No internet for over a month.

I am typing this on my crappy little INQ mobile, my only source of internet for over a month now. I know I'm a bit of an internet addict, but this is just getting ridiculous.... We get our broadband through o2, and we recently moved. We read on the o2 site that they offered a phone line as well, and we discovered that between canceling the bt line and paying the charge with o2. It would actually work out cheaper than having bt switch it over for us. Plus they advertised that it would only take 10 days to be up and running. We thought it was a win win. And yet, here I sit, a full 3 weeks after our original activation date, thumb typing on my phone. Apparently bt refused the line switch at first, which was later sorted out. But since then, we've not been able to get a straight answer from anyone as to what is happening or when things will be done. They always say they will call within the next 24 hours with an answer, and when they don't my husband has to ring up and they give the same answer again.

Write a letter, addressed private and confidential to the CEO, addressing them by name. Outline you issues and what you expect them to do to resolve it.

Works every time for me. Hope it works for you. Sounds really cr*p. 

DH brought me home an internet dongle with 3 months of "unlimited" (we can't do our crazy downloading) internet. It is so nice to be looking at a big screen...

Uh, BT call centres are the WORST. I remember when we got our line installed, I had to ring up three separate times before someone actually got our address to appear correctly on the bill. Even after spelling it out slowly and clearly each time.

This is why we were glad to switch from BT. Unfortunately, it doesn't make any difference.

The sooner the UK can get rid of BTOR's stranglehold on internet in this country, the better. I can't wait to be able to ditch our landline that we never use yet pay exorbitant taxes every quarter for JUST so we can have good internet.

(Sorry, the rant went on longer than I expected!)

Thank you for explaining. I feel enlightened!

This may sound mad, but have you tried complaining via Twitter? Virgin Media's twitter people really helped us out when the call centre wouldn't, because of various botched dates (didn't get the right permit, didn't bring the right equipment) they were posting a time of six weeks ahead, and we ended up getting it done in 3 days via Twitter.

Hugs to you lovely, how frustrating! Commiseration drinks/dinner sometime? x

I have honestly never used twitter, but I'll give it a shot! I dunno how to go about complaining on twitter though... Drinks and dinner sound amazing. I could use it. This has been a very stressful month... x

Write a letter, addressed private and confidential to the CEO, addressing them by name. Outline you issues and what you expect them to do to resolve it.

Works every time for me. Hope it works for you. Sounds really cr*p. 

Thanks. I will have to do this. I just hate that I have to deal with any of this crap at all. I just finished the nightmare of estate agents, and now this... 

DH brought me home an internet dongle with 3 months of "unlimited" (we can't do our crazy downloading) internet. It is so nice to be looking at a big screen...
This is why we were glad to switch from BT. Unfortunately, it doesn't make any difference.

Just an FYI here - O₂ was originally established by BT but was subsequently sold to a Spanish comany in 2006, but as you can see the poor customer service remains.


We have a BT line - but only for our internet which is AOL Broadband.

Oh, man, am I with you.  We moved here Sept 8th and I just got my internet hooked up 2 days ago, and only after haggling with BT/Sky endless hours, dropped calls, running out of my "top off" on my phone repeatedly, and finally working up the chain of command until they got BT to show up.  Sky is my new "evil empire", replacing AT&T in the States. 

The only thing that saved me was the "MiFi" my husband bought me from 3.  Cost something like £15/mo for 5GB which was enough for me  to email and do web searches, but not upload lots of pictures or anything. And now I can use it for mobile WiFi, since I have dropped the evil AT&T, and am using an app called "Line2" to make free calls to the states (as long as you have WiFi).   BT sure has a lock on this country!

Good luck!  Be a squeaky wheel.

I'm glad the dongle is working for you...at least you've got something in the meantime.  We had 2 dongles and neither one of them worked because the mobile reception here is so bad.   

We had problems with our internet too!  Sky made me want to go over the edge, and it took us almost a month and lots of moaning on my part before it finally was set up properly.

