BT SFI Engineer

Hi

My ISP has arranged for a BT SFI engineer to come out after a complaint filed through Ofcom. My ISP called a few days ago and said they are arranging for someone to come out and change our ancient phone socket to the new 'NTE' or summit like that.

Its just occurred to me, whilst waiting on BT to come round, regarding the charges as I wasn't told anything about pricing of any sort. I was just told someone would come and do x, y and z.

Has this happened to anyone else before?

BTo recently attempted to charge me £218 to replace just the faceplate of the NTE5.

The engineer came and fitted in the new NTE5 socket - free of charge

Well chuffed

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

The engineer came and fitted in the new NTE5 socket - free of charge

Well chuffed

I sincerely hope that you're right but some reports suggest otherwise even though the engineer has stated that there won't be a charge.

Don't believe everything you hear. Before you can make a charge, you have to provide proof that the end-user has placed an order, and no order was placed with BT. In any case, BT own half of the face plate.

hmmm

sorry but i dont seem to understand what you've said. the BT guy came and said 'normally we charge anything upto £200 for this sort of job' but because your ISP requested it, they will take the penalty upon them"

i havent signed any contract or anything - i think im pretty safe in saying I wont get charged.

In reply to a post by zebedeee:

Don't believe everything you hear.

I don't!
I was charged £218 myself after expecting and being told that there would be no charge for damage caused by a previous BTo "engineer" visit. That's how I know what the costs are. The charge was refunded immediately upon contacting the CEO's office but that's not the point.
I know others who have also been charged ludicrous ammounts in similar situations.

Edited by Deadbeat (Thu 27-Aug-09 17:11:59)

I'm afraid it's a case of wait and see. BT will bill your ISP. The ISP may then bill you.

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

i havent signed any contract or anything

Signing is irrelevant; a contract may be verbal.

Hi,
I've recently posted in this similar thread.

Even after BT confirming over the phone that there would be no charge - the engineer who arrived also confirmed there would be no charge they then got £250 on their next phone bill!!!

BT CS(India) are refusing to play the recorded telephone conversations back so my friend is having to try to get the info by using the 'freedom of information act'...

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

sorry but i dont seem to understand what you've said. the BT guy came and said 'normally we charge anything upto £200 for this sort of job' but because your ISP requested it, they will take the penalty upon them"

i havent signed any contract or anything - i think im pretty safe in saying I wont get charged.

Good luck with that. I'd be amazed if your ISP paid it. They aren't responsible for your master socket.

You might also want to consider how long it would take them to claw that back from your monthly subscription (IOW:how long do you have to remain a customer before it's worth their while). I would estimate over a decade.

Edited by Andrue (Thu 27-Aug-09 19:30:37)

In reply to a post by Andrue:

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

sorry but i dont seem to understand what you've said. the BT guy came and said 'normally we charge anything upto £200 for this sort of job' but because your ISP requested it, they will take the penalty upon them"

i havent signed any contract or anything - i think im pretty safe in saying I wont get charged.

Good luck with that. I'd be amazed if your ISP paid it. They aren't responsible for your master socket.

You might also want to consider how long it would take them to claw that back from your monthly subscription (IOW:how long do you have to remain a customer before it's worth their while). I would estimate over a decade.

I can cancel anytime, just need to give 30 days notice

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

I can cancel anytime, just need to give 30 days notice

Yes, they know that - you haven't grasped what I'm saying.

For them to be willing to swallow £200 on your behalf they have to be pretty sure that you will stay with them long enough for them to recoup the cost. Profit margins on broadband are crappy (the main reason it's taking so long to get high speed broadband in the UK - it's a lousy business to be in). Most ISPs are probably lucky if they make a couple of quid a month per subscriber. That would mean your ISP would need you to say with them for 100 months (over eight years) before they have covered the cost of the call-out.

