone.
the last 4 digits of the DD account number (I'm not sending that in an email).
my Talk Talk account number. (what account number they have never given me one?, all I have is the 8 year old written information from Nildram with my login details on it, talk talk have never sent me a damn thing).

I hate them so much.

haunted!

Also lol at ryoko, you can tell when they're just reading off a piece of paper, can't you? No common sense or anything.

for Ryoko - not sure why 4 digits out of a probable 14 would be too much of a worry.

I'd be tempted to cancel the DD with the bank and tell them in pleasant terms (after all, staff there now are not the cause of no paperwork / account number etc) that you've had nothing in writing since they took over Nildram some years ago, so cannot answer their various security questions.

Get yourself an independent e-mail account (eg with FastMail.net, in case Google Mail or Hotmail / Microsoft "Live" are considered evil services :) ) so you can switch ISP any time you want, and not worry about your ISP making a mess of e-mail services.

PlusNet had a bad reputation as an ISP years ago, because of various changes they implemented, marketing e-mail from Insight (I think) and then one year wiped out 700 GB of mail. OK, they said 90% was probably junk mail, but it only reduced anger among users by a limited amount.

They used to offer web hosting, but that has had various problems over the years. They used to offer fax-to-email and probably a few other things. Now they promote as offering broadband connection and e-mail (and don't offer / mention other stuff) though since they didn't cancel them completely they still have users (who won't set up independent web hosting because they are worried about search engines never finding their sites in future) who still have problems every few months.

I suggest using an ISP as just the method to get to the internet and don't risk anything else with them - not even your e-mail - as they can and do mess it up now and then... and e-mail is worse than anything else to move, as it is tied to the ISP in general. Some have offered e-mail only for a monthly fee, but I'd still take the free or independent route and use almost anyone else!

ps was sending e-mail round the world in the 80s, connecting first from the office (education, in support services of a computer centre) and later (after changing job in 1989) via BBS / Zetnet / Ultranet [had an e-mail address with them for 8 years until it was closed when Ultra.net taken over by RCN, a big Chicago cable firm] / Enterprise in mid 90s. Then in late 90s used Freeserve, Clara.net and BT for dial up with 2 phone lines, then Freeserve ADSL from end 2001, when they tested the Alcatel USB unit on a "wires only" connection (ie no BT engineer visit needed).

Have used Runbox.com, fastmail.net and for ~7 years, GMail

I've never had a problem with Talk Talk, used them for many years.

My freeserve fsnet email was taken over by Orange, and they too closed mine without a fricking by-your-leave or anything. They didn't give a monkey's when I complained. I'd had that address for 10 years, bastards.