Openreach - absolutely shocking
Discussion
I am assuming I am stuffed and now just need to dance to their very slow tune but if anyone has any ideas as to whether I can speed them up all thoughts are appreciated:
1) I've had basic copper wire broadband for years. In the last few months in the evening the internet for streaming purposes is half the time unusable.
2) called up talktalk and they have sent out openreach engineers 4 times now and on each visit it is a different excuse. The wires are corroded, the line needed resetting blah blah blah. anyway it works ok for a while then the same problem occurs.
3) In March I said ok fair enough I would like to upgrade to a really fast package and they said no problem. A 5th engineer comes out and digs a hole out the front then says someone else needs to come along to do something else. Another bloke turns up 2 weeks later and runs a wire from the end of my drive into my house. He says someone else needs to turn up and run the wire to a cabinet.
4) a week later another bloke turns up and says there is a blockage and he cant run the wire from my drive to the box but they'll hopefuilly have it done in a few days. That was back in April.
5) I try and fix the issues with my current talktalk connection and have spent hours on the phone to them all doing the same thing on the call each time. Talktalk tell me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router. This is despite the router randomly restarting itself frequently and me now having no connection in the evening very frequently. The last straw was 2 weeks ago when they had apparently removed the facility to speak to someone and you can now only get technical help over a webchat. 2 hours later the webchat tells me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router and they cannot do anything.
6) at that point I applied to swap over to sky internet as they seem to have a good package with the TV and its cheaper than I had anticipated. I called sky up as they had not contacted me and have now been told I wont be connected until late August as that is when Openreach will come and connect the wire from my drive to the cabinet.
the whole thing seems totally farcical to me and I cannot believe it takes 4 months to connect a wire to a cabinet which is only a few metres from my house. Is there nothing I can do about this ?
1) I've had basic copper wire broadband for years. In the last few months in the evening the internet for streaming purposes is half the time unusable.
2) called up talktalk and they have sent out openreach engineers 4 times now and on each visit it is a different excuse. The wires are corroded, the line needed resetting blah blah blah. anyway it works ok for a while then the same problem occurs.
3) In March I said ok fair enough I would like to upgrade to a really fast package and they said no problem. A 5th engineer comes out and digs a hole out the front then says someone else needs to come along to do something else. Another bloke turns up 2 weeks later and runs a wire from the end of my drive into my house. He says someone else needs to turn up and run the wire to a cabinet.
4) a week later another bloke turns up and says there is a blockage and he cant run the wire from my drive to the box but they'll hopefuilly have it done in a few days. That was back in April.
5) I try and fix the issues with my current talktalk connection and have spent hours on the phone to them all doing the same thing on the call each time. Talktalk tell me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router. This is despite the router randomly restarting itself frequently and me now having no connection in the evening very frequently. The last straw was 2 weeks ago when they had apparently removed the facility to speak to someone and you can now only get technical help over a webchat. 2 hours later the webchat tells me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router and they cannot do anything.
6) at that point I applied to swap over to sky internet as they seem to have a good package with the TV and its cheaper than I had anticipated. I called sky up as they had not contacted me and have now been told I wont be connected until late August as that is when Openreach will come and connect the wire from my drive to the cabinet.
the whole thing seems totally farcical to me and I cannot believe it takes 4 months to connect a wire to a cabinet which is only a few metres from my house. Is there nothing I can do about this ?
Jazoli said:
princeperch said:
Is there nothing I can do about this ?
Yes, get Starlink 
TALKTALK is your supplier .... maybe that's the problem ... from my experience you'll have fun with SKY ... YOU don't have a service from OPENREACH the ISP supplier has ..... If you want to blame anyone blame OFCOM for destroying British Telecoms one stop shop monopoly
princeperch said:
I am assuming I am stuffed and now just need to dance to their very slow tune but if anyone has any ideas as to whether I can speed them up all thoughts are appreciated:
1) I've had basic copper wire broadband for years. In the last few months in the evening the internet for streaming purposes is half the time unusable.
2) called up talktalk and they have sent out openreach engineers 4 times now and on each visit it is a different excuse. The wires are corroded, the line needed resetting blah blah blah. anyway it works ok for a while then the same problem occurs.