Given that the socket has nothing to do with them, replacing it doesn't benefit them in any way and that you could leave at the drop of a hat...it's just a none-starter. Your ISP would have to be incredibly stupid not to pass the bill on to you.

try to get the info by using the 'freedom of information act'...

doesn't apply to businesses or individuals - only bits of Government.

the SFI visit charge is set at £144+VAT and would cover fitting an NTE5 as well as things like pair swapping. The charge is waived if Openreach plant is at fault, as opposed to customer wiring or equipment.

Most ISPs are probably lucky if they make a couple of quid a month per subscriber.

There are many making closer to 50p per user per month...

I didn't realise that.
But it looks like BT have put similar 'privacy' rules in place. BT Privacy Terms

Pay £10 for the info - but "not all calls are recorded"!?


EDIT: As you seem to know how 'things' work what would you do if BT have billed you £250 after you have been told verbally(phone) and from the engineer on site that the work will be free?

Edited by b4dger (Fri 28-Aug-09 20:13:49)

I believe you can challenge / dispute the charge and from what I've read they basically look at all details of the fault call.

my first question would be to ask for a breakdown of the £250. BT operate to a published price list and I don't see how one could get to £250 for changing a master socket.

I'm also not clear if it's BT the ISP or BT the provider of line rental that was involved here, an SFI visit is a fixed charge to the ISP.

The data protection act might be a way to get hold of call records.

Thanks for that.

It wasn't an SFI via the ISP (which looking at your reply to Andrue would appear to have been a cheaper way to have proceeded!)

This was a phone call direct to BT.
With no modern Master Socket it was asked if one could be fitted to allow normal extensions etc. to be used (normalisation or regularisation of the wiring if you like).

BT confirmed this could be done without any charge.
A written reply/confirmation was requested but BT declined saying this wouldn't be necessary!

In reply to a post by Andrue:

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

I can cancel anytime, just need to give 30 days notice

Yes, they know that - you haven't grasped what I'm saying.

For them to be willing to swallow £200 on your behalf they have to be pretty sure that you will stay with them long enough for them to recoup the cost. Profit margins on broadband are crappy (the main reason it's taking so long to get high speed broadband in the UK - it's a lousy business to be in). Most ISPs are probably lucky if they make a couple of quid a month per subscriber. That would mean your ISP would need you to say with them for 100 months (over eight years) before they have covered the cost of the call-out.

Given that the socket has nothing to do with them, replacing it doesn't benefit them in any way and that you could leave at the drop of a hat...it's just a none-starter. Your ISP would have to be incredibly stupid not to pass the bill on to you.

Andrue, as the folks in the Dragon's Den would say "your numbers just don't add up".

If ISP's were only making £2 a month per customer, the customers would have to stay 2 years and 6 months just to repay BT's connection charge. Who in their right mind would set up a business where you're only into profit on year 3 ?

Have those making claims of 50p to £2 a month profit got any proof of their claims ?

In reply to a post by zebedeee:

In reply to a post by Andrue:

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

I can cancel anytime, just need to give 30 days notice

Yes, they know that - you haven't grasped what I'm saying.

For them to be willing to swallow £200 on your behalf they have to be pretty sure that you will stay with them long enough for them to recoup the cost. Profit margins on broadband are crappy (the main reason it's taking so long to get high speed broadband in the UK - it's a lousy business to be in). Most ISPs are probably lucky if they make a couple of quid a month per subscriber. That would mean your ISP would need you to say with them for 100 months (over eight years) before they have covered the cost of the call-out.

Given that the socket has nothing to do with them, replacing it doesn't benefit them in any way and that you could leave at the drop of a hat...it's just a none-starter. Your ISP would have to be incredibly stupid not to pass the bill on to you.

Andrue, as the folks in the Dragon's Den would say "your numbers just don't add up".

If ISP's were only making £2 a month per customer, the customers would have to stay 2 years and 6 months just to repay BT's connection charge. Who in their right mind would set up a business where you're only into profit on year 3 ?

Here's some advice - don't go into Business. Those costs are part of the 'overheads' of the service and are factored into their pricing and amortised over a few months. If an ISP charges £10pcm and makes £1pcm profit then the connection charge is part of the £9 costs.

