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*Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or broadband?

andyt1970
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Registered: ‎19-12-2019

*Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or broadband?

*Plusnet are happy to leave a family with a 3 year old autistic child with no working landline or broadband for Christmas…?

So, unless this fault is fixed by the end of today (19/12), it seems Plusnet and Openreach are happy to let a customer go without a working landline, broadband and wi-fi for Christmas as our line has been dead since Tuesday 17th and when I reported it. Apparently this is an external fault and an engineer needs to repair something at our local exchange, but trying to get a factual update out of Plusnet is like getting blood from a stone.

I am meant to be homeworking today, tomorrow and then until the New Year and I was also meant to be spending time with my autistic 3 year old son, but now I am having to go to work as we have no working landline or internet access of any kind. Try explaining that to a 3 year old.

Merry Christmas PlusNet / BT Openreach / whoever…… I’ve reported this fault, now can someone please FIX it ASAP and keep me updated.

I need my broadband so I can homework and be with my son over Xmas, my partner needs a working landline for calls, and our son needs his daily dose of YouTube video’s as he loves to sing and dance and watch his favourite CBeebies iPlayer programmes.

*We all know if it’s not fixed by today as we have been told then it’s not going to be fixed for Christmas…. so thanks for leaving us with nothing and in the dark, we only have PAYG mobiles each and I can only contact PlusNet while at work during office hours….

55 REPLIES 55
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Hi there, 

 

I'm really sorry for the issue with your line and for the poor experience of getting updates from us, it's far from what we'd want you to expect and we're definitely not happy to leave you without service. Would it be OK for me to give you a call so I can update you go through what we can do to help? 

 

Having checked the notes on Openreach systems I can see they've made us aware that the issue is linked to a "common fault" that means it's an issue that's affecting a number of lines in the same area. 

 

Common faults do tend to mean that greater priority is given due to the widespread impact and engineers have been assigned to work on it today (as of approximately 08:45 this morning) I've just spoken with Openreach and they've advised that the next update will be available to us tomorrow but they are hoping to have it resolved for us today.

 

I'm sorry that we're not able to tell you more than this at present but I'm taking personal ownership of chasing for updates on a regular basis and keeping the pressure on Openreach until it's been resolved. 

 

 

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 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
andyt1970
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Thank you for the reply. Do you know if it is still a fault at the local telephone exchange, or are the engineers "on site" somewhere local to me fixing things? i.e. someone has cut through some cabling / dug something up by accident?

 

Someone we know that lives on the next block of flats to us also suffered loss of service on Tuesday and there's was fixed Wednesday (TalkTalk customer).

 

 

andyt1970
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

EDIT: the above should have asked: 

 

i.e. has someone cut through some cabling / dug something up by accident? I wasn't implying I knew they had.

adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Hi Andy, 

 

We're not able to be aware of the exact cause or location unfortunately when it comes to common faults but yes it's likely that a "span" which is a bundle of lines or perhaps a cabinet has been damaged and needs to be repaired. Us not being party to that information won't have any effect on how long it takes to resolve though as much as it would be good to know I'm sure. 

 

We're just chasing to see if there's any further updates now so I'll keep you posted.

 

 

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 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
JOLO
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

@andyt1970 

On the back of your Trustpilot contact and this thread just to confirm that while Openreach haven't been able to say for definite that's it's third party cable damage they are advising it looks to be that it is the case that someone has accidentally caused a break in the cabling. Diggers are scheduled to go into to allow engineers to perform repair works and we should have something back tomorrow.
andyt1970
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Well no surprise to report NOTHING still works and this has dragged on since Tuesday now. Spoke to someone else who lives on the next block (500m away) and they lost all service on Tuesday and TalkTalk (again) got them connected back up the same day, so how come I am still without a working landline, and no broadband/Wi-Fi.

I was meant to be homeworking today too (plus until the New Year) and this is not now possible.

I have also lost (and will - having to had to come into work today) valuable, precious time with my son who I can no longer be with due to having absolutely NO broadband and landline working, so his Daddy has had to go into work again...

 

I will NEVER get this time back again, ever.....

 

I want seriously compensating for this and my landline and broadband resorting TODAY. No ifs, no buts, TODAY.

 

if TalkTalk can restore services to people 500m away from me, why can't PlusNet.

 

Absolutely disgusted.

 

No doubt PlusNet customer service staff will be winding down for a nice long Xmas break now, so I'll NEVER get this fixed before Xmas now.

 

[-Censored-]ed off? Just a little bit.

Moderator's note by Dick (Strat): Avoidance of swear filter edited as per Forum rules.

