BT is Total Rubbish
February 4th, 2010 | 
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The following is a totally daft tale but sadly, true and concerns BT the so called telecommunications company who have designed a system to ensure that as a customer, you will never ever be allowed to ‘disturb a manager’ with a question or a complaint
On my return from living and working in the States I rented a flat in Bedfont, near Heathrow Airport and at the time BT launched ‘broadband’ which was technically fine except that they wanted you to pay for it monthly by Credit Card for some bizarre reason.
Trying to Talk to BT Management
Early 2002 I had it installed but I persisted in trying to find out just why the idiotic payment method existed, credit cards are not meant for this, bank accounts and direct debits are. Over 8 months and try as I might, I couldn’t get hold of anyone in BT Management to answer my question but whilst this was frustrating, worse was to come.
After about 8 months I had to phone the BT Accounts Department with a query and was told that “I should be paying by Direct Debit anyway !” After my experiences with BT at Bedfont, I definitely am not a fan and exactly why, I was reminded of it all again the other day.
Following My Mother’s Death
My Mother died last week so now we are going through the process of settling her estate and Probate.
Having a land line at home, whilst essential for a broadband connection, in terms of the cost of it, is highly questionable, as we spend more on rental than calls. However the other day a bill arrived that said that we owed them about £80, “But not to worry, we will increase your Direct Debit to £38 a month from 17th February…” That would be a miracle because my Mother’s Account that BT draws from, will be closed by then !
The only reason that my Mother paid it was because she was used to doing so, I pay for the broadband plus between my Mobile, VoIP phone and Skype, I don’t use the land line for outgoing calls.
To cut a long story short, after some heated exchanges with an Indian BT Call Centre (why have a call centre in India ?), it would appear that there is no automatic provision to deal with a customer dying… shit it must happen thousands of time a day ! I don’t want to lose my Internet and mail so how to deal with the wooden tops ?
Inspiration !
Thinking about it, I pay Plusnet (my ISP),£22 a month and BT will want £38 a month for ‘Phone Service’ which = a combined £60 pm = I don’t think so !
I phoned Plusnet Sales (they are owned by BT), explained the situation and said I wanted them to provide both the phone and Internet service and please take the existing line over. They phoned me back an hour later – yes they can do at a combined cost of £18 pm and I think that includes free weekend calls plus they continue to host my two existing domains with them !
They should get that done in 10 days, just ahead of BT wanting to take a DD from my Mother’s by then frozen account. We then get a final close of service bill to set against the Estate as a debt for Probate purposes, I keep the phone and Internet going on the same number.
What Amazes Me…
When you consider what is the “Heavy Lifting Phase”, Registering the Death, arranging a Funeral, sorting out the Probate, Pensions, Medical Services and so on, it all runs properly but there will always be some Dick Wad like BT who hasn’t thought things through and put in an obvious procedure for something which must be a daily occurrence and hundreds at that. Strangely of course it probably wasn’t too much of a problem when people paid their bills once a Quarter via a cheque, this has arisen simply because of monthly Direct Debits !
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BT recently announced that it was upping my rental charge, trumpeting all the amazing stuff that it is doing to bring broadband to everyone etc. On its literature it quotes amazing possible speeds. In my location, quite close to Exeter the speed is so slow that it is barely faster than dial-up. In fact reliable authority informs me that most of the 3rd world is quicker. Now I don’t begrudge the 3rd world, far from it, but when I complained to BT they said that I was getting the best speed possible in view of my location, and no there was not any plan in near future to make it better and was there anything else that they could help me with. Maybe people would like to suggest what BT really stands for. Maybe it’s the Blind Trust that they expect us to have in them or the Byzantine Technology that ensures that everything will be done as slowly and incomprehensibly as possible. I’ll leave the ruder and probably cleverer ones to others.
Its about time BT was held to account for the bad service it provides in todays society. A lot of the old folk are to trusting and continue beliving that BT is the best on offer and realy there is not much compatition out there. I had my Bills amalgermated Broad band phone and the very exspensive BT vision I got a seperate bill fof phone although £100 in credit this was plased on the vision that I don’t use and told to pay phone bill of £50.00 they then joind the bills back all in one I do not use the vision and have now got rid although they have a bill for it and I cant get money back I say to all get out of contract before to late
I have had a catalogue of poor service from BT for the last year… And complaints to them don’t go anywhere. They are not interested.
I am so annoyed at myself for stupidly signing up to calls, broadband and btvision…. with this dinosauric company. I cannot wait until my contract ends to get free of dealing with them.
System is flakey
Call Centre technical service frustrating
Response times very poor
Customer focus??? ,,, Well they kind of play at it…. they are not genuinely interested in the customer!
This company is only interested in my money on a monthly basis…. once they got you, they got you!!
I have fought BT now for 10 years. Their whole attitude sucks, and they refuse to accept the blame for all of their faults. BT Broadband is by far the worst service in the UK, and what really pisses me off is the morons that work at the call centres who know absolutely zero about broadband networking – nothing! I am just waiting for the day when we’re totally wireless, so I am not beholden to the company that owns the lines.
BT, and their affiliated BT Openreach stooges are useless.
I’ve been without broadband for almost 3 WEEKS.
My provider says it is a problem with the network so cannot help, and you can’t complain directly to Openreach, so therefore it becomes a game of running around in a loop.
I run my own business, and things are tough right now, but having to rely on wireless internet is not great, and is not reliable enough for business use.
Someone needs to knock BT off their perch. Surely it’s time to lift the monopoly they have on the market.
Let someone else try – they probably could’nt do any worse.
BT should bring all call centres back to the UK then maybe will get to understand what is being said and hopefully they will understand us.i asked for some information and got sent a copy of my last bill(they are RUBBISH)
I had an email to say that BT Vision would be activated 5 days’ ago, I received the equipment (only because I ranted to a supervisor on the phone), they are absolutely incapable of performing. I have made at least ten phone calls and wasted hours and hours talking to various people without making any progress. I feel really sorry for the employees, they are all without exception, helpful, IT literate people, but any requests sent by them are totally ignored. I am going to move to Sky TV which I didnt want to do, but BT is pathetic.