Have I been misinformed by salesman?

[XTed]

Hi.  A BT salesman knocked on my door today pushing 'Full Fibre 500' which is now available in my area.

I explained to him that I was kind of stuck with Virginmedia because they deactivate email addresses after 90 days of a customer leaving. I've had the same email address for years and because it's used for my business, this has made me reluctant to leave as clients from the past sometimes still contact me with work.

The salesman, however, assured me that the email address could still be used because it didn't actually belong to Virginmedia. I told him I couldn't see how this would be possible because surely anybody sending an email to my old address after the 90-day grace period, would just have their email bounced back with an 'undeliverable' message.

He was absolutely adamant, though, that it would be fine, so I bit the bullet and went through the process of signing up. A BT customer service person rang me to go through all the details and I took the opportunity to mention the email business and he also said it would be fine. He has set up my BT account using the Virginmedia email I wish to keep (a 'blueyonder.co.uk' address).

Hours later, however, I've got a horrible feeling that I've been misled, as I've just double-checked on Virginmedia forums and there is no mention that it's possible to carry on using their email addresses after 90 days - no way at all. 

I'd be really grateful if anybody could confirm if what the salesman has said is true, or if I've been misled?

Many thanks.

[NigelB72]

To the best of my knowledge, BT don't use door to door sales people.

These door to door sales people are often from companies reselling BT products and are not directly employed by BT or endorsed by BT.

The link below will give you more information.

https://www.bt.com/help/landline/mis-selling

[Keith_Beddoe]

@XTed 

If you are a  business user, then you would need a BT Business package, not a residential one.

You would not be able to keep your Virgin Media email account, you would have to use a btconnect email address.

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Email/Keeping-email-address-if-leaving/m-p/4666698#M214860

You should be able to cancel the contract if you have not had a BT fibre connection for 14 days. I suspect its not even been provided yet.

If no service has been provided, then just phone up and cancel.

[gg30340]

If Virgin delete email addresses after 90 days that is what will happen. BT have no control over that and assuming Virgin do delete the email address then yes you were misled.

As regards being told you can use the Virgin email address to sign up, the sales person was correct because you can sign up with any email address that you want but if Virgin delete it then obviously you can not use it after deletion.

[XTed]

Thanks very much for replying, and the link.

You must be right, re. the salesman on the step, though the guy who rang me and sent me the link to terms and conditions, etc., was definitely BT. I'm surprised he backed up what I'd been told about the email address, though.

[XTed]

Thank you. 

No, nothing has been provided yet and the installation date is mid October. I've had lots of emails from BT with various bits of information and updates, and I've already activated the Netflix subscription included in the package.

I'll ring them today and I'll find out how I can log some sort of complaint about being given false information by both the salesman, and the BT guy over the phone.

[NigelB72]

@XTed it looks like up until 2020 at least you could keep your email address as long as you sign in every 90 days. There appears to have been a change in their policy and they now delete email addresses after 90 days of leaving them, so they're clearly using this tactic as a retention tool to reduce customer churn.

The best suggestion I have is to set up a free Gmail account (or other free email) so it's not tied to any ISP and use the 90 day period to notify your contacts of the new email address.

Personally, I've been using the same (Gmail) email address since it launched in the UK. Another benefit of these types of email addresses is that you can set up multiple ones for streaming services etc so you limit the risk of any dodgy exposure to your primary email address. They also can all be managed through an email app on your mobile etc...

[XTed]

Hi Nigel.

Thanks very much for this suggestion. I have felt that I'm trapped with Virgin, no matter what, because of this email issue, so maybe I need to bite the bullet and do exactly as you suggest.

I already have a Gmail address and it's been 100% reliable, unlike Virginmedia email which has a least a couple of problems/outages a year.

Thanks again.

[-Richie-]

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@NigelB72wrote:

To the best of my knowledge, BT don't use door to door sales people.

These door to door sales people are often from companies reselling BT products and are not directly employed by BT or endorsed by BT.

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The door to door selling team will most likely be 'Money Expert', how the relationship works I don't know the details of, from my understanding the generate leads, this will then see BT call the interested party and an order is raised, as it's done by phone then calls will be recorded.

I did find a Twitter post that endorses them from the official BT social media account Here 

[XTed]

That's it! The badges said 'Money Expert', but I couldn't remember.

So they're genuine, but using slightly dodgy tactics, backed up by the actual BT rep on the phone. I actually refused the whole offer first, because of the email issue, which I explained, but then the first guy came back with his 'senior'(?), who assured me I'd be able to keep the Virgin email.... and I went for it.

Thanks Richie.