Replacing master sockets are an extra expense that they won't have allowed for so it comes out of their profit. The cost of that comes out of the £1 profit.

Well actually it's not that simple. For the first couple of months there is no profit since it all gets used to offset costs but the basic principal is there. ISPs have budgeted for connection charges - they don't budget for replacing equipment that is nothing to do with them. What next - getting your ISP to fix your telly for free?

ISPs have historically covered off the connetion charge by tying the customer into a minimum contract period. These days some ISPs are happy to assume that customers always stay long enough to cover off that cost so don't bother with a tie-in.

Edited by Andrue (Sat 29-Aug-09 12:45:25)

In the past we'd often referred to an online BT pricing page that said that the cost of replacing the socket was circa £25 and it was free if someone resident in the house was registered disabled. BUT I noticed - and mentioned on here a few months ago - a hint elsewhere in that documentation that that might only be the price for the replacement AND there might be the normal BT callout fee on top of it. That may have turned out to be the truth! On the other hand they may have charged a lot for the call and replaced the faceplate for free.

It was a fact that many years ago BT used to modify you an NTE5 for free. The situation in the past couple of years has been much much vaguer.

Good luck with this.

I'm aware of this http://www.serviceview.bt.com/list/public/current/Ex... which is probably the info you're referring to.

£25+VAT (bottom of the page)

Jusy all seems a bit 'iffy' if BT inform you things will be free - then bill you further down the line!

"Change of Network Terminating Equipment, Conversion of hard-wired/master socket to Linebox and regularisation of illicit master socket and for Each additional line on same installation converted at same time as first - 01/04/2000 25.00 + VAT "

from Openreach price list.

BT is many parts, and comms can break down.

Yep - that's the same as I quoted ???

I guess...

In reply to a post by yarwell:

"Change of Network Terminating Equipment, Conversion of hard-wired/master socket to Linebox and regularisation of illicit master socket and for Each additional line on same installation converted at same time as first - 01/04/2000 25.00 + VAT "

from Openreach price list.

I was recently charged £218 odd for the replacement of just the faceplate of the NTE5. The fault was reported several times directly to BTr via 151 so there was no other party involved (except of course, BTo). According to the office of the CEO, this charge was correct and normal.

The charge was waived by the CEO's office due to the fact that the damage was caused by a BTo engineer on a previous visit. I was refused a cost breakdown because of the waiver.

Edited by Deadbeat (Sat 29-Aug-09 21:39:23)

Hmmm. I still wonder how that maps to the few bits of price lists we've found before but think of it like this...

BT-Openreach have been passing on charges for "customer" broadband faults since last year and these usually get quoted at £188. So if we take your £218 and subtract that we get £30. Now the previous £25+vat would equal £28.75 so if some bit of BT (BT-O, BTW, BTR in this case) have raised it or rounded it up we get the other £30.

So basically they charge a full engineer call out fee PLUS the (inflated) cost of the faceplate when the change is to the BT boundary on the connection because it is out of date.
Nice.

The price is crazy as adslnation has the faceplate/middle/surface mount backbox set for £5.86 and that's the NTE5a with the extra filtering built in just like the latest BT ones. And that's not the cheapest even with a quick google! Even the most expensive don't seem to charge more than £10. So they are even profiteering on the faceplate!

This suggests the first extension adaption like at the bottom of this Kitz pageis the most sensible for most people.

In reply to a post by Andrue:

Here's some advice - don't go into Business.

You're about 6 years too late. I have been running a very profitable limited company since June 2003. I wouldn't put my money into anything which didn't show a profit for 3 years, and very little after that.

In reply to a post by zebedeee:

In reply to a post by Andrue:

Here's some advice - don't go into Business.

You're about 6 years too late. I have been running a very profitable limited company since June 2003. I wouldn't put my money into anything which didn't show a profit for 3 years, and very little after that.

