BT Infinity problems, no customer service

Hi, I've not been active on these forums for a long time, but I could really do with some advice! I recently moved into a new flat and had BT Infinity Option 1 activated last Monday (12th). The service has been pretty terrible since then. BT said I'd get speeds between 23-30Mbps with a guaranteed minimum of 17Mbps. My HH6 has been syncing at ~20meg down / 5meg up however my speed tests have been consistently reporting ~5mb down / 4meg up and I'm getting ~10% packet loss after pinging google for an hour.

I've been performing all the speed tests whilst connected via ethernet, with the router plugged into the BT master test socket. I'm using both the TBB checker and the BT Wholesale checker, I've also done BT Wholesale test 3 where I've changed the HH's username and connected directly to BT wholesale and it gives the same readings. Most of my readings have been taken in the evening after work, however I've taken some first thing in the morning and other than one this morning where I got 18 down, 5 up they've also been terrible.

This is what the BT availability checker says about my line:

Exchange NEWCASTLE WEST is served by Cabinet 32
VDSL Range A (Clean) 54.3 / 40 / 10.3 / 7.2
VDSL Range B (Impacted) 40 / 20.2 / 8.5 / 4.6

To me it seems like there's obviously something wrong, so I called BT customer services this evening and waited for an hour and twenty minutes to speak to someone. When they finally answered they undertook some kind of diagnostic procedure, told me my line was fine and that I just needed to restart the router and "keep it away from any walls or electrical devices". When I told them I wanted an engineer to come out they just kept repeating the script.

We went round in circles for a bit and eventually I got fed up and told them I wasn't happy and wanted to make a formal complaint. I was told "Yes, the complaint is fine, I'm taking notes", I said that I wanted to make a formal complaint and wanted to know what their procedure was, when they'd investigate and when I'd hear from them (I know... haha). We went around in circles until I asked to speak to his supervisor at which point he cut me off.

Can anyone offer any suggestions as to what I can do next? I feel like I'm stuck with a broadband connection below the guaranteed minimum but there's nothing I can do about it? I'm at a loss as to what I can do.

In case they're of any use my line stats are:
Data rate:
5.07 kbps / 19.99 kbps
Maximum data rate:
5074 / 23695
Noise margin:
6.2 / 5.2
Line attenuation:
25.7

Edited by deleted (Thu 22-Sep-16 22:07:09)

Mmm the words 'guaranteed minimum' are not really true, as no-one guarantees the minimum at all, the only guarantee they could give is if you are not happy leave and go elsewhere.

You say you are using the master socket, do you have telephone extensions - if yes then their wiring can impact the speeds and thus you need to test with the test socket that will disable all the extensions (check that they've stopped working too). It is probable your speeds will improve if you have extensions and you test from the test socket and if that is the case then fitting a VDSL faceplate various options on Amazon should reduce the impact of extensions.

Thanks for the reply MrSafron, there's no internal wiring beyond the master socket and I've had the router connected to the test socket for 4 days now. The drop cable comes directly off the telegraph pole into the flat and then there's about 2-3m of wiring between the small BT box where the cable enters and the master socket.

The flat is also served by virgin media cable so I'd see being able to walk away from the contract as a win if they can't improve things. I can at least roll the broadband dice again! 17Mbps is setting the bar very low for FTTC, especially considering I live bang in the middle of Newcastle. I got 18 from ADSL in my last flat, if they can't get near the 30 they predicted I'll be switching to virgin when the contract is up anyway, if they can't even hit 17 I'd like to switch ASAP!

How would I go about getting them to do this? I'd imagine I'm going to have to suck it up for a while and present evidence of speed tests before they agree to this? Is there any route to get an engineer out / get out of the contract that doesn't involve their call centre? BT say you can report a fault / book an engineer online, however I just went round in circles with some basic automated diagnostic that told me my connection was fine.

Try a different router. The HH6 is known for problems of this sort.

Thanks BatBoy I hadn't thought of that! I don't have another router with a VDSL2 modem in it, I'll seel if someone at work has a spare I can borrow and give it a shot.

Yeap HH6 is not setting the world alight in terms of reputation, ideally you want to borrow a VDSL modem/router that supports G.INP and Vectoring - though it can take a few days for the DLM systems to turn on those settings so borrowing might not be that easy.

In terms is this a fault or not, its below the expected range, but not by such a large margin that it could be called a fault, i.e. the estimates are not 100% accurate and over time do take feedback from active lines to improve the data given out.

My line personally would be that BT said guaranteed minimum and you want out as that is not being met. Getting an engineer out if your wiring is optimal is unlikely to help, if your estimate was say 50 to 60 and you were getting 17 Mbps then I'd say it was worth the hassle getting them out.

