topic Re: phone provider changed withour permission! in Plusnet Feedback

phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 11:58:30 GMT

I had two emails in May/June to advise that a request had been made by another provider to move my services. I had not requested this. I telephoned plusnet twice and was told that this would not happen as I hadn't requested it. We then went on holiday to discover on return that, yes, our phone line and broadband had been moved. Phoned plusnet who did not seem very concerned about this and suggested that we "keep" the new number and just take out a new service for broadband etc with them!
I however, explained that as this was not out fault and would cause us more hassle to change our telephone number with everyone we know that they get back our old number. They arranged for an engineer to call ELEVEN days later to install a new line. Guess what? they didn't turn up. After taking a day's leave after not long having two weeks off for holidays, I was not impressed. Phoned again, they did not know why the engineer didn't turn up.
Chased again a few days later, to be told that the job had been done remotely! Yes, it seemed that we now had a new line, but again it was a different number not our old one!
We are now on day 30 and it seems like I may well have to phone again....

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

chrispurvey — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 13:13:21 GMT

Hi ncar,
Sorry to see the issues you've had with your phoneline.
I'm glad to see that you now have a working line but you state that it is the incorrect number, everything is showing as correct from our side.
If this is incorrect then we need to raise a fault and get an engineer to resolve this, this will not require access to your premises.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 13:18:58 GMT

Your customer service department already know this is not the correct number.
Ofcom have advised that you should have used the emergency restoration process. This should enable a service to be restored quickly according to them.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

chrispurvey — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 13:29:47 GMT

The line is now restored, but with it being on the incorrect number we've had to raise a fault.
An engineer has been tasked to resolve this on Wednesday 23rd July, as I mentioned it will not require access to your premises.
Please let us know how you get on.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 13:30:51 GMT

thank you I will

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

flexo1966 — Tue, 22 Jul 2014 08:57:24 GMT

Happened to me as well. Swopped to plusnet waited in for a day, no one turned up, plusnet had no clue. Long story short they lost my number of over 20 years and have so far refused me any compensation on the days holiday i have taken. Number was later restored. Customer support should be done over the trades description act. Phone lines are a complete joke and need immediate attention. This company had a very good reputation but now has sadly let it slip.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Tue, 22 Jul 2014 10:31:20 GMT

I hope also i'm going to have a credit for my invoice for the period of 22/06/14 to 21/07/14 for broadband £16.99, since it is not working due to the number being changed.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

chrispurvey — Wed, 23 Jul 2014 13:09:15 GMT

Hi ncar,
I've taken a look at the engineer notes and it states that they have resolved the issue, is your number now correct?

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Wed, 23 Jul 2014 13:16:45 GMT

Yes, had a call from the engineer at about 12.40 to say they needed access to the house, thought that this was being done remotely, but as I only work 5 minutes away and was able to leave that was ok. Our number has now been restored. Should the broadband come back on automatically or will something else need to be done?

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

chrispurvey — Wed, 23 Jul 2014 15:11:20 GMT

So the broadband has been knocked off your line due the aforementioned issues. I've managed to get a new order placed and this will complete tomorrow for you and you should be able to connect.
Let me know when you're online and then I'll get the rest the rest of this sorted for you around the time you've been without service.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Fri, 25 Jul 2014 12:57:11 GMT

Internet is now working!!

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

Townman — Sun, 27 Jul 2014 18:48:40 GMT

Chris

Quote from: ncar

I telephoned plusnet twice and was told that this would not happen as I hadn't requested it.

Has anyone checked the recording(s) of this instruction for PN to block the transfer? Slamming stories such as this have been rather too numerous of recent months on these forums. Is their a need for PN to review their anti-slamming processes? Does PN keep a watch on who is slamming their customers and report the same to Ofcom?
Whilst fundamentally the slamming third party is responsible for this shambles, the industry anti-slamming processes should have prevented this transfer / debacle. If those processes were followed and the line was still slammed then PN need to make representations to Ofcom / BTOR so that the failed processes are rectified.
It would also seem that the staff who dealt with the consequences were not aware of the presence of the emergency restitution processes fir either this customer or the others who recently experienced deliberate or accidental line slams. Is there a training need here?
Kevin

