No broadband from day 1.

[#1]

Hi,

Our broadband service went live on the 29th of December. We moved from EE to Plusnet to take advantage of the lower cost for 18 months. We also swapped our phone line. The phone has gone through ok, no issues. However, we have not received a single megabyte of internet so far. On day one I left it until midnight, just in case, as instructed. The following day it still wasn't working. We've been through contacting, getting call backs, running tests etc. Basically there is a fault at the exchange and we are waiting for Openreach to fix it. We've had no internet since the 29th December, no streaming services, a 15 year old son unable to play his online games he got for Christmas. Supposedly Openreach have said it will be sorted by midnight on the 4th at the latest.

My question is, how likely do people think it is that, by pure coincidence, a fault occurred at the exchange on the exact same day we moved from EE to Plusnet? That's what I have been told a few times by Plusnet.

So far, I have been very disappointed by Plusnet. Not a great start!!

[#2]

@GPears These things can and do happen - it may sound strange, but if changes are needed at the exchange, then disturbing the connection can give rise to this. Leave it alone and it works, disturb it and the problem arises.

[#3]

@GPears 

A warm welcome to the forums.  Is this ADSL or FTTC?

[#4]

Hi,

It's ADSL. It was working fine with EE.

Thanks,

Glenn.

[#5]

Your EE was probably a 'LLU' connection at exchange; PN will use O/R's so it's different set of kit.

[#6]

I have asked the question elsewhere (for confirmation) - but given that this is ADSL then there might be physical circuit patching required in the exchange.  Sometimes physical changes goes wrong ... maybe a duff port was selected for the new connection or the cable was not seated properly.  Whatever, this space is all in the hands of BT Wholesale / BT Openreach, not any individual ISP.

It does beg questions over the professionalism of service hand over by BTw / BTOR to ISPs ... but that is not new news.

[#7]

@Gel 

Does EE use LLU?  Given that they are part of BT Consumer Division, one would have expected that they are all on BTw not LLU.

I have seen articles on LLU which do suggest that EE uses LLU, but given that they also include Plusnet in their lists, I suggest that they are confusing the use of BTw services to deliver broadband, with true LLU in which the last mile is connected to Sky or Talk Talk in the exchange, rather than BTw / BTOR equipment.

[#8]

So, from the responses I've seen so far, it seems as if the consensus is that it's just one of those things, something went wrong during the changeover, it's down to Openreach to fix it, waiting five days (so far) for the problem to be resolved is neither here nor there. It seemed really unlikely that a fault would appear on the day it went live, but it seems my expectations are too high. 

[#9]

5 normal working days would not be acceptable whatsoever!

However...

1. BTOR will not treat failure on installation as an installation failure and respond immediately as might any non-quasi-nationalised body (they still work to GPO practices)
2. Failed installations (and indeed failed repairs) are treated as new faults with a 72 hour fix target
3. There has been a long bank holiday - indeed two of them
4. BT engineers have been striking - so there is a backlog of repairs and installations

Your expectation that a fault occurring on the same day as the swich might be too high if your expectation is not informed by what needs to be done to effect the change in supplier.  As I said above, I believe that (at least) for ADSL a change in DSLAM ports is required ... which might indeed give rise to your exact situation.

[#10]

Townman,

Please do not take my post as a dig at your responses. 

I think I am well within my right to be a little disappointed by the service I have received so far.

Many industries do not observe bank holidays in order to maintain service levels to their customers.

My expectation may not be based on what is required, however, it is based on the expectation that this is not an out of the ordinary situation, something that occurs on a regular basis and should be able to be completed first time each time. As I said, that's my expectation. 

I personally get very tired with the "get out of jail card" that ISPs have, which is, it's all down to Openreach so there's nothing we can do. Again, it's just a personal thing.

[#11]

Do not disagree with you in the slightest.  In this day and age, BT Openreach is not fit for purpose, but Ofcom has not taken the many opportunities to effect change.

I have had many challenging experiences with BTOR whilst seeing Plusnet move heaven and earth (as far as BTOR processes allow) to effect a better outcome.  If BTOR says wait 3, 5, or 14 days, then that is what it will be.  It should be better, but it is what it is.

I can think of no other service supply where a new provision is "signed-off" without being tested as working properly.  A failure on installation being treated as a separate fault is reprehensible, but it is the BTOR (GPO?) way ... and all the ISP can do is to request rectification as soon as BTOR resources are made available.

[#12]

@Gel   EE is part of the BT Group and use the same BTW and Openreach infrastructure, so no LLU, and therefore this changeover should have been very straight forward. 

The OP has every right to be disappointed, however the bank holiday and weekend will not have helped get them back online.

[#13]

I can't influence the repair sadly, but I can confirm that line tests are showing a fault at the exchange. It is really odd as it should've been a straight-forward transfer with no engineering work involved.

Looking into this further, there's a discrepancy between our suppliers records and Openreach's records for the broadband 'tie pairs' at the exchange. Can't see how this happened but suspect it was due to a supplier system error when provisioning the service. When the engineer goes out, they should be able to fix the problem though.

[#14]

So, last night I got a message from Openreach to say Tom had completed the visit and that I now needed to contact my ISP.
I double checked and we still have no Internet.
It really feels like I'm being given the run around. Getting very fed up with it now.

[#15]

Ah disappointingly the engineer left notes to us advising they couldn't find a fault, but testing your line is definitely still showing a problem, so I've passed the job back to Openreach for further investigation. Repeated jobs are normally picked up within 24 hours, so hoping another engineer is on the case soon.