Unfortunately Newcastle West Cab 32 is an ECI cab so doesn't offer G.INP or vectoring

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Yeap HH6 is not setting the world alight in terms of reputation,

Is it worth me opening the one I just got? Asking sincerely. If it's that pants should I stick to my HH5B?

If it's perform as bad as it looks then double uck!

Edited by deleted (Fri 23-Sep-16 12:36:13)

Mileage seems to vary - so if happy with everything now and prefer an easy life then I'd leave alone. If you enjoy tinkering then give it a go.

On HomeHubs one thing that often helps is renaming the 5GHz wifi band to avoid devices flip/flopping constantly between the two frequency bands.

I gave it a go - It's given me IPv6 - not sure what that does - but speed etc is still the same.

I have noticed I can only have 1 password for both bands when they are seperated. And right now nothing can log onto the 2G so I will put them back together again.

Seems to be fine apart from that here.

After running your readyness test I read up on how to , and changed my DNS to Google's IPv6 as it was taking a few seconds for pages to load.

Weird how BT have given me this but not this DNS to go with it.

Edited by deleted (Fri 23-Sep-16 14:04:36)

In reply to a post by 23Prince:

I gave it a go - It's given me IPv6 - not sure what that does - but speed etc is still the same.

I have noticed I can only have 1 password for both bands when they are seperated. And right now nothing can log onto the 2G

By "2G" I assume you mean the 2.4 GHz wifi band?

Have you tried the Quiet Line Test?


Always a good starting point.

In reply to a post by Danger:

I called BT customer services this evening and waited for an hour and twenty minutes to speak to someone. When they finally answered they undertook some kind of diagnostic procedure, told me my line was fine and that I just needed to restart the router and "keep it away from any walls or electrical devices". When I told them I wanted an engineer to come out they just kept repeating the script.

We went round in circles for a bit and eventually I got fed up and told them I wasn't happy and wanted to make a formal complaint. I was told "Yes, the complaint is fine, I'm taking notes", I said that I wanted to make a formal complaint and wanted to know what their procedure was, when they'd investigate and when I'd hear from them (I know... haha). We went around in circles until I asked to speak to his supervisor at which point he cut me off.

As a BT customer; I recognise that customer service scenario all too well as BT customer service often appear to be snowed under with customers ringing them up and when you do get through to speak with them I have found that the line often goes dead.

I have been with BT Infinity for some years, (at the last house which was about the same distance from the cabinet), we got around 55 Mbps and in this house we usually get around 34 Mbps and since Openreach carried out, (what they called improvements to the cabinet via Huawei engineers), a few weeks ago our connection has been even worse than it was.

In the area that we live, if we had and alternative to Openreach such as Virgin Media we would have left but as it in our case we are stuck with Openreach irrespective of which ISP we choose.

Quite frankly I blame the UK Government for setting up this inept and ridiculous broadband system where instead of simply having a national grid for phone lines as in the case of electricity we end up with needing to consider the cabling when changing broadband suppliers.

Imagine if your electricity supply was not within a reasonably tightly controlled standardised supply quality target range for the whole country and it was run and was controlled by BT/Openreach who decided that you could get up to 230 volts and that anything over 50 volts was OK for your electric supply line they would soon lose control over the supply cables.

As it is, the BT/Openreach speed targets go up and down like a tarts knickers and whatever you get is, according to them, within their target speed range but as I understand it if a customer is getting under the, so called, guaranteed level as per the email that they received when they took the service out and with proof via something like the BTW Performance Tests that customer can leave without penalty.

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2015/06/ofcom-d...

On the whole OFCOM is useless but this appears to be a small step forward. Therefore, especially since you have only recently joined them, I suspect that if you continue pressing BT and keep sending them BTW performance that you will be able to leave without penalty

If we had Virgin Media as an alternative we would go elsewhere but as it is we seem to be in the complaints process and will probably be setting letters to the local MP. (Not that that would do any good as all the rubbish tends to come out of Westminster and all of the good legislation tends to come out of Europe).

Even Spain is getting an FTTH rollout while we are stuck with BT/Openreach.

I wish you well with it but I would check what Virgin had to offer if I was you.

Regards,
Fido

Which modem are you using?

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Which modem are you using?

We have a few router/modems and it makes virtually no difference from the speed performance modem side irrespective of which one is used.

In the BT supplied HomeHub 5 (Type A) modem/router the modem part of which is generally OK but the wireless part of the HomeHub 5 is usually poor.

I prefer using my Asus DSL-AC68U, (which is an excellent all around as a modem and as a router).

These days with the Asus DSL-AC68U; I usually keep G.INP (G.998.4) enabled and G.vector (G.993.5) enabled as I found that it made no difference either way on an EC1 cabinet and should add some benefit as vectoring is introduced.

No I haven't, I didn't even know what that was until I Googled I don't own a fixed line phone, but I guess I'll pick one up for a fiver from argos so I can try!