This topic

Appalling Service

FMC1 — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 08:02:46 GMT

A few weeks ago I got an email from BT telling me that full fibre was now available in my area, and would I be interested in signing up. I immediately replied with a definite "Yes" (as my current broadband was not much better than dial up.)

I dealt with a guy on the live chat and he was very helpful in setting up the deal and a date was set for the install. I then received a mail telling me that my install had been passed on to openreach, which I assumed was fair enough.

On the install day a young guy turned up and as it turned out it wasn't actually openreach, but another sub contractor. I showed him where my router was and also where the pole was that he had to connect to. That's when all the problems started.

He seemed to have a problem with the fact that the pole wasn't actually in my garden, but was a couple of gardens down. He then informed me that unless the pole had a "date" on it, he may not be able to climb it. I told him that over the past few weeks, numerous bt engineers had been up that pole and they didn't have a problem. However he managed to get up the pole and got the cable fitted, at the same time he also cut my existing copper cable down.

It then came to fixing the fibre cable to the rear of my house where the existing copper cable had been, but that meant standing on a flat roof for 5 mins, but he couldn't do that either, as he had "never been trained"

He fitted the new plastic tensioning clip to the fibre and I then went up on to the roof and clipped it in to the eye bolt, he took some pictures of "me" doing this so it couldn't come back on him. After fixing the cable to the wall (very badly) he was ready to go into the house and drill the hole through for the cable entry.

Once in the house he informed me that the old bt box was now redundant, but if I went to screwfix I could buy a blanking plate for it ???? I asked him "why not just remove it if it was of no use" his reply was "I am not allowed to do that" So once again, I took it off myself. I also asked him to drill his hole right in the corner close to the box to make it less visible, but he drilled it about 6 inches away from the box, in the middle of nowhere.

Anyway, he then informed me that in just a few minutes, after he had made the connection I would be able to experience full fibre broadband with blistering speeds. After the outside connection was made he came back into the house and noticed that one of the green lights were flashing. He said "Oh, that's not good" and proceeded to call someone. After he hung up the phone he informed me that he had phoned his manager and his manager had marked it down as priority.

That was a week ago, and I still have nothing ! I have no broadband and also no house phone as they made me switch over to the new digital phone system. Anything that uses my network eg cctv, tv, 3d printer etc are now all dead.

After numerous phone calls to bt, I am being told that I need a specialist engineer N11 ? but as I say, that was a week ago. Surely a multi million pound company like bt should be able to get a "specialist engineer" to sort out my problem in less than a week.

Re: Appalling Service

Quesada — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 08:52:51 GMT

Hi. Have you tried raising the issue to Executive Complaints. Call 0800 028 5085 and ask for Allison Joyce. Good luck

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 09:07:52 GMT

Number goes nowhere mate, it just says that "We have tried to call you before"

Re: Appalling Service

Quesada — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 10:23:42 GMT

Hi. OK. This will be slower, but if you e-mail the BT CEO explaining your issue it will be forwarded to Executive Complaints. Good luck.

[Mod edit: removed employee data]

Re: Appalling Service

Kodikid — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 09:32:49 GMT

Sadly this has nothing to do with BT. Once again they are being blamed for openreachs failings.

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 09:47:31 GMT

Certainly worth a try my friend, thanks.

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 09:50:24 GMT

Sadly this has nothing to do with BT. Once again they are being blamed for openreachs failings

Yes you are right but as it was BT that done the deal I think they have to be responsible for any other company that they farm the job out to.

Re: Appalling Service

Kodikid — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 10:04:22 GMT

Openreach choose the sub contractors not BT.

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 10:09:15 GMT

Either way, someone should be held accountable, it's 2025 and this is not good enough, I even have to drive a mile away from my house to make this reply as there is no signal on my mobile at home ! but that's another issue.

Re: Appalling Service

Kodikid — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 10:54:45 GMT

Openreach are not public facing so there's actually no accountability. Sad but true

Re: Appalling Service

chrisjp — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 11:28:29 GMT

Nevertheless Openreach ARE accountable to BT who is your service provider and it's up to BT to put the heat under Openreach to sort out their muddles. Unfortunately it seems BT has no enthusiasm for taking Openreach to task and is just content to tell its customers "it's Openreach's fault and we can do nothing".
This is what is not good enough.

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 12:00:45 GMT

That's also my thoughts on the matter, and why the complete lack of "Specialist Engineers" surely there must be more than just a few ?

Re: Appalling Service

36ULW — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 16:08:58 GMT

‘Specialist Engineer’ refers to a Pay Grade, not a specific skill set.

Specialist Engineer grade usually refers to roles such as Clerk of Works, Field Based Coordinators, Auditors, etc.

An N11 is just an Accreditation to prove an Engineer, be it any pay grade can access a Fibre Node and be able to identify and issues, defects, etc with it. It doesn’t mean the Engineer in question has any, ‘Specialst’ skill set.

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Tue, 22 Jul 2025 14:18:51 GMT

Can I just give a massive thanks to Quesada for giving me that info. I contacted the person in question and almost immediately got a reply to say that my problem would be looked into. Then, this morning at 9am I got a phone call so as I could supply a little more information, and the person that was dealing with it was just going to email openreach with the details. By 10.30am I received another phone call to tell me that an openreach engineer was on his way to my house. I had to quickly get home and shortly after I arrived, so did the engineer. It took him about 3 hours and a call to India, but he managed to get me sorted out once he realised what the actual problem was.

So I am now back up and running, and all is good.

Once again a big shout out to Quesada for giving me that address, and also a huge thanks to the lovely lady who managed to make things happen so quick.

Re: Appalling Service

Quesada — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 07:36:05 GMT

No problem. I'm glad that I was able to help speed up the process.

Re: Appalling Service

FMC1 — Thu, 24 Jul 2025 15:55:40 GMT

I might also add that today I came home to two large box's that had been delivered. One of them was a large bouquet of flowers and the other was a box containing chocolates, biscuits, cakes and coffee with two mugs !!!

There was also a personal apology with my name on it from the excellent lady that dealt with my complaint.

So even though I was without any sort of service for a week, BT have went above and beyond to make up for the disruption, (Once the correct person had got on the case)