Really unhappy and i feel i have been lied to by Plusnet

[#1]

My broadband was due to go live last Wednesday after switching from Talk Talk to Plusnet... It didn't happen!
After speaking with plusnet several times, I was advised each time that there's nothing that they can do as they can only call Openreach via their call centre in India which is closed. They informed me they should have an update within 48 hours, this was on Friday, still heard nothing.

After sending a complaint about the lack of contingency in place, I have now heard from openreach who have confirmed this to be untrue:
"Hi James.

I am sorry you having issues with your service James.

You need to ask your provider to contact us direct. There are a number of way they can contact us apart from calling us and they know this.

I am sorry but we can deal with this direct with you as we can only up date your provider.

This case will remain open for 5 working days to allow for you to reply, if we don't hear back from you within this time the case will automatically close.'

Kind Regards

Gareth

Volume Complaint, Openreach"

All I want is my broadband connected and to not be mis-informed by my new provider... I also have a ten year old son that needs to do his schoolwork which is being set online and also the Internet is his primary means of communication with his sister and other family!

Please can you contact openreach, find out why the work hasn't been completed and just have everything activated like it was supposed to be!?

[#2]

Hi!

My experience is that I switched end of Jan  from Virgin to Plusnet being aware that their network speed would be slower but they seemed to have a good review via Which. My contact with customer service was also good, polite, efficient.Once appointment got made with Openreach to reactivate my old BT line, it took them at least 3 visits to sort it out, but they did well. thenonce connected 2 weeks were fine, a bit slow but manageable. However since Friday ( Locked in had started a week before and connection was OK), it has dropped dramatically, Friday evening, Saturday , Sunday nearly impossible to watch Netflix. Today I got kicked out from a Conference call.

Obviously Customer service is not not contactable.

My experience

[#3]

I was fed this line today too when I wanted to find out about a connection appointment (remote switch on).

I have no telephone line or broadband, and mobile reception here is hit and miss, so I'm fairly cut off from my family.

And like yourself I found it unbelievable that a company like Openreach wouldn't have a contingency plan to compensate for the closure of one contact centre.

So I also contacted them directly and was told that appointment and fault updates can be viewed by Plusnet through a service provider portal as a free service. And there are other methods of contacting them, other than calling their call centre if necessary.

I've been with Plusnet for years prior to a house move, if I could find a way out of the contract, I would go elsewhere...

[#4]

Thanks for your post @bondbournemouth I'm sorry to see you feel we've lied to you.

I'm afraid that the advice we've given regarding our suppliers helpdesk for chasing up orders either via call or e-chat is correct, however that's not to say that what Openreach have told you via Twitter isn't correct, for example the emergency welfare teams are still open as vulnerable customers/those without any form of connection are being prioritised.

Orders are still progressed by our suppliers back-end teams and we can check our suppliers portal for updates on an order, although we'd need to wait for the update to come through, we can't go chasing or discuss an order to gain clarification.

I've done some digging into this and on the face of things it looks like that the number port delayed the order, however I can also see we placed two orders on the 11th March about an hour apart (One manually and one automatically).

Based on this and the response we received from the suppliers of our ordering system that absolutely no work was carried out at all, I suspect that the order got stuck in the Openreach systems due to the duplicate order.

Generally there can only be one type of order open in the supplier systems at any one time and a duplicate order, especially a duplicate of a big job such as a working line takeover can tend to cause issues.

The order is still showing in a delayed state although all the activities on the Openreach order tracker are marked as closed, so I've fired an email off to try to get some clarification if this means the order is cancelled before replacing the order.

I'll follow things up with you tomorrow when I should know more. Apologies for the inconvenience this causes.

Thanks for your post @fderaucourt 

I'm sorry for the issues you've had with your order and the connection problems you're having now.

I'll take a look at that in a moment for you and respond back to your thread.

Thanks for your post @Baz888 I'm sorry for the issues with your house move.

