Totally Frustrated at lack of response

[#1]

I initially raised a support call on 10th August regarding the fact that our broadband speed was significantly less than it had been previously.
Nearly 2 months and 4 BT Engineer visits later I have been told that there is a definite loss of speed between the last junction box and our house but that BT are not prepared to fix it as the speed we are getting is 'within their contractual commitments'. The support department said they were 'sorry'!
This left me with no-where else to go as the BT line is the only way I can get Broadband into the house.
We then had a discussion about me PAYING MORE MONEY (!!!) to have the Broadband upgraded to Fibre - so to overcome the slow speeds that meant we could no longer watch things like BBC iPlayer without irritation pauses, I could pay more and have the upgrade.
In the telephone discussion I had regarding this last Friday morning, it was pointed out that I should expect to see a speed of about 15mbps instead of the normal 30 something on Fibre, due to the fault on the line.
I agreed to pay extra to have this improvement, however I wanted a written confirmation to say that if there was no significant improvement after this upgrade due to the known fault on the line that nobody was prepared to fix, that I wanted to be able to cancel the upgrade and not be subject to the 18 month cancellation fees.
This was agreed, and I was told that a new question would be raised for me that morning, confirming this. A ticket was eventually raised the following Monday, but contained no commitment to the expected speed I would achieve, or to the get out of the cancellation fees if the projected speed wasn't achieved.
I pointed this out on the ticket, but here we are, Thursday evening and still, nothing has been done about it.
I have just about had enough! I am appalled at Plusnet's general lack of urgency on this matter - the initial call was raised on 10thAugust and still, the response is incredibly slow and I have to constantly waste my time chasing this.
My next step is to transfer to BT - even though they are the cause of our speed problems - their Customer Service cannot be worse than this!

[#2]

from my engineer visits i believe the bit between the street box and your house are yours and have to be paid for to be fixed. Not sure if your responsibility starts when it crosses the property line or not though. Could it be possible for pn to test the location of the fault using equipment hat shows how many metres along the line the fault is. If it's under the pavement you might be alright.  Just a thought.
podman

[#3]

I'm sorry about any delays surrounding this. I can see that you spoke to an agent on the customer options team on the 10th. I'll need to speak with that person to check a couple of things relating to what was agreed between them and yourself.
I'll make sure that happens today and we hope to be updating you with regards to order progress ASAP.

[#4]

Hi Podman - it has been acknowledged that the fault is the responsibility of BT but because the lower speed I am now getting is above BT's contracted minimum, they are not prepared to fix it!
Apparently there are other spare lines on the cable but they are experiencing the same speed loss too.
Funny isn't it, that Plusnet never mention what the contractual minimum speed is when you sign up!

[#5]

Hi Adam - thanks for looking into this.
I actually spoke to the person in the Customer Options Team on Friday morning 7th October (not Monday 10th) and she undertook to raise a new question that morning.
The question was in fact only raised on the following Monday - 10th October and didn't contain the commitments that were made to me, by phone, on the Friday.
It is now Friday afternoon, so that is OVER A WEEK since we had the conversation and still there is no confirmation of what we discussed, so I am not in a position to proceed.
I await the outcome of your discussion with her today!

[#6]

Hi Adam
Another day, another failure by Plusnet to respond!
I was looking at my previous correspondence on here, which was regarding the fact that our promised downtime of 'half an hour' when we transferred from TalkTalk to Plusnet, actualy turned into 15days!!
At the time you posted the following message:
« Reply #12 on 29/03/2010, 16:52 »
Hi DW40,
I'm sorry you feel like this was a bad start. With regards to your points about us being more proactive and also the reason you left Talk Talk, we are currently recruiting at a much faster rate than ever before and we are well under way on expanding our customer support resources to meet the increased demand. I'm glad to hear you are in a happy place with this now and hope that any future dealings you may have with support are more positive, I am sure at least the we will be able to respond to you much more quickly.
Quite ironic really, in view of what has happened recently!

[#7]

Hi Adam - any update?
was expecting a response on Friday

[#8]

Quote from: DW40

Funny isn't it, that Plusnet never mention what the contractual minimum speed is when you sign up!

I believe that Openreach determine the minimum fault threshold in the first 10 days of line training so is not known at the time of sign up.

[#9]

Hi DW40,
Apologies for the lack of response, the agent you talked to is responding to your ticket now.

[#10]

Hi Matt
I now have the response from 'the agent I talked to' and I am appalled at the response.
It has taken her a week and a half to come back in writing and totally renege on the commitments she made to me on the phone on Friday 7th October.
I have now had enough. I am disgusted at plus.net's attitude to someone who has a genuine performance issue.
In my own time, I will now start looking for an alternative supplier.

[#11]

Hi DW40,
I'm looking into the details of the ticket which was raised. I notice that you said you've had 4 engineer visits, and although this is frustrating it seems we have been doing all we can to resolve your issue. As for the move to fibre, I don't think we would put into writing that if you didn't achieve a certain speed you would be able to cancel any contracts entered into. If poor speed is due to a fault we would endeavour to rectify that.
I will come back to you once I get more information about your conversation with the agent.
Jojo

[#12]

Hi Jojo
Thanks for your response.
My point is, that over the phone, she DID agree that if I did not experience an improvement in speed , then I would not have to pay any fees if I cancelled the contract. I then asked for this to be put in writng and that is when the problems began.
Basically it has now created the impression to me that I was strung along in order to get me to pay for an upgrade, but that when I asked for the commitment to be repeated in writing she was either not prepared or able to do this.
I think this is a very poor way to treat your existing customers - especially one who is experiencing performance problems that Plusnet and BT are not prepared to fix the root cause of.
I do feel that I have been lied to and also once I complained, the 'agent' has been extremely slow to respond - so I look forward to receiving your update on here once you have had the conversation with her
Thanks
David

[#13]

Interesting development:
My question was updated on Wednesday evening by someone who confirmed that they had listened to my original phone call and that the 'agent' concerned in fact DID make the commitments that I have asked to be confirmed in writing.
They also said that they would discuss this on Thursday and that I should expect to contacted and spoken to on the same day.
It is now Friday afternoon and I have heard nothing , so yet again promises made by staff at Plusnet have not been met.
The saga continues!
Is there anybody at Plusnet who is prepared to take responsibility for this and actually speak to me about it? It appears not. Why do I have to do all the driving? I am not paid to do this - YOU ARE!
Just to reiterate - this issue was first raised by me on 10th AUGUST and is still not resolved.

[#14]

Hi there,
As per the notes on ticket 47502395 I can see that you did speak to us over the weekend and got this resolved. I can also see that a fibre appointment has been scheduled and confirmed. Is there anything else you're looking for help with?
Adam

[#15]

Hi
Just read that you're considering moving to BT, and as a BT customer at another premesis, I can say with utter conviction that BT's customer service is USELESS. In fact, it's worse than useless. We have an ongoing issue with them and our BT homehub constantly freezing (which I've read is a known problem) but their call centres are not in the UK, and the operatives appear so poorly trained that they are clearly merely following a script and seem to have difficulty in comprehending what the actual issue is. And believe me, if you want to see real lack of urgency, try using them!
At least with Plusnet you are guaranteed to speak to someone in the UK, and you don't have to start from the top each time you call them.