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so why should I stay with Plusnet?

mgillespie
Grafter
Posts: 222
Registered: ‎08-04-2007

so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Been a long time customer of Plusnet ( 5+ years), but I really am at the end of my tether.
In the last two weeks I have endured:
a 3 day outage of no router sync because someone unplugged something at my exchange.  2 days of that were wasted because of Plusnet's failure to escalate it promptly (despite me providing more than adequate information about the tests on my equipment before I raised the call) Angry Ticket#48320222, 48333545
this was followed by a call to Plusnet support informing them that my exchange is now a market2 and that I wanted a market2 deal.   This resulted in Plusnet trying to spin me a yarn that it wasn't a market2 exchange, it was a market1, when I told them that 3 other trackers were all showing this, they quickly backtracked and called it a "internal systems fault"   perhaps they think all their customers are idiots.... Angry ticket #48607120
This week my broadband has been down since middle of the week, got router sync this time, but authentication problems.    Also my phone is not routing correctly either, calling our landline does not call our number, it calls someone else (i'm guessing both problems are related). Angry   Nothing much seems to be happening with regards to sorting it out (everything stops for the weekend with BT Wholesale it seems), worse still, Plusnet have told me naff all as to what's going on (Ticket#48358727)
Because of the almost total lack of communication, I decided to call them only to be hung up on me after sitting in the support queue for 35 minutes>:(, and then the redial took another 40 minute wait>:(, only to be talked through how to enter my details into a Thompson router (I stopped the guy as soon as I worked out he was trying to talk me though Thompson router instructions, and I didn't have one of those, and never said I did).
In addition to all this, all the perks of the Plusnet of old have slowly been whittled away.   No CGI access, the SMTP MX backup mail servers have recently been retired, so all this downtime means I am losing emails  (of course the IMAP that Plusnet offer is woefully inadequate space wise).
I realize that some of these problems are down to BT Wholesale, but after the first round of problems, I asked Plusnet what the eventual problem was, and what BT/Plusnet were doing to ensure it didn't happen again (which is the key to continuous improvement and just got the brush off)
SO WHY SHOULD I CONTINUE TO STAY WITH PLUSNET?   The only reason I can think of right now, is the referral discounts..  really that is it......  (oh and the 12 month pre-pay I took out on my phone rental) Angry
16 REPLIES 16
Wheel_nut
Grafter
Posts: 893
Thanks: 1
Registered: ‎03-08-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

If you leave PlusNet and leave your DD details on your Account, you will still get your Referrals Discount credited to you each time it exceeds £5.
If you had any extra freebies on your account before, you can keep them if you switch to a newer product.
You can also leave your Telephone Line Rental with PlusNet and migrate your Broadband service to another provider.
Having said that, I am sure that Adam or Joanne or Matt or James will pick this up in the morning and resolve it for you.
mgillespie
Grafter
Posts: 222
Registered: ‎08-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Thanks for the info on the Referrals, mine is well over the fiver every month, it's good to know I am not stuck to Plusnet because of it thou.
My biggest gripe really is Plusnet's support that treats all customers equally with regards to their technical knowledge, or their inability to read/comprehend  the ticket history. On both my recent outages, before I even raised the call, I did all the required tests:

  • in the lack of router sync, I took my router and filters round a friends and checked it synced, which it did, I also tried my master socket connection under the faceplace, and it did not help

  • on the auth problems, I tried the BT test login and navigated to the BT test page successfully, which eliminates everything in my house


In both fault cases, these were fully documented in the initial tickets, but in no way did it help speed up the resolution of the faults.  I did had to endure the have I switched it off and on again fault finding scripts.
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
Plusnet Help Team
Posts: 16,872
Thanks: 882
Fixes: 221
Registered: ‎27-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Hi ClashcityRocker,
I'm really sorry to hear about these issues.
Just to address the more immediate issue first I can see that tests performed on the 11th do indeed show a problem with the line, more specifically a physical disconnection of the line at the exchange. I can see that engineers began work to resolve this just over an hour ago so I'd hope this should be resolved soon and will make sure you're kept posted.
Re ticket 48607120 and the market area issue I can only apologise as the person who initially responded had only checked our internal record of your market area rather than use a checker as you did. Feedback will be given about that and also for any problems you may have had when calling us.
Quote
I realize that some of these problems are down to BT Wholesale

To be entirely honest, none of them are. Thanks for drawing the issues you've had with support to our attention. With regards to the fault that's with our phone suppliers BT Openreach at present. I'll keep communicating with them and updating yourself.


If this post resolved your issue please click the 'This fixed my problem' button
 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
mgillespie
Grafter
Posts: 222
Registered: ‎08-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Well broadband is back now (although had a few disconnects), but Plusnet phone has gone totally now (no dial tone).
In the last 2 weeks I have had the following combinations of award winning phone and broadband service:
Working everything
Working phone, no broadband (no router sync)
Working everything for a few days again
Working outgoing calls, no broadband, wrongly routed incoming calls
Intermitantly working broadband, no calls at all (no dialtone).
I wonder what other magical combinations the magic wiremonkeys at BT Openreach can conjure up...
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
Plusnet Help Team
Posts: 16,872
Thanks: 882
Fixes: 221
Registered: ‎27-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

We've reported the lack of dial tone back to the engineers for you, they're on their way back to the exchange. I'm sorry things aren't much further forward but I'll keep you updated as often as I can.
If this post resolved your issue please click the 'This fixed my problem' button
 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
Plusnet Help Team
Posts: 16,872
Thanks: 882
Fixes: 221
Registered: ‎27-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

I've just tried calling you. Could you let me know how things are from your side please?
If this post resolved your issue please click the 'This fixed my problem' button
 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
mgillespie
Grafter
Posts: 222
Registered: ‎08-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Everything seems to have settled down now, The router stats show the ADSL connection has been up for 3 days, the BRAS profile has sorted itself out (eventually) and the phone is working again.
Can you take a look at the last item on ticket#48358727 and then it can be closed down.
Thanks.
shutter
Community Veteran
Posts: 22,212
Thanks: 3,773
Fixes: 65
Registered: ‎06-11-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

with respect to Adam Walker`s response above
and particularly this line......
Quote

Re ticket 48607120 and the market area issue I can only apologise as the person who initially responded had only checked our internal record of your market area rather than use a checker as you did.


