Elderly priority customer - fault on landline

[lmoir]

Hello everyone,

I'm aware most people here are just BT customers too but I really could do with leaning on some of you for advice. My grandmother who is 88 years old has just came out of hospital yesterday morning. 

We got her home to find that her emergency care line was reporting no phone line connected. All her landlines are down, unable to make outbound calls and inbound calls despite ringing on the callers side, never actually rings the landline within the home.

The phone just states "Check phone line cord". We are desperate to get her care line back up more than anything, she's very frail and poorly. After a long work through the automated lines I got someone yesterday who filed her as a priority to get this fixed. They said I'd hear back in 6 hours... That was over 12 hours ago. I booked a rapid immediate callback through this priority system this morning at 10am. It advised it'd be an estimated 10 minutes for a callback. It's been 2.5 hours now and the ETA has fluctuated between 10-20 minutes all day. I've kept checking it. I can't book another. Tomorrow the family and I are all back to work, we are taking turns staying over night just to monitor her but we are exhausted with the lack of communication from BT and the feeling of being powerless in this situation.

P.S. I'm on my grandmothers account as being able to act on her behalf. Can any customers advise something I could do I feel powerless and given her current bad health it's causing a great strain on me.

Thank you everyone,

Liam

[Keith_Beddoe]

@lmoir 

Welcome to this user forum for BT Retail phone and broadband customers.

Is she registered as a priority?

https://www.bt.com/content/dam/bt/help/including-you/BT_Free_Priority_Fault_Repair_Scheme.pdf

Also see https://www.bt.com/help/here-for-you

[rbz5416]

Could she have missed a bill payment while in hospital that's resulted in the line being cut off?

Does her master socket have two ports, one for phone & one for broadband? If so it would be worth removing the front cover & plugging a phone directly into the test socket behind.

Does she also have broadband? If so, just wondering if she may have been moved to Digital Voice. That requires phone to be plugged into the back of the Hub.

[rbz5416]

If all else fails & you have an Argos nearby, they have a Doro 1380 SIM free mobile with large buttons & a single button emergency dial on the back for £35.

[lmoir]

Hello there,

So it turns out she is not, they raised her as a "welfare case". BT just called me to advise that this was welfare which is different to priority despite both giving priority call out for a technician. She's given me the same form you've linked and asked me to complete it for her, which I'll gladly do.

The technician also just called me from the exchange. Apparently he said someone has been in there recently and damaged the aluminium connection. He repaired it and called the landline to test, so all is working now!

[lmoir · Accepted solution]

Hi there,

In regards to her bill, all has been paid and she is up to date. She does have internet which was strangely working but the landlines were not. 

The gentleman at the exchange box down the street called me and informed me someone has accidently damaged her lines connection but he's repaired it now and is all working again. Her care line system is also back online.

I did try the master socket prior to the fix but no luck. I'm just glad to know it wasn't something that had been done in the house!

[RobbieMac]

Welcome and thanks for posting @lmoir

I'm sorry that your Grandmother's service were faulty after she returned from hospital.  I appreciate how vitally important it is that her emergency care line is available when she needs it.  I am really pleased to see that this was raised as a welfare case and that the service is working for her now 🙂

Take care,

Robbie