3) In March I said ok fair enough I would like to upgrade to a really fast package and they said no problem. A 5th engineer comes out and digs a hole out the front then says someone else needs to come along to do something else. Another bloke turns up 2 weeks later and runs a wire from the end of my drive into my house. He says someone else needs to turn up and run the wire to a cabinet.
4) a week later another bloke turns up and says there is a blockage and he cant run the wire from my drive to the box but they'll hopefuilly have it done in a few days. That was back in April.
5) I try and fix the issues with my current talktalk connection and have spent hours on the phone to them all doing the same thing on the call each time. Talktalk tell me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router. This is despite the router randomly restarting itself frequently and me now having no connection in the evening very frequently. The last straw was 2 weeks ago when they had apparently removed the facility to speak to someone and you can now only get technical help over a webchat. 2 hours later the webchat tells me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router and they cannot do anything.
6) at that point I applied to swap over to sky internet as they seem to have a good package with the TV and its cheaper than I had anticipated. I called sky up as they had not contacted me and have now been told I wont be connected until late August as that is when Openreach will come and connect the wire from my drive to the cabinet.
the whole thing seems totally farcical to me and I cannot believe it takes 4 months to connect a wire to a cabinet which is only a few metres from my house. Is there nothing I can do about this ?
That sounds remarkably similar to the story our window fitter told me yesterday, even down to a bloke saying there was a blockage (he had 3 different engineers turn up over a number of weeks to say there was a blockage!).1) I've had basic copper wire broadband for years. In the last few months in the evening the internet for streaming purposes is half the time unusable.
2) called up talktalk and they have sent out openreach engineers 4 times now and on each visit it is a different excuse. The wires are corroded, the line needed resetting blah blah blah. anyway it works ok for a while then the same problem occurs.
3) In March I said ok fair enough I would like to upgrade to a really fast package and they said no problem. A 5th engineer comes out and digs a hole out the front then says someone else needs to come along to do something else. Another bloke turns up 2 weeks later and runs a wire from the end of my drive into my house. He says someone else needs to turn up and run the wire to a cabinet.
4) a week later another bloke turns up and says there is a blockage and he cant run the wire from my drive to the box but they'll hopefuilly have it done in a few days. That was back in April.
5) I try and fix the issues with my current talktalk connection and have spent hours on the phone to them all doing the same thing on the call each time. Talktalk tell me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router. This is despite the router randomly restarting itself frequently and me now having no connection in the evening very frequently. The last straw was 2 weeks ago when they had apparently removed the facility to speak to someone and you can now only get technical help over a webchat. 2 hours later the webchat tells me there is nothing wrong with the line or the router and they cannot do anything.
6) at that point I applied to swap over to sky internet as they seem to have a good package with the TV and its cheaper than I had anticipated. I called sky up as they had not contacted me and have now been told I wont be connected until late August as that is when Openreach will come and connect the wire from my drive to the cabinet.
the whole thing seems totally farcical to me and I cannot believe it takes 4 months to connect a wire to a cabinet which is only a few metres from my house. Is there nothing I can do about this ?
Took 3 months to get sorted, they even disconnected his phone line, as in if you ring it you get the message that says this number is not recognised...and that was his business number!
ETA: He was on EE.
I was on BT 50mb, £20 a month.
Got told I had to go EE at end of 2 year contract, who offered me 500Mb fibre at £24, or I could stay on the 50Mb for £40!
So out the came to run new cables, couldn't get through the ducting to my house, they tried over 3 days, dug up part of my porch, decided the pipe was blocked and I'd have to have a new cable run.
Can I just stay on my 50mb for £20 deal "Nope"
They hired a tunneling machine as we have a block pave way close (ex show houses) and it has to run from a neighbours garden 50m away (Manhole/duct joining hole in their front garden), so they tunneled from there to ours, put a new pipe/ducting in and ran the cable from that, only it came up to the left of the house and I needed it on the right. I didn't want cables tacked around the house so they tunneled another pipe over to where it was needed to enter the house.
In the end, 2-3 blokes for 5 days, sometimes 5 blokes, a tunneling machine, new ducting, because they forced me onto a fibre broadband, which they won't get the money back on.
Got told I had to go EE at end of 2 year contract, who offered me 500Mb fibre at £24, or I could stay on the 50Mb for £40!
