Plusnet is a joke

Plusnet is a joke!
I am not with Plusnet but my elderly father signed up to the fibre optic service in November 2012. Ever since then he has been beset by problems that to this day have still not been resolved. Their customer support is pathetic and ticketing system useless.
He was promised 28mbps but since day 1 has never had higher than 11mbps. He gets multiple daily disconnections. Since install all the extension phones stopped ringing and last week his email and domain went down.
Several BT engineers have been sent out to rectify the slow speed/disconnections and phones not ringing. Hours were spent looking at the wiring and cabinet and the BT engineers couldn't find anything. One even said that hardwired phones don't work with fibre optic and to live with it. Shortly after the "phones not ringing problem" was fixed by a different engineer. The guy before obviously hadn't a clue. the latest engineer plugged a meter into the phone socket and said it registered at 28mbps and can't see what the problem is.
My father has sent numerous tickets to Plusnet, many going unanswered for days and spent hours hanging on the phone to customer service. The latest advice from telephone support was to try it hardwired which he has now done, noticing no difference.
Last week both my parents email went down completely. All email sent to them gets bounced with DNS error Domain name not found. Another phonecall to Plusnet yesterday and they said it had been cancelled and untagged but would be sorted within half an hour. Today - still not working.
So to sum it all up - slow internet with constant disconnections and no email which is now even worse than it was initially. Plusnet don't seem to care a long as they get their money.
Is my father able to cancel out of this 12/18 month contract? As it stands the "service" they are providing is ridiculous!

Hi Flimbo

Sorry to hear of the poor experience you've received, I'm happy to get one of the team to pick this up and keep you/your father updated with progress and try to resolve the issue as soon as possible.

If you can PM me your father's username I'll pass it on and get someone to get in touch.

Thanks but it's already ongoing and wouldn't want to confuse things even more than they already are.
After phoning Plusnet today they said line is still dropping out (6 times today) and are getting BT to come out again tomorrow morning. They last came out on Monday and couldn't find anything wrong then so who knows what they'll do tomorrow, if anything. And another phonecall to Plusnet today revealed they had cancelled his personal email and domain last week for reasons unknown, even though they guaranteed they could transfer it across from Madasafish before he signed up.
Beyond a joke now.

By leaving things as they are you will continue to be dealing with a different person each time you make contact. Get Chris involved and you'll have ONE person keeping an oversight on what's happening and that person will be far more experienced than the usual people that you deal with.

Your choice - but if you do decide to leave things as they are don't come back moaning on here if things don't progress when you've had the chance to get the issue given special attention!

We'll see what happens with the BT engineer tomorrow morning. If still no progress then I will take Chris up on his kind offer of help.

I agree with Jelv, give Chris the info he wants it will only help, surely it can't get any worse than it already has

Just adding to what the others have said re Chris's offer, he and his colleagues who come here are higher up the food chain at Plusnet than the people on the phone and ticket services, and have more clout. There's nothing wrong with those people, but they have a very busy time dealing with "routine" stuff.

And just to add, plenty of us have in the past had excellent service from Plusnet. I am sure once you have it sorted, the service will be good. The next problem will be when you switch to another provider.

I hope so! It's just taking so long to get sorted and each BT engineer visit is promising but they leave with no improvement.

As I live in another part of the country to my father I only have what he tells me. I do have access to his member account and email settings at Plusnet online and have managed to setup a plusnet email for both my parents which they can access through webmail which will do them for now. This wasn't available until yesterday after finding out plusnet had cancelled my dad's domain.

Does PN provide domains? Or do you mean email address?

http://www.plus.net/support/hosting/domains/domain_r...

First result when entering domain into the search box on Plusnet's Home Page.

Ouch! Why would anyone pay Plusnet £52.88 to register a uk domain for two years as opposed to the £6 or so it would cost anywhere else? They're 'avin' a larf!

I think what you are highlighting here is a BT issue, not a PN issue.

BT supply the infrastructure for most ISPs and it is their (in)ability here to deliver a quality service that is the root of your father's problems, not PN. Chris has offered you a helping hand, respond to him NOW and you will see a difference. This is clearly a complex BT problem and needs focused management.

I can assure you (from recent on-going experience) that PN do have the ability to manage the resolution of this issue with BT OpenReach, even if they do not have the direct ability to fix it.

Yep. I didn't have time to see if any webspace is included - at first sight it doesn't. Similarly email.

Well nothing has been sorted since the BT engineer came out yet again yesterday. He replaced the BT modem and now the speed has dropped even more and still getting disconnections.

Chrisparr - I have sent you a PM. Hope you can help.

Edited by deleted (Tue 22-Jan-13 12:06:16)

This domain thing flimbo, which is quite separate from the connection issue, sounds odd. Cancelling domains isn't something we hear about.

Would you mind PM'ing me the domain name in question and I'll see what I can find out about it for you, quite independent of Plusnet?

Basically the domain got untagged during an account change from MAAF as mentioned in this post: http://forums.thinkbroadband.com/plusnet/t/4200474-p...

It was then retagged back to MAAF but not added back to the account (as the account had now switched to Plusnet). We've got it tagged back to Plusnet (FORCE9) now and it should be back up and running as soon as the domain records update. Adam's looking after this and will ring again when the DNS records are sorted to make sure the emails are being received correctly.

He's also looking after the fault.

Cheers Chris.

Thanks for looking into the problem. Much appreciated.

Although I think things have been mentioned about the domain now being active, mail is still being bounced from it. Speeds are now 0.25mbps.

Hi there,

Sorry to hear that this is still an issue, I've been dealing with this for a few days now and I'm guessing that it's your father that I've been corresponding with rather than yourself?

A new fault appointment has been booked for tomorrow and I'm currently dealing with the email issue.

Yes it is my father you've been dealing with. Email now seems to be sorted and up and running. I've checked it out remotely. Many many thanks! He's very pleased.
Next step is the line speed...fingers crossed for tomorrow.

Edited by deleted (Thu 24-Jan-13 18:45:54)

And after a six hour visit from BT Openreach the line seems to have been fixed too. Running at 28mbps so far. Fingers crossed.
Many thanks to all those involved in getting this sorted out.

Edited by deleted (Sat 26-Jan-13 13:28:53)

What did the openreach guy do to fix your problem? that took 6 hears to fix.

I think he mentioned fixing the "star wiring" at the junction box in the loft.