As above, we can and do check for updates on an order online via our suppliers portal however we'd need to wait for an update to come through. I can see yesterday afternoon we were advised: "Your order requires planning validation. We may contact your customer if we need to. You will receive a further update by 08-04-2020"

To give a bit more information on this from what we've got, the order is with contractors for cabling and jointing work. I've set a reminder for myself to check back then for you and I'll provide an update when we know more.

While I appreciate the frustration and I understand from your thread Here that an engineer said all that's needed is a remote switch, I'm afraid that this isn't something we can do unless line records show a stopped line at your address. I've checked and there aren't. Realistically we'd simply place the appropriate type of order and that's progressed by our suppliers. In this case the only type of order we could place was for an installation because there's no stopped or working lines.

Apologies for the inconvenience this causes.

[#5]

Hi,

Thank you. This is much better than being told that nothing can be done at all until the Openreach contact centre re-opens in 3 weeks.

I suspect I've confused matters by using the wrong terminology, by remote I just meant not having to access my home.

The last engineer did a cable pull to the jointing box at the bottom of the street and installed a Master Socket in my house. He did say only a switch on was required at the exchange, but when I spoke to the lad that booked the appointment for the 27th, he clarified with Openreach that the work was actually required at the green box.

That was what the appointment for the 27th was supposed to be booked for. I'm struggling to understand what further cabling and jointing is needed that Openreach didn't know about to be honest, but there we go.

You're the first person who has offered to keep me updated. So that's very much appreciated.

Regards,
Baz

[#6]

Thanks for getting back to me @Baz888 

No problem and apologies for the way we've handled this. I understand what you've said but I'm afraid I'd currently no way of relaying this information across to Openreach so we'd need to allow the order to run the natural course.

I've subscribed to email notifications on the order via our ordering system, which means I should get emailed any KCI's (Keep Customer Informed) and if there's one before the 8th April I'll take the ticket off hold and let you know.

[edit]

Customer in this case would be us as those notifications will be coming from Openreach

[#7]

@Gandalf could you look into my account please.the bt engineer come to my new house on the 27th march,the connection date and said he couldn't come in to install the new phone line but did anyway and I stood in the kitchen,he drove off in the van,came back and said they won't let him near the green box I think it was then left.i got a text a couple of hours later to say my phone line was activated but have been left without broadband since

[#8]

The situation sucks doesn’t it? I’m in a semi-rural town with no landline or broadband. My family is 200 miles away and I’m on my tod, friends are also self-isolating. I’m still getting texts from Plusnet as though it’ll all go ahead - my router arrived today! But as I’ve not been able to contact them I can only guess whether the engineer will turn up this Friday. I think they need more moderators! I was always against overseas call centres as UK and local knowledge are worth paying for. Not cheap foreign exploitation. This is a key reason for choosing Plusnet, with whom I’ve had no problems with before. I can give them some slack under the circumstances.

[#9]

So if a moderator could answer my questions then I’d be a very happy bunny. I posted at the weekend and still no response. It’s the not knowing that’s stressful.

[#10]

@Gandalf I have just checked the ADSL checker and it says there is a open order on your line which is due to complete on the 8th April and the date has changed from the 27th March,what does this mean?

[#11]

Hi @Juanita

The moderators on here are just customers volunteering their time to look after the forum.

They have no access to Plusnet systems or your account.

[#12]

@Juanita moderators are customers just like you and I and don't have access to your Plusnet account.

eta beaten by 22 seconds 😁

[#13]

Ahhh I am a newbie and hadn’t twigged that, so sorry. I know the moderators have no access to my account, I’m trying to get info under impossible circumstances (already fed up with that other U word. Does anyone know if an engineer will need to enter my home??? If they arrive....don’t get the Linux ref 🤔

[#14]

It’s all so technical! Love the moving eyes though 😻

[#15]

@Juanita if you already have a phone line installed then no,if you don't you will have to wait until June or later apparently