I hate, hate, hate the damnable dongle (SLOW)- but my man always got on me and said it was "better than nothing." It definitely is, but I hope your internet shows up soon!

PL, let us know how you get on. What hassle!

Keep a record of everything, as well! You can also cc. Ofcom, if you wish.

Good luck with it all!

PL, let us know how you get on. What hassle!

Keep a record of everything, as well! You can also cc. Ofcom, if you wish.

Good luck with it all!

Well I called them on Tuesday and b*tched them out, but really seemed to get nowhere. They could give me no more information. I told them if I didn't get a date soon, we would be terminating the contract. Suddenly, the next day, we get an activation date.  November 8th, apparently. We will see.

Pathetic, because our original activation date was October 8th.... A full month late. And I'm doubtful they can even stick to that, given what I've seen thus far.

am using an app called "Line2" to make free calls to the states (as long as you have WiFi). 

Have you got a link for this? I searched the iTunes app store for "line2" and "line 2" and nothing came up... But I'm interested!

Well I called them on Tuesday and b*tched them out, but really seemed to get nowhere. They could give me no more information. I told them if I didn't get a date soon, we would be terminating the contract. Suddenly, the next day, we get an activation date.  November 8th, apparently. We will see.

Pathetic, because our original activation date was October 8th.... A full month late. And I'm doubtful they can even stick to that, given what I've seen thus far.

Have you written to the CEO? I'd seriously forget ringing anyone now in your shoes. You could even send it recorded signed for. Must be maddening. 

Have you got a link for this? I searched the iTunes app store for "line2" and "line 2" and nothing came up... But I'm interested!

Try this one:

https://www.toktumi.com/Line2.aspx

Let me know if that doesn't work, and I'll look for another avenue for you.

I've been a month without internet, too, and am probably going to have another two weeks before it should come, although it sounds like you've had it worse so far. Hopefully mine goes as planned, but we'll see...

First I was going with TalkTalk, but when they lied to me about activation dates and pricing, I decided to go with Virgin. Virgin told me that I'd have internet within 10 days and that an engineer wouldn't need to come to my flat. It's been over two weeks and now there's an engineer coming on Wednesday. I'm supposed to have internet a week after the engineer visit. I'd complain about having to take the day off of work, but it coincides with the Tube strike, so I'm kind of in a winning situation there. That is, if the engineer comes. I do realise now that it's BT and not the ISP causing issues, which just makes me think it's not right that BT has no competitors within the country. If there were one company to rival them, perhaps we'd be able to get them to set up phone lines just a bit faster.

It frustrates me that the British are so great at inventing things yet absolute rubbish at maintaining them. There is no reason why broadband should still be so reliant on phone lines in this country. Nor should the Tube be completely f****d. But I suppose that's the joy of living in the UK.

I'm off to enjoy the last three minutes of my library internet usage. 

That is, if the engineer comes. I do realise now that it's BT and not the ISP causing issues, which just makes me think it's not right that BT has no competitors within the country. If there were one company to rival them, perhaps we'd be able to get them to set up phone lines just a bit faster.

There are other companies that provide their own phone lines - my parents haven't had a BT phone line since 1994! They've been with Telewest/Virgin for over 15 years now and had to cancel their BT line in order to switch to a Telewest phone line.

It frustrates me that the British are so great at inventing things yet absolute rubbish at maintaining them. There is no reason why broadband should still be so reliant on phone lines in this country.

It's not completely - Virgin broadband runs on both phone lines and fibre optic cable, so you don't always need a phone line to get it, just it depends whether the cable service is available in your area. I've had Virgin Media broadband installed at 3 different addresses in 3 different towns now and all of the services have been through fibre optic cable, not through the phone line.

Internet was switched on at last today... They gave us a new activation date of the 8th, but we checked it today and it works. I'm grateful to have it back, although now I have an internet dongle with 3 months of internet for nothing!

Still going to write and make sure I get something for my trouble...

I'm glad you're back on!