So out the came to run new cables, couldn't get through the ducting to my house, they tried over 3 days, dug up part of my porch, decided the pipe was blocked and I'd have to have a new cable run.
Can I just stay on my 50mb for £20 deal "Nope"
They hired a tunneling machine as we have a block pave way close (ex show houses) and it has to run from a neighbours garden 50m away (Manhole/duct joining hole in their front garden), so they tunneled from there to ours, put a new pipe/ducting in and ran the cable from that, only it came up to the left of the house and I needed it on the right. I didn't want cables tacked around the house so they tunneled another pipe over to where it was needed to enter the house.
In the end, 2-3 blokes for 5 days, sometimes 5 blokes, a tunneling machine, new ducting, because they forced me onto a fibre broadband, which they won't get the money back on.
I had a blockage as well when I was trying to convert from Openreach copper to fibre, again, because Sky pushed me to fibre. After umpteen civils visits from Openreach and a hole being dug in both the pavement outside and a corner of the garden it got sorted and the road was properly repaired and resealed. Again, no idea what it cost them but it would have been thousands. I paid nothing.
In short, keep at it, Openreach should sort it out eventually. In my case I was able to stay on my copper based broadband deal until the fibre line was ready.
In short, keep at it, Openreach should sort it out eventually. In my case I was able to stay on my copper based broadband deal until the fibre line was ready.
Any ducting on your own property is really your responsibility (as with any utility company) , if OPENREACH re do YOUR ducting for free you can thank them .... Otherwise have the pleasure of a pole and an overhead cable 
.
Lots of houses built between 1970 and 1990 don't have ducting , at best a armoured cable put in by the builder to save money. BT put overhead in because people didn't want their drives dug up .
TeleWest Cable (now Virgin) would just put a slit in your lawn and drop a fibre in after they'd dug the pavement up and repaired it creating a safety hazard
I moved to EE from BT because the offer was too good to refuse, BUT I COULD HAVE STAYED WITH BT and probably wish I had
.Lots of houses built between 1970 and 1990 don't have ducting , at best a armoured cable put in by the builder to save money. BT put overhead in because people didn't want their drives dug up .
TeleWest Cable (now Virgin) would just put a slit in your lawn and drop a fibre in after they'd dug the pavement up and repaired it creating a safety hazard
I moved to EE from BT because the offer was too good to refuse, BUT I COULD HAVE STAYED WITH BT
and probably wish I had Edited by The Three D Mucketeer on Tuesday 9th June 15:38
In your situation I would just go Starlink.
Starlink is my fall back plan - I'm waiting for mid July when Openreach are due to fit fibre to my home. I'm hoping the shenanigans will be minor as we have an overhead cable (which has never been a problem) but I wanted a Plan B as Openreach tend to use contractors around here.
Starlink is my fall back plan - I'm waiting for mid July when Openreach are due to fit fibre to my home. I'm hoping the shenanigans will be minor as we have an overhead cable (which has never been a problem) but I wanted a Plan B as Openreach tend to use contractors around here.
For the Op, I had massive problems dragged out over months with Openreach installing fibre, they blamed sub contractors, did not turn up for booked appointments and their customer help was appalling.
What finally sorted it was a polite informative email to the Openreach CEO explaining the problem and what I wanted done. They obviously don't read it but I was then contacted by the Executive complaints department who were actually very good. Same person each day phoned me to check what was happening, she then arranged a site visit and got it all sorted. The difference in not starting the story each time you speak to customer help makes such a difference.
Then once it all worked she sorted out a bit of compensation, think about £350 which did not cover my time but was a decent effort.
Might need to google to get the current CEO as its not the one I emailed a few years ago.
What finally sorted it was a polite informative email to the Openreach CEO explaining the problem and what I wanted done. They obviously don't read it but I was then contacted by the Executive complaints department who were actually very good. Same person each day phoned me to check what was happening, she then arranged a site visit and got it all sorted. The difference in not starting the story each time you speak to customer help makes such a difference.
Then once it all worked she sorted out a bit of compensation, think about £350 which did not cover my time but was a decent effort.
Might need to google to get the current CEO as its not the one I emailed a few years ago.
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