BT Groundhog day

I have two phone lines in my house (two BT twisted pairs). One is a business line, with AAISP FTTC. The other has Bulldog/Pipex ADSL2.

Since the Pipex line is only for backup now, I decided to downgrade it to a cheaper package, so I called BT and asked them to take over the line with a basic ADSL package.

Instead, they took over my business line, causing all my incoming calls to come in on that socket. When I called customer services, thay told me I was mistaken, and I only have one line. After a long time on the phone, with warnings about how I must pay if it's my fault, they agreed to send an engineer out. When he arrived, he didn't believe me either, until he took both sockets off the wall, and put his test equipment on it. He said it was an exchange fault, and I had to call customer services again. I wouldnt let him go until I called them, so he could explain it. But they didn't believe him either!! He ended up leaving while I was stuck on the phone to CS. 5 days later engineer two arrived, and said the same thing. I called CS again, and its just back to square one.

There doesn't seem to be any way out of this. AAISP tell me my business line doesn't exist any more!

Did you call BT using the business line per chance? I bet the sales person took the caller ID rather than the number you read out to them....

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In reply to a post by stuorguk:

When I called customer services, they told me I was mistaken, and I only have one line.

Doesn't your BT bills show you have (had) 2 lines?

No, because my business line is billed by AAISP, and the Residential line is billed by Pipex.

BT Retail are only aware of the ex-AAISP line, not the Pipex one, as the Pipex one is full LLU. So that's why later CS calls are telling you that you only have one line.

Calling them on the Pipex line would probably have worked fine, but that's no comfort now .

I expect MrSaffron has got you sorted out with his PM.

I made all my calls to CS from the pipex line, and whenever they called me back, it's on the other line.

The Caller ID comes up the same on from both lines. Customer services dont know what LLU is. I dont think the engineers do either.

Thanks, I got a call from BT a few hours later. They are looking into it.

BT confirmed they took over the wrong line. But it's too late to rectify apparently. AAISP have to request to take back the line they already supplied. They should have received a cancellation request, which should have raised alarm bells.

What a mess.

Compensation?

I haven't even considered that yet. Just want the nightmare to end.
What can I reasonably ask for?

£50,000 seems reasonable.

as the BT servie requested was residential then good luck seeing as theyy no longer offer compensation on residential lines only thing they offer is rental rebates you could ask for a goodwill gesture but this gesture will be no where near what you want

Have you lost the AAISP FTTC service, or just the line rental?

The only saving grace, is AAISP FTTC is still working. There would be hell to pay if that had gone.

ah, but it was my business line they messed up. Unauthorised takeover.

Going to wait to see what AAISP say, as they need to take the line back over again.

Most service contracts have exclusion claused for "Consequential Loss", lomiting their liability to liquidated damages and then only of proven costs.

However, if BT can be shown to be "Negligent" then it opens up the unlimited liability coffers.

p.s. IANAL

Re the Pipex line, Plusnet can do a line and broadband takeover as well. You need to get beyond first level support I think, but orbrey (a Plusnet rep on these forums, freqently here), knows all about it.

In reply to a post by Wheel_Nut:

Most service contracts have exclusion claused for "Consequential Loss", lomiting their liability to liquidated damages and then only of proven costs.

However, if BT can be shown to be "Negligent" then it opens up the unlimited liability coffers.

p.s. IANAL

I assume, due to the context, that is a typo for "vomiting their liability".

I dont think I want to introduce another ISP to the party right now! My head is spinning enough with the three.

I think I might just drop the residential line, port the number to VOIP, and get a 3G dongle for backup. less to go wrong hopefully.

.... only if loquidated.

Hi stuorguk,

Is the Customer Services team getting this sorted for you? If you're still having trouble with this send in an email using our "Contact Us" web form at:

http://bt.custhelp.com/app/contact_email/c/4950

We'll take a closer look at this for you.

Thanks,

Stephanie