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

Acassim — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 09:50:36 GMT

Morning Kevin,
Slamming is indeed a tough subject to broach given the OFCOM regulations surrounding the process of an order to transfer a phone service away. We are required to inform all customers who have such an order placed which we do via email however we're not allowed to call the customer direct regarding this as it could be classed as an attempt to retain a customer who is legitimately looking to transfer the service to a new provider.
Given this, we can only hope that customer who are indeed being slammed will pick up the email notification and get in touch with us. Once they do this, we are well within our rights to cancel the transfer at the customers request however up until this point we're powerless to do anything more.
It seems in this instance, the customer wasn't aware of the latest attempt that completed as they mentioned they were away on holiday so I can agree that in an situation such as this, the process should be more robust to ensure that the line isn't slammed. Unfortunately for both the customer and ourselves, our hands are somewhat tied
Moving forward, with the introduction of the new SIM2 process we will no doubt see a lot more of this type of issue as it will cover both LLU and BT network customers for both phone and broadband but will leave us in the same boat across the board.
With regards to reporting this to OFCOM, we generally do this however action only tends to be taken en mass when a number of providers submit reports of slamming from a given source so we tend not to see much of punishment being issued to the offending company until a significant number of reports are lodged against them.
In an ideal world we would be allowed a non-retentions style call to each customer who transfers their services away so that we can check the legitimacy of the order on the fly and cancel this where the customer didn't request it, unfortunately this is unlikely given the regulations surrounding the process as well as being a bit of a killer where resource is concerned from an outbound call perspective.
From memory in my previous role, there is potential for an ISP of our size to have upwards of 3000 to 5000 transfer orders open at any given time, once we add in the SIM2 process we would look to have this increase significantly. God only know what this would look like within a large ISP such as BT but I can only imagine that it would sit within the multiple tens of thousands!
I foresee that the best way of dealing with this is to ensure that we have a robust automated system to deal with sending out the alerts to customers as soon as the order is logged in the system to allow plenty of time for it to be picked up and contact to be made to cancel if this isn't something that should be happening.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

Townman — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 10:21:28 GMT

Adam,
Thank you for providing a detailed and comprehensive explanation, not just in respect of this individual's experience, but the wider context as well.
This user's experience does though point to some challenges with the process...
1. If the communication is via email, then it is essential that users maintain their preferred contact email address in the PN portal and regularly monitor that email address. May be such emails should be sent with a read acknowledge, with the responses processed by the CRM system - idea for the new CRM system?
2. Whilst the 10 day transfer 'hold' period might be just enough to allow end to end cancelation of a slam, it is not long enough if someone is on a two week vacation... Whilst lengthening it is going to pee off those who do want to migrate.
3. A second attempt to slam (or was it another Sky human mistake?) within such a short period ought to have raised some concern... if there was some alert maker capable of being set on an account, indicating a recent transfer block request. I recall a few weeks ago a user's line being transferred because Sky identified the wrong asset - clearly in such a situation having seen the transfer attempt fail, it will more than likely be resubmitted, no doubt with the same wrong information.
4. Could PN consider providing a separate "fast answer" (or even automated) contact number for slam transfer cancelations? Thinking about this user's experience, if they had been monitoring their email whilst on holiday abroad, the last thing they need to be faced with is an international mobile phone call to the general support number and the inevitable wait.
Finally, you made no comment about PN staff's awareness of the emergency restitution processes to which the OP / Ofcom referred. Looking elsewhere on the forums today, it seems to me that thus would me useful in other situations were lines have been cancelled in error - e.g. Horseygin.
Cheers,
Kevin

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

picbits — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 10:37:48 GMT

Out of curiosity, who was the telephone provider who was taking over your line ?

