topic Shameful Customer Service in Plusnet Feedback

Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Mon, 09 May 2016 20:47:30 GMT

I have just had a horrible experience with Plus net customer care and wanted to Share it with everyone here.

I have moved from Sky Broadband to PlusNet and have had my ADSL speed reduced from 5 mbps to 3 mbps. Finding it challenging I raised a case online on 4th May. Since no action was taken until today, I called customer care to see if I can leave. The agent was not only rude but told me that if I try taking legal help then people will laugh at me. He very "politely" kept the phone down on me after refusing to give a reference number for the call.

I am quite shocked that this is the level of service I have received from such a big company. It was a mistake going for PlusNet.

Will fight as long as I can. Otherwise will think that I did charity and make my peace.

Moderator's note by Dick (Strat) Excessive white space removed.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Chris — Mon, 09 May 2016 13:49:35 GMT

I'm very sorry for the poor experience you've had. I've looked over the contacts on your account and I've sent feedback on to the manager of the person you spoke to as that is not the standard of service we want to provide.

Looking at your line, there was a higher number of errors showing so our faults team have tried to made a change to improve the quality of the line and therefore help with the speeds you're seeing.

How are the speeds looking now?

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Mon, 09 May 2016 20:47:03 GMT

Thanks for escalating. I was pretty disappointed as I was expecting an award winning service and not someone making a joke of my issue.

I have just replied to the support case. There has been no difference in the last 48hrs.

I am really struggling as I had moved over my TV and Main Phone over IP / Internet in Jan. Now besides communication I am also struggling with entertainment as everything just keeps buffering. Moreover my Job involves supporting data networks for a large corporation and with slow internet at home, I am now struggling with out of office support which I normally have to do over the weekends.

Had Sky for a year and never and an issue for a single min. Thought all ADSL are same and took the plunge for the PlusNet deal.

Moderator's note by Dick (Strat) Excessive white space removed

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Thu, 12 May 2016 21:19:36 GMT

Its been 9 days and no resolution. Everyday the agent only says that it has been escalated and someone will get back to me.

It is clear that this is not going to get resolved and I have to wait 8 weeks to go to tribunal !

Regretting the moment I got suckered into going for the plusnet deal... Never Again.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Chris — Fri, 13 May 2016 09:31:05 GMT

	Upstream DSL Link Information	Downstream DSL Link Information
Loop Loss:	27.8	50.5
SNR Margin:	8.5	6.0
Errored Seconds:	0	0
HEC Errors:	0
Cell Count:	212	265
Speed:	888	5109


Maximum Stable Rate (KBPS):	2272	Fault Threshold Rate (KBPS):	2272
Mean Time Between Retrains (Seconds):	86400	Mean Time Between Errors Upstream (Seconds):	2160
Indicative Line Quality:	A	Mean Time Between Errors Downstream (Seconds):	5

The mean time between errors on your line is very very very low. This is not going to be helping with the speeds you're seeing at all.

How is the phone line, is there any noise/crackling etc when you pick up the handset?

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Fri, 13 May 2016 14:38:35 GMT

There does not seem to be any noise.

Also I only connect the phone to the socket to test for noise. Besides that there are no instruments connected. Only the ADSL router. Though I have added a brand new micro filter yesterday to see if it makes a difference but no luck.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

MatthewWheeler — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:02:25 GMT

Our faults team will get this looked into but it's likely to need a engineer visit as we're seeing a very high amount of errors.

You don't have any devices near the router that could be causing interference do you?

Re: Shameful Customer Service

MauriceC — Fri, 13 May 2016 16:45:34 GMT

MatthewWheeler wrote:You don't have any devices near the router that could be causing interference do you?

E.g. DECT Phone base station; PC; Laptop or even the router itself?

I had a case where a TG582 had a very 'noisy' power supply causing lots of problems.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Townman — Tue, 17 May 2016 13:05:10 GMT

@Chris,

Seting aside the low MTBE the synch speed is right on target for 50dB attenuation.

@vaarunmalik,

This might imply that there is something causing interference. Given your IT skills, you might care to look at monitoring the SNRM using router stats. Links for down loading and setting up with a TG582n can be found below.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Wed, 18 May 2016 20:41:18 GMT

I had booked the Engineer visit on 16th but have not heard back yet.

Surprisingly I got an email on 17th saying the below

Estimated line speed	4.5Mbps to 9Mbps
Current line speed	20.9Mbps

On the same day the speed went slightly up to 4.5-4.6 Mbps which is still sad. But I was surprised what 20.9 Mbps current line speed meant ?

The connection was stable for the last 2 days but today again it went down to 3 Mbps. It has been raining all day and I am guessing there is a problem outside the boundary of my property but it is one of those things which will take a very motivated engineer to identify and resolve.

I have removed everything in the 1m vicinity of the router and changed the router itself with no luck. If it was a power supply that would have got resolved in changing the router. If it is something else in the room then it seemed to have not created any issues with Sky broadband for last 1 year.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Townman — Wed, 18 May 2016 22:45:46 GMT

The profile figure is very odd. That will need CRT (PlusNET assistance).

