OMG what a bunch of turds!

I feel your pain. I came home about a month ago to find that my phone wouldn't make or receive calls. Called BT to be told that I had called earlier that week and cancelled the line, er no I haven't! After a half hour argument and me asking them to listen to the recorded call to find out who had cancelled the contract I was told that it hadn't actually been cancelled. So why is my phone line off? "I don't know!"

Anyhow, they set up my line again but we had to wait 4 days for it to be activated and 2 weeks ago I got an £80 bill for cancelling my contract within the 12 months! Erm, check my account you are getting my payments each month! Cnuts! Needless to say I'm now adding BT to my worst ever customer service list along with Sky!

Anyone else expecting a fight between OT and BT (Baby Talk) ?

Cosmo- that is appalling! Jesus...

I do hope that it gets sorted for you, I wrote in my complaint letter that if I didn't have the issue resolved within 14 days of receipt of the letter (sent it recorded as well so they can't claim they didn't get it lmao!) I'd send a copy to Ofcom.. Which I did on Friday. So if they want to fight, I'll fight back. Aaaand copy in Ofcom, of course!

My theory is: if they didn't f*ck up so much, they wouldn't have to throw in all these "sorry, here's x amount free" stuff. Don't know about you, but if I knew that my products would work 100%, and if not, I could speak to someone who could sort it out quickly, I'd be happy to pay that little bit extra. By outsourcing most of their departments they're actually losing more, as the quality of the work done isn't as high. Don't get me wrong, I have NO issues with outsourcing some things, as it creates employment opportunities elsewhere and thereby forwarding the discounts to us, etc, but it really makes such a difference to me to be able to call and speak to someone that will understand me the first time round of explaining the issue, and who can resolve the issues there and then, as well as Me understanding Them. Would cut down on a lot of the waiting times as well, I'm sure!

? sorry, I'll change the subject header!

Yes, I stopped reading once I realised it wasn't. ? Sorry Mrs S Smith.

? sorry, was thinking what the heck has gone on now! Hope you get it sorted.

My boss rang Npower today to complain and the customer service person hung up on my boss and boss wasn't even rude!

? oooooooooookeeee I could see where the confusion would come - it would make logical sense really!! ?

Most people, including the majority of people who work in them, misunderstand the purpose of the outsourced call-centre.

They're not there to help, in most cases they are incapable of helping with anything other than a basic enquiry.

They are a firewall, they are there to prevent the people who do have the power to help from being "bothered" by every Tom, Dick & Sally that has a query, be it serious or frivolous

That's fine but surely it'd be easier to just, you know, tell people they're wasting their time?

Surely the fact that we pay for a service means we should get a service?

Gah.

It would be easier, but it would piss everyone off. As it stands, maybe half, maybe better of callers will eventually get cheesed off and take the 'problem' on the chin. Really.

After they've calmed down (if things at the call centre have gone according to script) their comment will be "I shouted at the poor wee lass/fella on the phone and sure it's not his fault...blah, blah) A percentage will end up feeling guilty.... No kidding.

Of course you should get what you've paid for, but with the majority of major operations (particularly in telecoms) you'll jump through their hoops first.

OK that's fair, I see that. But I just thought Mr S and I had already jumped through all their hoops? All I wanted to do tonight was to change the DD details. Mr S then tried the automated system, and it seemed as if the previous DD hadn't even been set up yet though!!

We've made 9 calls to them in the last few months, Nine. Surely it shouldn't take this amount of time?! Seriously?

I feel like sending them a copy of my mobile phone bill with the BT calls highlighted and get them to pay for the bill. but we know that won''t happen ?

I too hate BT, we managed to get them to wipe £400 worth of mis-billing due to their complicated billing procedures and inept staff /depts!!

I feel your pain.

We have no choice but to go with them as we are in a village with no cable and rent a v.old cottage so not allowed to install a dish!!!

I too feel your pain my dad died last year and so i contacted them to dissconnect his line...a few weeks later we had a bill for over £150 for charges including disconnection FFS!

hours of calling followed, including bieng passed between here, India Scotland it was finally sorted but really not what i needed at that point in my life, needless to say i have now changed companies on my own phone too.

They are appalling when it comes to things like that. It took me speaking to 4 people last year to explain that No my Grandad couldn't come t the phone to confirm the bill was to be changed into my Nan's name because the reason for the change was that Grandad had died.

Their "customer service" even tops Virgin Media's - though only just!

Julz and Bouch - oh my God, that is horrendous ☹️ Puts my issue into perspective altogether doesn't it?

As it stands, though, with everything else I have to organise before the move (2 weeks!) I could do without having to deal with ineptitude..

? to you both. I would've written to them, Ofcom, the PM, hell, anyone that could care/listen, if that had been me..

And BT have also worked out that it is cheaper for them to issue a refund cheque to a deceased customer than make the effort to get the cheque issued in the correct name in the first place! If you have a serious complaint, forget going via customer services, it is much quicker to email the CEO directly! I haven't been with BT for years and funnily enough I haven't had any telecom problems since leaving them.

LOL Annabel - I like it!

...how would I go about finding out the CEO's contact details? ?

Ian Livingston is the current CEO and I would assume that his email follows the standard BT pattern so would be ***.**********@**.***

If you want to send a letter I would use their Head office address;

BT PLC, BT Centre, 81, Newgate Street, London. EC1A 7AJ

i used to work for the company that BT outsourced their accounting function to but unfortunately they have just made the last of the ex-BT staff redundant and offshored the majority of UK based roles so I don't have any contacts left.

HTH

Oh my goodness- Annabel, you have made my day!!

Going to put an email together for his attention now - I sent across the complaint in recorded delivery to the head office address that you have, and I've got proof of signature as well, so I think I can send Mr Livingston a nice lengthy email..

Question is, do I send it from my work email, or my hotmail? With the work one I can ger read-receipts.. Don't actually have/use a btconnect email..

xxx

OK so a quick update:

Mr S took the day off yesterday to spend the morning on the phone to BT and make sure this was all sorted out. Was passed from department to department, and got through to the complaints team who told him that yes, he still had to pay for the £136.80 although they could see that another monthly plan was meant to have been set up.

When I met Mr S at lunch, he was on the phone to an Overall Accounts Manager (I think) as a reminder letter had come through the door that same morning (last time we apparently didn't pay for the bill, no reminder letter was generated and we were simply cut off, which was the reason for the original complaint) and she was HORRIFIED at the treatment we'd had. She, apparently, was going to do a thorough investigation into all our complaints (had read the letter, which had been put on the system on the 9th Feb, but still hadn't been dealt with, etc) and now, she did the following: a) Cancelled the bill altogether, so our account was on zero, b) credited our account by £150, and made sure that the new plan was active (no bill to pay til May!!!) and c) made sure that the 3 months free broadband we were initially offered as a way of compensation would kick in after that.

So all in all, we're going to end up paying for 4 months out of the 12 for this contract. Great for us, but How can it make financial/business sense to BT?

Win! ?

xxx