BT and online help

FranP

Calendargirl

Have you considered changing providers?

£80 a month sounds very high to me.

I am with PlusNet which sits on BT service. I get the highspeed line for £27, and if I want a phone line it is £19 extra. So yes BT does seem a bit high. Do you have TV as well?

I also use Plusnet and quite frankly I don't care what it costs, the Customer Service is so much better than any other company I have used it's worth the cost (although currently it is definitely cheap) simply to save all the hassle of chatbots, queues etc.

Chocolatelovinggran

I concur, Nandalot. On the couple of occasions when I have used my mobile to complain that I have no internet, eventually an engineer was agreed, and a broken link was fixed.
Not before, of course, I had been on the phone for some time, following copious instructions - to no avail.
Exasperatingly, whilst on hold (!) , a soothing voice told me, endlessly, that problems were best resolved by going to the website and....but, dear lady, I am ringing to tell you that I have no internet..
Is anyone familiar with the song "There's a hole in my bucket, dear Liza"?

" At your age" is the magic key. Register yourself as a BT Priority Customer for Protected Services (free)

0330 123 4150.

I do the same for our gas and electric supplier.

We had to split from BT last year due to extremely poor service . After over 50 years. Truly sad as we worked for them at various levels until children for me and husband's retirement in the late 90’s.
When will we paying customers of many core services be restored to the status of ‘important’ I wonder ? All of them appear to be solely focussed on mega profits for shareholders with zero accountability.

On the 27 March I’m giving my 30day notice to Virgin media ! Too expensive, customer service atrocious!
Going to Vodafone for broadband and in April moving to Lebara for mobile!
Will not touch BT,EE Talktalk !
Such a nightmare to find the best deal that suits me!
Don’t get me started on travel insurance for oldies with health issues! More expensive than the trip?
Can gransnet do a value survey on travel insurance please?

I've been with various providers over the years and found that BT were difficult to deal with, particularly on the website where links given led nowhere.
I have a cable provider now, there's only one available locally but I always get a reasonably swift response to email enquiries and a call back from a technical person to solve my problem if necessary.
I pay about £32 per month and this also includes the phone line and evening/weekend calls - since we also have mobiles we rarely use the landline, but it is useful to have for calls where a clear line is necessary.

Me too, which is why I stopped using BT. It is a monumental disgrace. Why is there still "British" in the name? It patently isn't.

£80p/m!😱 That's outrageous. What are you getting for that? Just broadband???

Calendargirl

Have you considered changing providers?

£80 a month sounds very high to me.

I am with PlusNet which sits on BT service. I get the highspeed line for £27, and if I want a phone line it is £19 extra. So yes BT does seem a bit high. Do you have TV as well?

Well. Don’t go to Virgin.
I can’t get anyone out to resolve my t.v.
It keeps,switching itself of and we have no idea why.
They want you to do all the work by giving instructions over the phone.
Did all that and the problem is still there.
When my contract expires,I will be going over to EE.

We've had no broadband since January 8th in Cornwall since the big storm brought down a tree a couple of miles away that broke all the overhead wires. My OH has been onto them constantly and his new best friend seems to be the lovely lady in Newcastle who updates him daily with progress (or mostly, lack of it). Finally we have internet back again but it's been a long haul. In order that he can work there properly, we're going to sign up and get the Starling think. Expensive (and I hate Musk who owns it all) but in remote areas I think it'll be worth it.

They don't really want to help you at all and just wish you would do away with Customer Service once the they have got you money

This seems par for the course for many companies nowadays.

I think this type of service is a National Disgrace and there should be a real person who you can speak to.

A few years ago, when I was treasurer for a local organisation, I found dealing with BT was a nightmare. But a month ago, my broadband contract came to an end and it seemed that BT would be the best provider, so I changed to them.
I have to say, it's been a breeze, with knowledgeable, helpful people in Britain on the end of the phone during the changeover.
I initially thought I'd not pay for a home phone, but changed my mind after I nearly left my mobile on the train. I panicked, thinking that without any phone I'd be cut off, so I called and asked for the home phone to be reinstated. This happened the same day, and a week later I got my old phone number back too.
Well done and thank you, BT.

Today 17 March after 45 continuous years as a BT customer - first with a landline, followed some years later with broadband and finally mobile - my divorce from them becomes final.

