Digital Voice Scam

[Digitalvoicescam]

After having digital voice thrust into our lives against our will, and with only 7 days notice to a change something that has been in places for decades, the service is as expected. Pathetic and unreliable.

What disturbs us the most is how BT is not informing customers of what this service is, and the huge negatives with virtually zero positives.

On your own website it states the following: 

https://www.bt.com/help/landline/what-is-digital-voice-and-how-can-i-get-it-

"What does this mean for me?
For most households, upgrading to Digital Voice will have no impact on how you use your phone today.

Digital Voice will give you the same reliability, trust and familiarity of your current home phone service and it will enable new benefits and features, such as crystal clear calls and the ability to block nuisance calls at the touch of a button."

This is completely not true and deliberately deceiving to customers. It is not the same reliability, not even close. All you have done is list positives that are not true to the real world and not even remotely accurate.

Does BT enjoy taking advantage of ignorant customers? Does BT enjoy providing zero support to households before they permanently change a service? Does BT enjoy giving the absolutely bare minimum notice to customers before huge changes?

My suggestion - not that BT actually cares because if they did I wouldn't be typing this - is think about respecting customers, provide true information to customers that is not deceiving. Also, have a customer service set up aimed at helping customers and not wasting their time on the phone with random agents who know nearly nothing - again, BT know their customer service set up is below mediocre, my suggestion is to think about others and not just what's easy for you.

[imjolly]

So what problems are you experiencing as you have not actually said and maybe someone on forum can help

[licquorice]

What a load of nonsense

[NigelB72]

I concur with @licquorice  and @imjolly ... Utter tosh and completely unwarranted without some kind of background. This forum is a customer to customer help forum and not a place for random venting  if you want help with a problem, please explain what your issue is and we'll see if we can help you.

[garybs29]

I'd also like to know how it's not as reliable, it has been for me!

[FTT]

I think to offer a bit of balance and fairness to the OP I reckon some underlying points are correct.

DigitalVoice is NOT a telephone line that most people would understand it. Not even close.

As for reliability it is also not as reliable as 'copper' that is my experience (I've had several occasions of known (ie I witnessed it) loss of service. That is total service of course as both services are really just one. When there's no broadband there's no telephone line so to use the word 'trust' is a massive over statement. And of course the not-very-old chestnut if you have no electricty you also have no service.

Otherwise, DigitalVoice has the positive of providing great call quality but I think that's about it. No other benefit to me the last 20 months telephony-wise. I do love the braodband speed increase and that cancels out my discomfort from losing my traditional landline.

Obviously, it's not a scam. People need to look into any service carefully they are responsible to look into anything new. 

Suppliers do need to be clear that it's something new and quite different. That's a fair point.

Anytime I've mentioned DV to relatives or friends their eyes glaze over either they don't care or have no idea. 

[Digitalvoicescam]

@licquorice  and @NigelB72 A very classic arrogant internet user response. How can you both have been on this forum for this long and post that? Although to be honest, considering the amount of posts you've made, your childish responses do not surprise me.

FYI, not that you realise since you're both just posting and replying to random things I bet, this is the feedback and suggestion forum. A place for feedback, and a place for suggestions.

[Digitalvoicescam]

@FTT  Firstly thank you for an actual reply. I wasn't looking for discussion really, just a way that is easiest for me to make suggestions to BT. A scam is a slight overstatement, deceiving is a better word which I mentioned, as they know the downsides but are just telling everyone it's great. Our household are very angry at not being told about DV at all, ever, until an email that in 7 days it will be changed. We were on holiday and weren't even home to protest or say no, we just came back to our landline not working. I work in IT myself for over 10 years and I had never heard of this service, and none of my colleagues had heard of it either. Digital is also not an accurate representation of what it is, they are internet phones, which is also deceiving. I had lengthy and pointless interactions with BT customer support months ago, and speaking to someone beyond a random agent who knew nothing beyond basic Q&A, as well as getting a manager callback, was absolutely horrible. It's like BT knew virtually nothing about what they were pushing on customers. All the while blaming big bad openreach, that they were just enforcing what they were doing, but we pay BT for the service.

We have had multiple calls cut out recently - presumably due to poor wifi signal - and we are not having these wifi extenders dotted around our house. Another downside to the service. We're fed up with it, not that anyone cares, because we know BT don't.

@imjolly

I mentioned some things above to FTT. Bottom line is, we are tired of being told what to think about a service, and how deceiving BT are with describing and pushing it to customers. More to the point, the sheer lack of respect to not inform customers about it beyond 7 days and via email alone, no mail, nothing! Not long before the sudden email we paid to get more phone sockets wired to another room, now they're useless, a waste of money. We've never had a problem with BT and have always been with them, but out of principal we will be leaving and giving our money to some other company - whether they give us the same service, or worse, at least we won't be giving money to BT.

Edit: I've just noticed an admin has moved my thread to another section, one that isn't for feedback and suggestions.

[jac_95]

Hi @Digitalvoicescam 

Sorry to hear about your experience. I'm a customer like you but have worked in the telecoms industry so know a bit about this and how they are implemented.

It is true that by 2023, VoIP based fixed line voice services will only be available to order and that everyone will need to be moved onto this type of fixed line voice service by 2025 as the PSTN phone network we have today will be completely shut down. This change by Openreach and Virgin Media has been in planning and consultations since at least 2017 and is industry led but backed by government.

Now when you change over to BT's implementation of this VoIP service, you don't need additional DV adaptors or DV specific handsets as you can just plug your existing phone base station into the back of the Smart Hub 2. BT do also have DV adaptors that allow you to place your existing phone base station away from the Smart Hub 2. These work by connecting to the DECT receiver inbuilt into the Smart Hub 2. They do not communicate over WiFI. Same with the DV handsets they communicate over DECT to the Smart Hub 2.

The change needs to be done by all communication providers that offer a fixed line voice service as detailed in https://www.futureofvoice.co.uk

Industries, organisations and representatives are also informed and aware of this change.

Now as for comms, what I have been doing to help out is reaching out to local groups and community councils giving them the background and facts around this change so there is no surprises and for locals to help eachother out with this digital change to the fixed line voice service.

 

[imjolly]

DV works over dect not wifi so dropping of your wifi will have absolutely no effect on your DV  connection.  The change by openreach to digital has been well published in the press over last over last few years so I am surprised if you are in IT  that you are not aware of the changes and PSTN ending in 2025