topic Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then? in Plusnet Feedback

Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

FedupwithPlusNe — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 17:59:15 GMT

Today, Friday afternoon, I finally had enough of PlusNet: the poor support, the slow speeds, the high cost, the misleading 'honest' advertising. So I did the obvious thing, requested a MAC Key. Guess what? I can't get thru to anyone, just put on hold for fifteen minutes and then disconnected. Try again? No chance, now the recorded message says the 'Customer Options Team' are no longer available. Hmmmm now why would that be? PlusNet once again are not acting honestly and are breaching the terms of their own commitments. A MAC Key must be provided on request. Now I've requested one by raising a ticket but what's the betting I'm just told to call the same number, and be put on hold again. Not a good way of trying to retain customers.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

mikko — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 19:57:25 GMT

There are only two ways to request a MAC from PN: by phone (0800 432 0200 or 0345 140 0200) or by post.
From the PN T&Cs:: Note: we can't reply to cancellation requests made by Ticket.
Pretty ropey I know'. I posted about it before but nothing changes. Lucky it's not only by post. They should make it easier but that's a business decision I suppose.
I'm gonna stick with 'em for now as I've seen worse and I haven't seem any other ISP's staff coming on to a forum like this to try and sort things out.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

adamwalker — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 09:23:22 GMT

We're really sorry about the long wait and especially if you were disconnected.
We're not able to help with cancellation requests via the forums I'm afraid but keep trying.

Quote
now the recorded message says the 'Customer Options Team' are no longer available. Hmmmm now why would that be?

What time did this happen please? I ask as that team's open hours on the phones are 9.00am to 5.30pm

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

gswindale — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:24:50 GMT

Adam,
Is there a sound reason why MAC Keys cannot be provided simply by raising a support ticket?
This would at least give departing customers a good final impression of the company.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

adamwalker — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:34:01 GMT

It's to give us the opportunity to try and retain customers where possible. That's something that's obviously in our interests but its also important that we don't want to leave a bad impression in case customers want to return to us in the future so we'll do all we can to push any such issues back into the business.
Adam

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

Chris — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:35:27 GMT

It's a conversation we've had many times on this forum so please forgive me if I summarise the reasons.
Basically we have to provide minimum 2 methods of cancellation, we're decided for us at the moment it's calls and letter. The main reason is so we can talk to customers before they leave and try to convince them to stay, or to offer to fix any problems they may be having, this conversation is much better to have over the phone and leads to much higher save figures than ticket does.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

jelv — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:54:22 GMT

Do you have a figure for the percentage of calls to the Customer Options Team resulting in a fault being raised, fixed and the customer remaining with Plusnet?

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

Chris — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 16:09:38 GMT

I'm honestly not sure, I know we track the save rate at different intervals (7 days, 14 days, 21 etc) but I'm not sure how much we've tied that back to faults.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

gswindale — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 18:48:49 GMT

Quote from: Chris
It's a conversation we've had many times on this forum so please forgive me if I summarise the reasons.
Basically we have to provide minimum 2 methods of cancellation, we're decided for us at the moment it's calls and letter. The main reason is so we can talk to customers before they leave and try to convince them to stay, or to offer to fix any problems they may be having, this conversation is much better to have over the phone and leads to much higher save figures than ticket does.

So basically it's because it is not in your interests to provide soon-to-be ex-customers with a good level of customer service.
Fortunately I'm happy with PN at present; however should I ever wish to move; I would not want to be hanging around waiting for somebody to answer the phone & try and convince me to stay - I'm requesting my MAC for a reason.
Similarly I want to go as quickly as possible - I don't want to have to rely on Royal Mail to fail to deliver or have to pay over the odds for recorded delivery.
I would very strongly recommend that you allow requests to be made by ticket along with a box to allow you to call the customer at a time to suit the customer to discuss any issues.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

jelv — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 18:57:41 GMT

Someone is syncing at 3Mbps and finds their neighbour is getting 12Mbps from say BT. Doesn't think it's a fault but rings up to get a MAC to migrate to BT. As a result of call a fault gets raised and soon they are also getting 12 Mbps with Plusnet.
I think you'd be very surprised how often that sort of thing happens!

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

FedupwithPlusNe — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 00:54:27 GMT

Quote from: _Adam_Walker_
It's to give us the opportunity to try and retain customers where possible. That's something that's obviously in our interests but its also important that we don't want to leave a bad impression in case customers want to return to us in the future so we'll do all we can to push any such issues back into the business.
Adam

It gives a far worse impression when people like me tell all their friends how PlusNet's Customer Service Stats show 'Max waiting time 2 minutes 43 seconds' at the same time as the team who issue MACs are keeping customers on hold 20x longer than that. Good honest broadband? Opportunity to retain customers? I think not.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

adamwalker — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 08:48:37 GMT

We're looking at updating those stats to be more helpful as they don't reflect the wait times for the customer options team that deal with cancellations.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

BabaOsw — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 09:34:06 GMT

Upon reading this (based on just one of the issues I still have (MAC code)), it brings me to raise the issue that by sending things through the post often appear to go missing - possibly through convenience (not saying this would be the case with PlusNet) and therefore leaves making a phone call. This will obviously lead to customer service asking the question 'why do you want to leave?' scenario. I do not think this is fair on your customer service staff as they will more than likely receive high tempered conversation. I for one will not/cannot phone an expensive number from a pay-as-you-go, especially to be on hold for 'x' amount of minutes - and I do not/will not have a landline phone connected. If the only option therefore to post, it would have to be 'recorded', yet another expense to the consumer - of which maybe the reason they are wanting to leave in the first place.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

dimcass — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 14:20:03 GMT

I'm thinking of leaving and I,too, do not trust post or want to have a long chat with someone trying to convince me to stay with Plusnet.
I'm very happy with PN but by changing I can save 120 a year and that's quite a lot for me.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

adamwalker — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 14:35:58 GMT

Sorry to hear you're both thinking of leaving.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

KevinG — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 10:32:15 GMT

Quote from: dimcass
I'm thinking of leaving and I,too, do not trust post or want to have a long chat with someone trying to convince me to stay with Plusnet.
I'm very happy with PN but by changing I can save 120 a year and that's quite a lot for me.

But if you had that conversation you might save £10 a month staying with Plusnet.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

dimcass — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 11:28:36 GMT

you really think that would happen?Has anyone you know had a discount of 50%?

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

jelv — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 11:54:30 GMT

You won't know if you could get a discount like that unless you ring up and ask!

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

whelpton — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 12:07:39 GMT

Quote
Has anyone you know had a discount of 50%?

And more.

Re: Won't provide a MAC Key? Why's that then?

joncooper — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 12:10:07 GMT

This is exactly why plus.net want people to phone, so they can find out what your issue is and maybe resolve it.