Loyalty means nothing these days and their prices are higher than any other . When I rang last month (out of contract) to negotiate a lower price (fibre unavailable despite living within touching distance of Canary Wharf and my speeds are just 2 and 3 !!!) ) not only were they not willing to negotiate but when I said "that's it - I've had enough" - the response was "it's a month's notice, you must return the router or we will charge you and as you have a BT email and wish to continue accessing it via Outlook the charge is £7.50 pcm".
I have no more words!!!!!

I would happily vote BT as the provider with the worst customer service in the history of customer service.

When I moved, it took over 5 months to get me up and running. Countless people came and dug up my garden. They drilled holes in my exterior walls, didn't come with any equipment to clear up with and broke MY hoover and a long handled dutpan and brush. Rarely showed up when they were supposed to.

I think I worked out I had spent over 36 hours on the phone to them.

I got so much credit on my bill for them not fixing all the faults and carrying out the work in the allotted time that
I didn't have to pay a bill for 14 months! (They even got the amount of credit wrong -to their benefit of course. But I soon put them right ).

Nightmare! Hope it's all sorted soon. It's so stressful.

We did get a man who said we needed a new hub which is now installed, but he wasn’t a BT man just a sub contractor. Apart from ordering the new hub he managed to mess up our phone line which had worked perfectly in the morning.

In the past BT sent out an excellent young man who set everything up and wouldnt leave until we were happy. Full marks.
Now we've had to transition to EE everything is now OK. They did send a man to set it all up but he wasnt as good as the BT one.
Answer. Get them to send a man. Play all the poor old soul tricks you have to. You shouldnt have to but needs must.

Yes, it does indeed ‘Lemonjam*. Also despite installing new hub and repositioning booster discs, the broadband is up to its old tricks again and was absolutely dreadful yesterday. DGC both had trouble accessing their virtual lessons and DGD lost connection in the middle of a live assessment. Both are autistic and found the situation very distressing. Stealing myself up to phoning them today. No plans for full fibre in our area either.

BT, consumer division, is transitioning to EE the leading brand for broadband, media and TV services. I have been with BT for 18 years now and yes there have been problems from time to time. When not resolved quickly enough I make a formal written complaint- and in fairness they have then resolved.

Renegotiated broad band and TV package yesterday in fact- £43.99 per month for broad band Full fibre 150 and EE Entertainment TV package which includes includes BT box to record + Sky Now, Discovery channel and Netflix- price only goes up in second year of 24 month contract on 1/2/27. £80 a month does seem a very high price in comparison?

We have been with Zen ISP for donkey's years. They have been in the best category on Which? annual survey for ages too. This year Zen topped the list of the three best suppliers in the country. We pay £42 a month for an excellent service indeed. Highly recommended by our family. I have always managed to speak to an actual human being - rare these days!

Sarnia

Oh for the good old days when you could speak to a breathing human being. Automated this, that and the other may be the way things are done now but it isn't an improvement. As for the bots. Arrgh!!!

I have spoken to 4 real humans at BT this year. They all want to improve on my deal. The one who rang yesterday got an earful because - like the others - he had not looked at my account. I had just signed a new contract. What a waste of everyone's time.

Oh for the good old days when you could speak to a breathing human being. Automated this, that and the other may be the way things are done now but it isn't an improvement. As for the bots. Arrgh!!!

I wish I could speak highly of BT. We had our ‘engineer’ visit yestedday. He was a sub-contractor. He decided the problem was with the hub so has ordered us a new one. BT fault checkers on phone had said hub was fine it was the position of the booster dishes and that is what he was meant to sort. Anyway since he left we now have a fault with the landline even when phine connected directly into hub. Apparently no fault with the line so will have to wait till new hub arrives to see if that sorts it. What a pain!

We had a problem with our internet last Saturday. We have a 5G Hub and our provider is EE

I cannot speak too highly of the EE staff, 4 in total, all in the UK, all endlessly helpful. It took two hours in all to sort it out. DH did most of the talking but I took over if he got breathless.

The problem, in the end proved trivial. Our Hub is registered at our current home, but we also have an EE dongle, bought 5 or more years ago and not used recently - that was still registered to our old address.

However what really caused problems was trying to read back to EE staff, numbers printed on our SIM card. Tiny SIM card minute numbers, mid grey on pale grey and also eually small print on labels stuck on to euipment. In the end we had to take a photo and enlarge it to be able to read them.

Every time I have used BT helpline, I am connected to India and after the call have had a flurry of scammers on the landline trying to convince me to turn on my computer as there are issues and they need access to it to fix. I expect it now.