Trying to get a line & broadband.... NIGHTMARE!

[#1]

I have been trying for the past three weeks to get the above from PlusNet. I have endured numerous 50 minute waits only to get through to the wrong department. All I want is a new telephone line, (there are two free pairs already available in my house), to be connected from the street cabinet about 50M away, and of course I want fibre broadband.
All I have is an enormous list of texts on my mobile telling me, after every appointment I have made for the connection "Unfortunately, there has been a delay to your phone line order. We'll contact you again when we have more details" Quite frankly I'm getting sick of this and wonder quite what is going on between PlusNet and the provider of these facilities?
Other than wait for 30 minutes at least to speak to someone, then find it's actually someone else's job, so another wait, what can I do? PlusNet seems very adept at hiding itself behind a long delayed phone connection, but could manage a live chat when I was signing up!!!
Is there anyway of actually e-mailing someone? This service is appalling. I was with Virgin before moving to another area, which although you got someone in Pakistan, things were sorted within a day or so, and sometimes remotely. I wish Virgin was in this area.
An incredibly bad experience thus far, and I have not even got any service!!!   

[#2]

Hi Carl,
A warm welcome to the forums.
Sadly your experience is not untypical of plusnets's supplier BT Openreach - they are scoundrels!  Personally I've been waiting 3 months for my order - PlusNET have been excellent in chasing matters, but they are not getting answers.  All that's required in my situation is for a ree to be trimmed to enable access to their pole.  BTOR have been dragging their feet for weeks claiming that they are waiting on the electric company (dual service pole).  Today I phoned the electric company who told me that they have no record of a request from BTOR.
The point of telling you this is to illustrate that the messages from BTOR (which is what PlusNET have to rely on) are often less than complete, leading to confusion and apparent incompetence.
I would suspect that in your case, there is a shortage of pair from the cabinet / fibre ports free in the cabinet.  In some places, new connections are on hold awaiting a disconnection in the cabinet.
BTOR are seriously broken and nobody is holding them to account.
Hope you are soon connected.
Kevin

[#3]

Thanks Kevin.
This situation is appalling. The fibre is at the street cabinet, and there are three pairs of lines already coming into the house, (one of which is being used as a business line for my wife). I am now seriously considering cancelling this order as all I have are texts informing me, "Unfortunately, there's been a delay to your phone line order...". To add insult to injury I'm getting these bl**dy messages every day which just infuriates me more. PlusNet were quick enough in relieving me of £220 for advance phone line payment and router!
I know that PlusNet are owned by BT. I did not go to BT in the first place because of the tales of dreadful service. It looks like their incompetence is everywhere.
I think I'm going to do a door to door survey in the local area to see how many people would change over to Virgin, (my supplier before we moved to this area), and if we can get enough get Virgin too lay in a fibre.
It is with interest that I note there is no reply of any kind from a member of the PlusNet team!!
Fortunately, there are no trees to contend with or poles in this area, even so if I had been waiting 3 months I would have been long gone by now! Sorry to hear of your problems.
Best regards
Carl

[#4]

What have they said is the reason for the delay?

[#5]

Hi Andy,
After each "engineer booking", once verbal communication is concluded, and about half an hour later I get "Unfortunately there's been a delay to your phone line order. We'll contact you again when we have more details". This, of course tells me 9/10's of nothing! I keep getting these messages by text each day which infuriates me even more.
The street cabinet is 50M away. There are three pairs of lines already laid to our house, one of which is my wife's business line, so there are two spare. The fibre is present in the cabinet. They quickly took £220 from me for advance payment for the telephone and router, since that platitudes and what appears to be false promises that work is in progress.
I'm starting to think that PlusNet is staffed by Everybody, Somebody and Nobody - Everybody thought Somebody had done something about it, but Nobody had!
Regards
Carl

[#6]

Hi Carl,
Sorry for the delay. I'll post our most recent update in black and white to avoid any miscommunication:

Quote

This order now requires a physical survey. The next update will be provided by the surveyor, after the survey has been completed. The next update will be 28/08/2015 **** TEST SHOWS DP1310 IS SERVED BY A 5PR CABLE IN DUCT TO A JRF10. THERE ARE 5 WORKING LINES SO DP RELIEF IS REQUIRED. SPARES AVAILABLE ON DP'S 1306,1307. NO PLANDO SOLUTION.

It looks like the distribution point that you are synced to has no spare lines available on it. A surveyor is attending the site to investigate the rationality of syncing you to a different DP. Should this be the best resolution, you unfortunately may be facing a further delay in provision.
Once again, apologies for the inconvenience.
Matty

[#7]

Matty
Thanks for the update. At last tangible evidence of something being done about this.
The BT Engineer has called me a few minutes ago, and will be checking out the cabinet tomorrow.
Thanks again.
Carl

[#8]

Did you tell the engineer about the two unused wires to your premises?
Just in case either is occupying a connection.

[#9]

As I suspected, no spare pairs somewhere.  That's going to need new cables or a tidy up of records to identify what is actually unused.

[#10]

Estragon / Townsman
Yes I told the engineer about the two spare pairs coming into the house, but as you can see from the reply from Matty, and my chat with the BT engineer yesterday, these are in the street cabinet but are not connected as there are no lines free. As a matter of interest I was talking to my wife about this last night and she told me that when the engineer came to install her business line he started at the street cabinet almost opposite, but then had to go "down the road", (presumably to the next street cabinet), before coming back to the local cabinet and finally installing the line in the house.
Similar thing was mentioned by the BT engineer yesterday. I guess they find a spare pair in the nearest street cabinet to my local, and then wire it into my local cabinet from spare pairs common to both cabinets?
Waiting with bated breath for the BT Engineer to arrive..... I did copy his phone number into my mobile yesterday, so he has no escape!!