The source of REIN could be anywhere, not just within 1m of the router. Without constant monitoring of the SNRM it is not possible to confirm or deny the presence of REIN. Electrical devices deteriorate over time, so back in your sky days they might have been ok but not now.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

War4war — Thu, 19 May 2016 00:13:47 GMT

You can get the agent who spoke to you. The company keep a complete call log so purely time and date will reference the call on your account.....you just need to complain. Note don't accept their Bull that you need to write in...that's wrong. As an airtime provider of services they can take complaints verbally over the phone. It's a breach for them to refuse ... that's cause for a regulator complaint who do take phone complaints.
So called service is not great. You can also leave the contract if it reasonably provides a poorer service. If you log speeds and produce as evidence they are screwed. Disregard Bull on contract....most of these idiots can barely stand up to see lightning and hear thunder let a one answer reasonably.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Thu, 19 May 2016 20:24:18 GMT

I have checked every thing at home and I am sure the problem is not on my side.

On 13th May I agreed to an engineer visit but instead of that the faults team thought the problem was resolved and on 16th May put my ticket on hold. 3 days down today on 19th, there is no update and I am still chasing for an update.

Its been 16 days that I have had an under performing connection but the Support team only counts since last communication which is shameful way of covering their poor service!

I am quickly realizing that I am stuck in this trap until my contract end.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Mustrum — Thu, 19 May 2016 21:47:11 GMT

But what checks have you done? How are you testing, wired or wireless? Where are you testing? What with?

From the stats, it would appear you have a good connection, but your own tests are poor. So it would help if you could provide a little more information.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Sat, 21 May 2016 10:10:32 GMT

I have tried 3 different routers. I am connecting the laptop directly to the router via wire. Router is connected to the master socket.

The problem is the ADSL sync is itself very low so I am not going to get the minimum promised bandwidth anyways.

Every time I chat with an agent they can see a problem on the line however when it is escalated to the faults team, they are not able to find any issue.

Attached is the Openreach speed test result.

I feel like I am trapped in a cycle of 72hrs. I chase over chat - they see a problem and escalate - faults team comes back with nothing.

I requested the agent to remove interleaving to see if there is any speed improvement but they are said the line already had too many errors.

I don't use a fixed phone and there is nothing else connected to the line to create an issue from my side.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Townman — Sat, 21 May 2016 10:32:39 GMT

At this point in looking at your problem, BTw speed tests on their own are nearly useless. You (we) need to see that your line is synching at the best possible speed and that everything which contributes to delivering the best usable speed is aligned. That is why we ask for concurrent router stats, BTw speed test (further diagnostics) and PlusNET current speed.

Though the laptop is connected via a cable, is its wifi interface switched off / disconnected? If not there is no assurance that the speed tests are being conducted over the Ethernet interface.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Wed, 08 Jun 2016 13:28:10 GMT

BT Speed test results are below

Download speed achieved during the test was - 3.88 Mbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speeds is 1.2 Mbps-4 Mbps.
IP Profile for your line is - 3.92 Mbps

I was advised speeds between 4 - 7 mbps while placing the order with min speed of 4.5 Mbps. Previously with Sky I used to get downloads of 5 - 5.5 Mbps and I am not talking about ADSL sync speeds.

There is nothing wrong with the equipment on my site. I know how network works and I am running tests properly. Moreover even if it was the Wi-Fi in my house that was such a big issue then I have 802.11ac which is giving me a link of 526 Mbps. This will not make the ADSL bandwidth drop from 5.5 Mbps (with Sky) to under 4 Mbps (with Plusnet). Still I am testing over ethernet without any other device connected.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Townman — Fri, 10 Jun 2016 21:31:00 GMT

Do you know how ADSL works?

In the absence of the information requested, if you think there is still an issue, the only advice I can offer is to raise a broadband fault report (use the link below) and hope for the best.

Re: Shameful Customer Service

vaarunmalik — Thu, 21 Jul 2016 21:05:15 GMT

To continue the saga... Its been more than 2 months and numerous ridiculous 10-days waits for the line to stabilise, 3 engineer visits and a horrible customer care experience, now I have come to the conclusion that it is Plus net's poor quality equipment that is responsible for my misery.

The BT openreach engineer has advised me that the cabinet is getting 8mbps and I am not far from the cabinet. One engineer went as far as saying that PlusNet use older technology to control the connection and many times don't know how to configure it in the first place.

I am kind of sick of plus net engineers always resetting the line and asking me to wait 10-days with no resolution. This is a time wasting tactic cause they have committed to speeds they cannot delivery.

Whether this gets resolved or not, I am never going to use plusnet ever again in life and I would spread the message as far as I can. Regret leaving Sky!

Re: Shameful Customer Service

Townman — Tue, 26 Jul 2016 10:03:47 GMT

Sorry, but that is total [-Censored-]s - however not untypical of appalling lazy BT Openreach engineering.

ALL OF THE EQUIPMENT USED TO DELIVER YOUR BRIADBAND SERVICE BELONGS TO BT OPENREACH.

Retail ISPs such as PlusNET, Sky, Talk Talk, indeed BT Retail all use the same exchange to cabinet to home infrastructure owned and managed by Openreach. In exchange, only Sky and Talk Talk use non-BT Openreach equipment. In some areas, Sky and Talk Talk do have better equipment than that is being supplied by BT WHOLESALE to all of the other ISPs. As I asked before, do you understand how ADSL works / is delivered? No ISP controls the local infrastructure / equipment. There are different standards and in some rural areas, BT infrastructure is still in the stone ages.

If you have 8mbps at the cabinet then the loss between the cabinet and your home is down to the length and / or quality (could be aluminium) or the 'copper' d-side circuit ... or possibly your internal wiring.

Yoh have ignored several requests for router stats - just what is the reason for your reluctance?