I also refer to my posting http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,80676.0.html ; Suggestion - employ more staff to answer tickets and phones....
A posting I started in 2009..... 2 years ago.... if you care to read through the comments/responses from plusnet senior staff, many promises were made back then.... and several times the phrase "we are getting there, (or similar) were used...
here is a quote from Jameseh in response to Purleigh`s posting...
Quote

6) Improve support staff training so they solve the problem FIRST time. ->
Absolutely agree.
We've a lot of focus on this currently,
but obviously it's not an overnight fix.

Seems to me that PlusNet has moved,.......... to somewhere above the Arctic Circle..... where the nights can be endless.... but I don`t think they last 2 years....
so how long does an " OVERNIGHT FIX" take....


Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

I agree, all those points highlighted two years ago are no better today.  Angry
It seems that if you want a 'sensible' response to an issue, you are much better of airing your problem on this forum, and with a little patience generally things get resolved.
From responses expressed on this forum, it would appear that the CS people on the phone don't seem to have detailed product knowledge or the power to resolve very much.
The ticketing system is still way too slow - why does it often take four or five DAYS to get a response from CS after the customer has either raised a ticket, or added more detail to an existing ticket ?.
Then there is still the issue of tickets not being read properly, with all that entails.
The best thing that Plusnet have done in the past two years is let 'Jojo' loose on this forum, and show the rest of CS how it should be done !  Wink
shutter
Community Veteran
Posts: 22,212
Thanks: 3,773
Fixes: 65
Registered: ‎06-11-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

To all those SENIOR and Middle Management PlusNet staff, who think they have made progress in the last two years....
Please read this
http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,80676.msg778128.html#msg778128
and think again..... is today`s service level any better..... I doubt it very much if you can hnestly say "Yes".....
The same problems are being aired on the forum as 2 years ago, and the level of complaints does not seem to have diminished, despite assurances that  "give us time, and things WILL improve".
As I said way back then..... Get rid of the problems, and then the complaints will diminish to an acceptable level..... although to the 1% of customers who will always complain , their problem is still a 100% problem to them......
mgillespie
Grafter
Posts: 222
Registered: ‎08-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

I find it very frustrating when you contact Plusnet and the 1st line support is LESS knowledgeable than you are, it also seems they rarely read the ticket history and just read from scripts.
Perhaps Plusnet has outgrown itself.  It's certainly NOT the same Plusnet I joined many years ago, and has taken a turn for the worse 😞
x47c
Grafter
Posts: 881
Thanks: 3
Registered: ‎14-08-2009

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

I think you will find this in most 'mass market' consumer applications.....ie that the call centre staff are now just reading from the script, and you have to wait to get to the end of it.
I'd guess that plusnet's subscriber base is now in the millions and the only way you can run some sort of consistency in approach is by having these scripts.
The costs of employing that many truly knowledgeable people in the call centres is too great. and anyway once you trained them up...they then get poached by the firm across the road.
It's only is business to business stuff - and even then probably only in the bespoke made to order sector than the customers and the suppliers staff can have detailed technical conversations about how to resolve an issue where both parties personnel are highly qualified: I confess - this is indeed my background!
Same for banks,  If you want a true old style personal service then you need to have assets to invest in the £m's.  The rest of us have to deal with the call centres.
Same for flying.  It's no longer up to the pilots, its now all standard operating proceedures and standard approach patterns to a landing.
You and me and the others on here are a small minority of subscribers - such is life.
Its not unlike the comments on the MSE savings site where you see people saying unless they put up the interest rate then I'm moving my money all £50K of it.  You have to gently explain to them that the deposit base of the savings group is £20billion and that whether or not they move your £50K is of no consequence to the savings group whatsoever.
So it could be that the complaints you see on here are actually a microscopically small fraction of the business that plusnet is doing
Chris
Legend
Posts: 17,724
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Registered: ‎05-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Quote from: shutter
The same problems are being aired on the forum as 2 years ago, and the level of complaints does not seem to have diminished, despite assurances that  "give us time, and things WILL improve".
As I said way back then..... Get rid of the problems, and then the complaints will diminish to an acceptable level..... although to the 1% of customers who will always complain , their problem is still a 100% problem to them......

Gerry,
You seem to have overlooked the substantial period (6+ months) between your previous post on this topic and the last few weeks. During this period we had good call answer rates, ticket turnaround times were fast (and still are with the exception of fault tickets).
At the moment there are more fault ticket than we'd like than we'd like which is causing delays to picking them up. General CSC enquiries though are *not* delayed and over 80% of them are answered within 4 hours now, our provisioning team are also in a good position.
Former Plusnet Staff member. Posts after 31st Jan 2020 are not on behalf of Plusnet.
Chris
Legend
Posts: 17,724
Thanks: 600
Fixes: 169
Registered: ‎05-04-2007

Re: so why should I stay with Plusnet?

Quote from: ClashcityRocker
Can you take a look at the last item on ticket#48358727 and then it can be closed down.

I've replied to your ticket and hopefully we can bring the issue to a resolution.
Former Plusnet Staff member. Posts after 31st Jan 2020 are not on behalf of Plusnet.