Being charged £49.99 activation fee!

Just tried to sign to PN Unlimited Broadband and phone through Top Cash Back and to my surprise there is a £49.99 activation fee on my first payment! Is this new as I thought that if you take the phone the £25 activation was waived!!

It isn't an activation fee it is a line install fee which is a charge where the line needs to be reconnected

Just phoned PN Sales to query the £49.99 fee and they confirmed that I will not be charged as I have a working phone line already which is with O2! I eventually signed on to PN Unlimited Broadband there and then instead of going through Top Cashback. Will now ask for MAC from O2 and lets hope the service I get from PN is as good as I got from O2! No chance of me migrating to Sky that's for sure!!

Edited by deleted (Tue 09-Apr-13 17:35:57)

In reply to a post by pcoventry76:

PN never came back to me. Seems they dont like dealing with ex staff so stuff them

What's this then?

But I don't need a new line as my line is with O2 and active. The PN sales person then checked rectified/waived the £49.99 fee, hopefully, as he said my first monthly bill will be £28 appox instead of £74.96. Any way I have asked and got my MAC from O2 and have now given it to PN. Just waiting for confirmation of migration date and later the change over of my phone line.

I would definitely phone PN sales and query the £49.99 fee if I was you and don�t need a phone line reconnection! The online sales just added the fee on for no reason at all! It was only when I phoned PN sales that the sales person checked and noticed I did not need to be reconnected but switched from O2 to PlusNet.
I�ve come to the conclusion that it is better to sign on over the phone than online, at least you can discuss and clarify any issues there and then.

I think he might need a new line connection.

Have a read of this thread.

The posts at 17:32 and 22:41 slightly contradict each other, unless I'm mis-reading one of them. In particular it had a dial tone, but now he knows it hasn't but doesn't have a phone to check. (Maybe a dial in to the number it gave doesn't work though).

The earlier posts suggest an LLU line that has been ceased. It possibly won't be appearing on BT Wholesale's records, or at least if the cease took place today it won't appear for a few days. If at all.

RobertoS, now that I have read the thread to the link you provided above, I can understand why PN are asking pcoventry76 for the £49.99 reconnection fee. If the line was with Sky LLU and has been stopped or ceased it needs to be connected back to BT network. It�s what puts some people off Sky and Talk Talk, amongst other reasons, having the line on their network! So in pcoventry76 case the fee seems to apply.

Edited by deleted (Wed 10-Apr-13 01:22:12)

A sale where you make a loss is only a good sale if scope for large profit at a later date.

Adsl is so low cost that is not the case.

Check with talktalk the line connection may be charged and appear as a credit on the bill

In reply to a post by scopio:

Just tried to sign to PN Unlimited Broadband and phone through Top Cash Back and to my surprise there is a £49.99 activation fee on my first payment! Is this new as I thought that if you take the phone the £25 activation was waived!!

Was you address on their database? Im looking at signing up and Im getting this too, I think its because they are using an old postal database so things arnt tallying up .

In my case we changed the houses number 2 years ago and if I use the previous number the activation fee isnt included

Yes my house number was in the database, so in the end I ordered by phone.

What is a puzzle is that if I tried to order online directly though PlusNet web site the £49.99 fee does not appear. It seems it only comes up when ordering via Top Cash Back! Smells of something like not wanting to pay the cash back!

Plusnet's copy of the Royal Mail Postal Address File is way out of date. I discovered this when helping someone on their Community forums.

Hmm, not sure this is anything to do with us - signup uses BTs live appointing systems. Only issue would be if you had to choose the option for 'address not listed'.

Was it at signup you found the issue Jelv, or somewhere else?

probably here http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,1136...

I've sent you IMs with the details.

Correct - I've sent him that link

I just tried to sign up and as my address isn't listed it wouldn't let me (yes I did try manually entering my address) (

Try making sure the address you give matches the address shown on the bill from your last broadband and/or phone provider.

A large number of sites, (I don't know about Plusnet), don't have the necessary number of lines for correct addresses. Even when using postcode lookups they can miss out a line that is present on the relevant card address, and editing doesn't work.

For most purposes it doesn't matter, but when a comparison is involved it's deadlock.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Even when using postcode lookups they can miss out a line that is present on the relevant card address, and editing doesn't work.

For most purposes it doesn't matter, but when a comparison is involved it's deadlock.

This is certainly true with my address; the Post Office database has a different post code to the Borough Council database! In fact I had to use the Borough Council's interpretation of my post code for PayPal as it wouldn't accept the one that I normally use from the Post Office database. Which one is correct is anyone�s guess!! So I just try one first and if that one doesn't work I use the other one!

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

A large number of sites, (I don't know about Plusnet), don't have the necessary number of lines for correct addresses. Even when using postcode lookups they can miss out a line that is present on the relevant card address, and editing doesn't work.

The fields in the Edit Details section of the PlusNet control panel are:

House Number
Street
Town
County
Postcode

Many smaller places have both a village and a postal town, so the above fields are not sufficient.

In reply to a post by Oliver341:

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

A large number of sites, (I don't know about Plusnet), don't have the necessary number of lines for correct addresses. Even when using postcode lookups they can miss out a line that is present on the relevant card address, and editing doesn't work.

The fields in the Edit Details section of the PlusNet control panel are:

House Number
Street
Town
County
Postcode

Many smaller places have both a village and a postal town, so the above fields are not sufficient.

Exactly. I probably didn't have a problem because I signed up over the phone.

I need:- No.; Street; District; County; Postcode.

The same address but without a district and with a different postcode, (still SK), is six miles away on the other side of Stockport. Even correctly addressed post can still go to the wrong one, though rarely since the postcode "red barline" system came in.

It shouldn't need county as that is not part of the postal address. However, the village/district is essential and many sites miss it. Apart from that bit I share an address with a corner shop about 3 miles away, which is enormous fun

I wonder though whether or not the county is included in the billing address comparison. I expect it depends on the intelligence of the coder at each company.

In reply to a post by kasg:

Apart from that bit I share an address with a corner shop about 3 miles away, which is enormous fun

Endless pot noodle supply? Awesome!

Looking at my details on Plusnet it looks as though when I did it I put in
House name
Street, Village (in the street box)
Town
County
Post Code

In reply to a post by Oliver341:

In reply to a post by kasg:

Apart from that bit I share an address with a corner shop about 3 miles away, which is enormous fun

Endless pot noodle supply? Awesome!

Final demands and letters from bailiffs, mostly.

Mine's got Number; Street; District (in the town field); Stockport in the county field; postcode.

I've just omitted the town on my Plusnet details, the name of my village is unique in the world so there's no chance of any confusion!

In reply to a post by kasg:

I've just omitted the town on my Plusnet details, the name of my village is unique in the world so there's no chance of any confusion!

"Kasgville"?

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

"Kasgville"?

Much less common than that

Llanfairpwll something or other?

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

Llanfairpwll something or other?

I should never have started this!

Way out, man!