• Replies 8 replies
  • Subscribers 84 subscribers
  • Views 358 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Options
Related
Hints and tips
  • To quote someone's message, first select/highlight the relevant text, and then use the Quote button that appears
  • To "mention" someone, type @ followed by the start of the forum name, and choose from the list; that person will get a notification of being mentioned

More broadband shenanigans !

Lotus

I posted last week about moving home and the problems I'd had getting my new broadband set up. Since then it's been working fine at my new home, but my problems with my internet provider (Vodafone) are sadly not yet over.

Today I received an email with my latest bill, which had charges for my new home for the next month, plus charges for my old home too, but the service at my old home was supposed to have been cancelled 4 days ago!

I tried online chat - first time got connected to an advisor, but got disconnected halfway through. After 5 more attempts to chat to an advisor - when the AI bot kept asking me a couple of questions, then froze up and didn't connect me to someone, I finally got to chat online with someone who said she could see my instruction to cancel the old service from just over a month ago, but it takes 30 days to be disconnected and then another 22 days for the final bill to be produced, so it would probably be sorted out on my next bill.

A bit later it occurred to me that I hadn't actually had confirmation that the service at my old address had been disconnected. So I rang and asked if it had. The advisor kept me on hold for ages, then came back to say it had now been cancelled. A few minutes after getting off the phone, I got an email saying they were delighted I had decided to stay with them and my service would now not be disconnected!

So, back on the phone and more going through security and waiting. Finally I was told that there had been a problem with the initial disconnection order and it hadn't gone through as expected, so the connections team had to cancel the original order and place another for "instant" disconnection, which will happen within the next 48 hours. When did "instant" come to mean "In the next couple of days"?

Frustratingly, I can't cancel my direct debit as they're using the same one to take payment for my new home. So hopefully it will now get disconnected and I'll receive a credit next month. That's what I've been told should happen, so fingers crossed!

Just wanted to have a rant really. Has anyone else had a similar frustrating customer "service" experience ?

Parents

  • Oh yes! I have had many experiences of a lack of customer service. I get frustrated with the amount of time I have to spend on telephone calls without speaking to a human. When calling an organisation, I dislike being put on hold and having to listen to descriptions of all the amazing offers that are available and being forced to listen to horrible music between promotional talk.

    The worst thing is when the recorded voice will tell me that the information I need is likely to be available on their website. I make telephone calls because the information isn’t available on the website.

    I moved into my current home some years ago and had a bad experience in the process switching from BT broadband and phone to the same service in my new home. BT had organised appointments with me for Openreach to make connections. The engineers failed to turn up on both dates, and I got very agitated. I spent ages on phone calls to BT, but nobody could help me or tell me what was going on. In the end I made an official complaint and actually made contact with someone who telephoned me back with further information and apologies. I didn’t want to proceed with BT, so I chose Plusnet because they seemed to offer good service, even though it is owned by BT. I was able to keep my phone number and BT sent me financial compensation for the missed appointments.

    Plusnet used to have better customer service than they do now, so a few months ago I upgraded to Superfast fibre back with BT. Virgin has had extremely bad reviews because they overcharge and underdeliver, and some of the alternatives were not viable for me.

Reply

  • Oh yes! I have had many experiences of a lack of customer service. I get frustrated with the amount of time I have to spend on telephone calls without speaking to a human. When calling an organisation, I dislike being put on hold and having to listen to descriptions of all the amazing offers that are available and being forced to listen to horrible music between promotional talk.

    The worst thing is when the recorded voice will tell me that the information I need is likely to be available on their website. I make telephone calls because the information isn’t available on the website.

    I moved into my current home some years ago and had a bad experience in the process switching from BT broadband and phone to the same service in my new home. BT had organised appointments with me for Openreach to make connections. The engineers failed to turn up on both dates, and I got very agitated. I spent ages on phone calls to BT, but nobody could help me or tell me what was going on. In the end I made an official complaint and actually made contact with someone who telephoned me back with further information and apologies. I didn’t want to proceed with BT, so I chose Plusnet because they seemed to offer good service, even though it is owned by BT. I was able to keep my phone number and BT sent me financial compensation for the missed appointments.

    Plusnet used to have better customer service than they do now, so a few months ago I upgraded to Superfast fibre back with BT. Virgin has had extremely bad reviews because they overcharge and underdeliver, and some of the alternatives were not viable for me.

Children
No Data