Elapsed Day No. | Day | |
1 | Monday | We called our ISP about upgrading. They advised that delivery would take abut a week but (in their case) we had to arrange and pay for BT to downgrade the ISDN line to analogue. |
We called BT on the sales number (still) printed on their bills advertised as being open until 20:00 in the evening. Got a recorded message saying that the offices were open only until 18:00. |
2 | Tuesday | Called BT sales and were told that our line was serviced by BT Wholesale, not BT Retail. We don't believe this to be the case, but we were told we had to call BT Wholesale to be reverted to BT Retail in any case. |
Called BT Wholesale and requested the change. |
Called BT sales again some hours later, but were told that the reversion to Retail had not taken place. |
Called BT Wholesale again and were told we had to send an email with all our account details etc requesting that we be made a BT Retail customer. |
Called BT sales again and placed the order for a 'downgrade' from ISDN to analogue. |
7 | Sunday | Go into office (having not been in on Saturday) and find letter from BT saying they are coming to make the physical change the following day. The letter was posted on Wednesday using second class postage and no-one called to make the arrangements. Although it was convenient, more worrying was that the wrong ISDN number was being kept for the new line.
The letter said that order progress could be checked on the BT website - although only www.bt.com was given as the URL. After about ten minutes we found the route to the page - and then after about another ten minutes of registering etc we got through to a page saying that our order number could not be viewed online. However, an order progress line phone number was given. We called the number, only to find the line is no longer in service. |
8 | Monday | Called BT sales as soon as they opened and changed the order to show the correct line number. However, the work order had already been issued and we had to advise the visiting BT engineer of the number change.
We advised the engineer and he used the correct number and the 'de-installation' went smoothly. |
Called our ISP's sales line and they said they were to busy handling sales enquiries and could we please order online. We ordered online and took the ADSL router/modem option. |
12 | Friday | Called our ISP, (Surefish, an aid charity-based ISP), for a progress update and were assured everything was on track. |
15 | Monday | Receive notification from our ISP that they are going to draw the advance subscription fee for the flat rate service we are cancelling in favour of ADSL. Email the ISP and get the payment stopped, but in the process lose use of the flat rate service without yet having the ADSL service (for which we have paid the first month in advance) working. |
18 | Thursday | Called our ISP and were told the equipment was being shipped today and would be with us tomorrow. |
19 | Friday | No equipment delivered. Called our ISP and were told that the modem/router was being shipped today and would be with us on Monday. |
22 | Monday | Wrong equipment delivered - and with no micro filters. Called our ISP, found that the correct equipment delivery would take too long and so decided to buy directly from our usual equipment supplier instead. Our ISP said they would call to arrange equipment collection. Ordered the equipment, a four Ethernet port router/modem, for delivery the next day. Supplier said no micro filters included, so we them. |
24 | Wednesday | Wrong equipment delivered - and with no micro filters. The router/modem arrived from our equipment supplier, a day late. It only had one Ethernet port, not four as we had been told, and a micro filter was included with the router.
The courier left the router/modem package at the serviced office reception on the ground floor, yet came up to our office to collect the modem incorrectly delivered by our ISP. The ISP had not called about us and so we had not delivery details, etc.
Installed the modem and tried the service. Our password was being rejected.
Called our ISP and they were not sure what username and password we should use. The ISP offered several but none worked. The ISP raised a fault ticket, we received an email confirmation with the ticket number. |
25 | Thursday | Nothing heard from our ISP. Called the ISP; no news and no timescale in which we might hear something. |
26 | Friday | Called our ISP again in the late afternoon, having heard nothing from them. They would not commit to any timescale to hear back from them. |
27 | Saturday | Had an email from the ISP suggesting we try another username. We had tried this particular username the previous Wednesday; it did not work then and it did not work now.
Tried pressing for a timescale for repair or the possibility to speak to the people the fault had been escalated to - but with no success. The ISP would not commit to any course of action or timescale.
Having heard nothing back in the late afternoon, we emailed to cancel the order and requested a reference number (for BT) for migrating the service to another ISP. |
29 | Monday | Having heard nothing back from our ISP regarding either the fault or the cancellation, we called the ISP and went through the step by step process - including having to request repayment of fees for services and equipment not provided - on the phone.
The contact person indicated that they have to get special permission from managers to make outbound calls, and this is one reason why we may not have been called. Inbound calls cost 75p per minute (about JPY 145 per minute), but outbound calls are actively discouraged.
To find out if and when the service has been cancelled, whereby we can order from another provider (another week's wait), we have to call our ISP daily. |
30 | Tuesday | Our ISP called to find out what the problem was with the modem delivery, intending to implement remedy. The wrong modem was delivered on day 22 and collected on day 24. Perhaps a little late to be calling? |
31 | Wednesday | Having heard noting from our ISP, we called to find the status of the cancellation. They did not know the status, said they would 'escalate' it again, and would let us know something, at some time.
This is as far as we have got with this one line, so we have to wait to see what happens. We still have no idea why the initial problem occurred, and when and how it might have been remedied. Such a laissez faire approach to customers is very hard to understand, especially as broadband services ought to be more profitable than the ISPs narrowband services. |
We deeply regret starting this whole process and wish we had remained with the particular ISDN line. The concept of having the customer form part of the delivery chain may have some merits, but if we were to have included it in the cost of the upgrade we never would have started. The opportunity cost of our participation probably outweighs many months' productivity gains.
Another uncomfortable aspect of this prevalent poor service quality in telecoms in the UK is that UK consultants - ourselves included - are asked by operators in other regions of the world to assist them in improving their services. These operators assume that, coming from Europe - and perhaps the UK in particular - we are used to receiving and receiving high levels of service. Working with an Asian client recently we were horrified when the contact number they gave out on a prepaid Internet access product was no longer in service, yet we have just had a similar occurrence with BT. Where does that leave Europeans in advising others?
However, in mitigation, there is an old saying that the cobbler's children always have the worst shoes. Sadly for the UK telecoms industry, how true. But why does this have to be the case? Why cannot the telecoms industry use the supply of its own services as an example of what it can achieve for other industries? Sadly, we have only questions, and no answers.