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

Acassim — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 11:26:36 GMT

Thanks Kevin,
Apologies for missing a response on the emergency reactivation process, I think I was a little too carried away in regards to the new processes headed our way
To address your question in order:
1) I'm hoping that I'm reading this one correctly - I understand the logic behind having the read acknowledgement on the transfer email however I'm unsure on how this could benefit either party. At present we're only supposed to cancel a transfer order if the customer gives us consent to do so. Given this we wouldn't be able to action anything either way of the email being opened and read. I guess it would shift responsibility entirely from the company if the customer read it and didn't act upon it and it later transpired that they were being slammed however at present this isn't going help the matter either way.
2) I in complete agreement with this, there will always be an unforeseen issue present that could cause this type of problem however an increase in this transfer window would only serve to upset the customers who are legitimately transferring their service so its a bit of a tough one to settle. In my mind (and I understand this may not go down very well) it would make sense to have a page interrupting regular browsing that would inform of the transfer and link to either a support ticket or even better, an interface that gives the option to accept or reject the transfer that links into the order system if this needs to be cancelled. This would then give the customer full control although at the expense of causing interruption.
3) I'm also in agreement with this! Just last week I dealt with an account where the customer provided us with a slightly different address to that of the house they were moving into which resulted in us attempting to take over a line twice before we got to the root of the matter. This type of issue does indeed happen by accident and ideally it would be stopped automatically if attempted and cancelled in quick succession. Maybe an improvement to the idea given under option 2 would be to allow customers to lock their line at the wholesale level via the member centre, this way they could unlock it if they do intend to transfer and all attempts would be rejected while locked. Unfortunately this would be down to the supplier to offer such a system although I'm sure we could build something similar on our side if we had the time or resource to do so.
4) In an ideal world I think this would be a good idea however this would require a heck of a lot of resource to cover it and I would hazard a guess at this workflow being subject to peaks and troughs in calls. Ultimately I think we should put the power in the customers hand and allow them free reign over what they want to do, as covered in answer 3.
Finally, with regards to the emergency re-provision of services slammed/ceased in error, I'm not aware of a solid supplier process for this under either of the situations. We have access to an expedite service at cost to ourselves (which should be covered if we ceased the asset early/incorrectly) however this isn't guaranteed to complete any earlier (and in a lot cases doesn't) which would soon start to mount up. There would be no way for us to claim these monies back from the provider who slammed the service.
As the majority of these issues turn out to be slammed lines, I would estimate the cost of covering the expedite process as being anywhere north of £50k minimum per year on a conservative estimate. It would be interesting to see the actual number of slammed lines we see over the annual period however it would be a little tough to quantify as this isn't something we actively report on in-house.
Given that OFCOM mentioned this process I will be sure to have a dig around to see if this is something that exists as it could well be something we're unaware of and therefore severely underutilising!

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

MisterW — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 11:49:58 GMT

Quote
Given that OFCOM mentioned this process I will be sure to have a dig around to see if this is something that exists as it could well be something we're unaware of and therefore severely underutilising!

Let me help you Adam.
According to this http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/consultations/switching-fixed-voice-broadband/MPB_28.pdf it was something being proposed in 2010

Quote
Emergency restoration process
–
A strawman proposal is being developed by
OR/OTA and will soon be shared with CPs for their review. Work in progress.

knowing OFCOM it's probably still being discussed

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

Townman — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 11:59:41 GMT

Adam,
Thank you for another comprehensive response filled with positive out-of-the-box thinking. If oxygen can be breathed into any of your ideas a significant improvement could be made to this arena.

Quote
It would be interesting to see the actual number of slammed lines we see over the annual period however it would be a little tough to quantify as this isn't something we actively report on in-house.

If you don't measure it, you'll not know what it's actually costing PN to fix mistakes - wherever they arise from, especially 3rd parties. Until you have a view on the end to end cost of this (including end user dissatisfaction) the impact of doing nothing cannot be appropriately informed. I recall around 4 such incidents reported on the forums over the last two months.
It would be interesting to learn what you find out about the emergency restitution processes referenced by Ofcom. If there is a hidden process (in most circumstances it should just be a software change / configuration regression) then obtaining access to it could deliver massive benefits all round.
Kevin

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

Townman — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 12:28:54 GMT

Quote from: ncar
Ofcom have advised that you should have used the emergency restoration process. This should enable a service to be restored quickly according to them.

Hi ncar,
Seems as though your somewhat unfortunate experience has shone a good deal of light into the inadequacies of the Ofcom over seen industry processes. Loosing supplier is obliged to be passive in advising that a transfer instruction has been raised and slamming supplier is free to immediately re-raise the order with no restriction or review. At all times defensive action is reliant on the EU dealing with each 'industry rule dictated' passive notification.
Would you by any chance still have your Ofcom complaint reference number? Passing that on to Adam (by PM) might be a route to helping him finding what the agent is referring to. Mistaken advice from Ofcom is not unheard of. The agent might be referring to an idea which never got implemented (see above), has just been implemented or even is about to be implemented.

Re: phone provider changed withour permission!

ncar — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 13:25:06 GMT

Not sure of the supplier trying to take over the line.
Adam, I can forward you the email I received from Ofcom if you require it.