Telephones, or lack of!

Thursday January 3, 2013 by Mike A

As we enter our third week of no landline and have had numerous second rate excuses from BT, we were wondering if anyone else in the Blog area have lost their service – BT tell us ‘it is an extensive problem both nationally and locally’.

We are now on our fourth promised repair date, all in the last week and all unfulfilled.

Thanking you,
Jim T

Posted in Services | 8 Comments

8 Responses

on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 12:57 pm | Reply Peter T

Have not had a problem here, but friends near Bristol had problems lasting some weeks a month or so ago and my brother in Northumberland was without a land line for several weeks just before Christmas. Is BT having a more widespread problem with their repairs?
on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 1:10 pm | Reply Mike A

Sympathies, Jim. No problems for us, but I found this message on BT’s Service Status Updates page – http://btbusiness.custhelp.com/app/service_status/ – it might be relevant.

“Due to ongoing poor weather conditions across some parts of the UK you may be experiencing loss of telephony and broadband services. As a result repair times in the following areas may be delayed:”

…then there’s a long list of areas, including Derby.

So maybe it’s a case of BT having insufficient people to do the repairs?
on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 1:31 pm | Reply Cheryl Woolley

David & Sally were months without a phone when they moved to Denstone and had one problem after another trying to get it sorted. Probably not a fault – just BT at their totally useless best. Their complaints policy says ‘If your complaint is about repairing a fault, call us free on 0800 800 151. This line is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you’d like to speak to someone about a fault, our customer service advisers are available from 7am to 11pm, seven days a week.’ ‘If an advisor can’t sort out your complaint, we’ll escalate it. A team leader or manager will then work with you to try and sort out the problem. If that doesn’t work out, we’ll involve a Centre manager or a Complaint Review Service team. We settle most complaints by this stage but, if not, we’ll explain our final position. In some cases, we might send you a ‘deadlock’ letter. This means there’s nothing more we can do.’
on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 2:00 pm | Reply Emma S

Ours is fine too….
on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 3:14 pm | Reply JimT

Thanks for all the responses.. We have embarked on the escalation processes- so far, Ravi, Raj, Jane & Anita have all given us repair dates, as yet unfulfilled. Latest one is end of play tomorrow, so here’s hoping. BT Complaints will then contact us once the repair has been effected.
on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 5:31 pm | Reply Fiona H

I have had endless frustrations with BT since I have been back in the village. Have recently changed line and broadband to Plusnet. Will reserve judgement on performance but switch over was fine so I have hopes of greater things to come!
on Thursday January 3, 2013 at 5:59 pm | Reply Lynda Keyworth

Here at Tissington I am with Talk Talk and have had no problems, but our service comes via Parwich exchange must be higher water level
on Friday January 4, 2013 at 3:01 pm | Reply Jim T

Anita. Rang this morning, at about 9:30, to say it could be Monday before we would be restored; 10 minutes later, Kevin rang from Matlock to say he was on his way to fix our phone!
It is now 1:30 and he has done as promised and our service is fully restored. Corrosion appears to have been the problem – just an old, knackered system.
Will have to wait and see what Customer Services say!
Thanks to everyone who replied.