 

 

RealAleMadrid
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Unfortunately blaming PlusNet for this will not get you anywhere, they are completely at the mercy of Openreach who maintain the phone network and if cable damage has occurred it will take time to repair. Your references to TalkTalk getting their customers working again may be totally irrelevant, probably a completely different fault. TalkTalk certainly don't repair Openreach cables.

You may get a small goodwill payment for loss of service after the fault has been fixed but that's about it. It is not a guaranteed  service.

 

andyt1970
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

The 2 separate people we have spoken to also lost landline/broadband service at the same time as my partner (when I was at work) early Tuesday afternoon, both had no dial tone and no internet, both of them have now already been "fixed" and are now able to make telephone calls and use their TalkTalk broadband, so my point is, how come I also suffered this total loss at the exact same time yet we haven't been connected up yet, they both live on the next block of flats 500m away. Once I leave work here tonight at 5pm, we are totally blind all weekend with no landline or internet access until I come back into work Monday morning (when I was meant to be homeworking and enjoying Xmas with my son for the 3rd day, and 6 days after everything went dead on us).

 

 

 

adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Hi there, 

 

I completely understand how you feel, unfortunately it's not a safe assumption that if a Talk Talk line has been fixed then yours should be too, they mostly operate on a separate network that they maintain themselves so that's likely to be a coincidence and an individual fault with their service.

 

Having checked in with Openreach the fault was worked on yesterday afternoon and the final steps to get this fixed will need some excavation work to take place as they've identified a section of underground cable that needs to be replaced. That work is set to be completed by the end of the day on the 23rd at the very latest. That does imply that it may be done today but it's unfair to set an unrealistic expectation with you but I will continue to chase for more updates as the day goes on and will keep you up to date. 

 

Openreach still have this as a priority case for us due to the fairly widespread impact of it and should have everything resolved before Christmas. 

 

Once resolved I will be arranging a good will gesture for you and credit for the time without service too. 

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 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

I'm just waiting for Three 5G Mobile Broadband to be available in my area hopefully soon.

Very quick speeds not reliant on old  underground cables which can get damaged and third parties to repair faults.

Easily transferred to a new property and even taken on holiday.

I think if 5G mobile broadband is as good as the experts are saying and at a reasonable price many people will be transferring to it we will have to see.

I don't think it comes with calls but as most people I know have mobile phones with all inclusive calls anyway and more people are not using home phones  my daughters have a landline but do only use it for broadband  

 

Brian A

andyt1970
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

There's something about this whole situation that is dodgy to me, and a lack of consistent facts.

 

First I was told it's "external" and something that needs fixing at the local exchange, now after i queried is it due to someone accidentally cutting through something am told yes, it is. But no one can tell me WHERE? Near the telephone exhange or near to my block of flats. I process streetworks permits for all of Greater Manchester and haven't seen any permits submitted by Openreach anywhere near my flat to undertake footway/carriageway works, and certainly no "2 hour emergency work" permits. So where is the fault? Also, I just rang the 5 businesses in the shops underneath the flats where we live and none of the them have been affected by any loss of service at all this week. Surely we are all on the same "section"? When this happened to us before (2 weeks before my partner was due to give birth) and we were left with no landline/broadband with SKY, they found that someone had simply "removed" my connection from the "box on the wall" on the landing at the top of the stairs to these flats and connected a new tenant up, and literally cut us off. SKY soon rectified this.

 

 

adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

We're not party to the precise location of the fault, if we did know that wouldn't get things fixed any sooner to be frank as it's in Openreach's hands alone. We don't have any further updates just yet but I will let you know as soon as there's been more movement on the issue.

 

 

 

 

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 Adam Walker
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andyt1970
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

"the fault was worked on yesterday afternoon and the final steps to get this fixed will need some excavation work to take place as they've identified a section of underground cable that needs to be replaced. That work is set to be completed by the end of the day on the 23rd at the very latest."

 

I thought they had done all the digging yesterday/last night/today, and whats with this section of underground cable that needs to be replaced? Is this the cable that contains the "wires" to my landline/broadband so still isn't working? How deep are they digging.....

 

How long does it take them to get new cable?

 

I'm finishing work in half an hour so will totally be in the dark now over this until Monday. It doesn't look like it'll be working tonight if there's some big open hole somewhere with a section of damaged cable in that needs replacing if they have given you a date of 23rd December.

 

Do they work weekends?

 

 

adamwalker
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Re: *Plusnet happy to leave family with a 3 yr old autistic child with no working landline or bro...

Hi Andy, the fault is with a span of cables, that contains multiple lines that serve a number of properties in the same area, hence it still being classed as a common fault. 

 

The engineers should have the cabling required but such faults can take some time to organise and fix unfortunately. 

 

Yes, Openreach do work weekends, especially for widespread issues like this one so I'm confident there'll have been some movement by the close of play on Monday. 

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 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team