Heh, well neither would an ISP - although I do wonder sometimes at their financial acumen. Several of the bigger ones seem happy to run at a loss just to help make up a bundle :-/

Anyway the OP will find out if they get charged or not. If not then congratulations to them. Maybe they can get their ISP to replace their telly

I think the reality is packages that are designed for light users. low priced and low usage, generate very little profit since there is no headroom. Even if the light user uses no traffic it is typically priced so low that the only real profit made on those type of accounts is when such customers order topups, so usage = profit.

Then we have the higher priced packages either aimed at people who want higher limits/unlimited or for people who want quality, these I expect have higher profit margins. I expect isps like zen, aaisp and ukonline make more profit per customer then isps such as plusnet, entanet (wbc packages) and BE (with quidco cashback).

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

I expect isps like zen, aaisp and ukonline make more profit per customer then isps such as plusnet, entanet (wbc packages) and BE (with quidco cashback).

Be and O2 are still on a land-grab. (I wonder if they will be in September?)

The free months and cash-back will be coming from Marketing budgets, so the service itself will be showing a healthy profit in the books.

In reply to a post by KevinR:

So basically they charge a full engineer call out

This "engineer" was a lone 17 year old female trainee who had to borrow my Krohn tool because she didn't have one in her toolkit. She was a very nice and well spoken young lady and, on chatting to some BTo engineer friends later, they said that she is a lovely girl and pretty bright too (Their words not mine).
To send a trainee out to a job unsupervised and without the necessary tools is crazy in itself. But, particularly given some of the nearby estates etc, it's sheer lunacy to send out a young, naive girl unaccompanied. On many of these estates, the Police won't attend a call unless they have backup and local authority, housing etc workers are always despatched in pairs at least and often accompanied by estate rangers and CPO's.
Within about a mile radius of where I live, there have been three vicious murders in the last five months, two of them young girls and one a company boss.

BTo simply don't have enough personnel locally to maintain a very aged network which traverses some very difficult terrain. Their answer to that problem appears to be to offer the staff who know these local systems inside out extremely favourable voluntary redundancy packages.

BT-Openreach have been passing on charges for "customer" broadband faults since last year and these usually get quoted at £188.

by who ? The SFI charge is £144 + VAT = £165.60. Simple as.

The £25+VAT is the charge to sort out the master socket to current standards. It is a specific charge for that activity. Similarly there are rates for moving an NTE5 which are £85 per visit plus £55 per hour or part thereof (all plus VAT). These rates apply when the work isn't covered by a specific fee in the price tables.

From October the visit charge becomes £105+VAT including the first hour, which is effectively a reduction from £140 for visit plus up to one hour.

The Openreach charge for a filtered faceplate is £5.88 +VAT.

it is, from a different place. I hadn't seen your post at the time.

AFAIK Be make a loss, as do Easynet (UKonline). You can't really say a service is profitable by hiding a load of associated costs elsewhere.

In reply to a post by KevinR:

Hmmm. I still wonder how that maps to the few bits of price lists we've found before but think of it like this...

BT-Openreach have been passing on charges for "customer" broadband faults since last year and these usually get quoted at £188. So if we take your £218 and subtract that we get £30. Now the previous £25+vat would equal £28.75 so if some bit of BT (BT-O, BTW, BTR in this case) have raised it or rounded it up we get the other £30.

So basically they charge a full engineer call out fee PLUS the (inflated) cost of the faceplate when the change is to the BT boundary on the connection because it is out of date.
Nice.

The price is crazy as adslnation has the faceplate/middle/surface mount backbox set for £5.86 and that's the NTE5a with the extra filtering built in just like the latest BT ones. And that's not the cheapest even with a quick google! Even the most expensive don't seem to charge more than £10. So they are even profiteering on the faceplate!

This suggests the first extension adaption like at the bottom of this Kitz pageis the most sensible for most people.

Maybe I am missing something, but WHY did the OP's ISP decide to replace the master socket? Had the previous master socket developed a defect - or did the ISP decide to send an engineer to upgrade the socket, merely to facilitate extension wiring?

BT Openreach are responsible for maintaining everything between the telephone exchange and the master socket on the subscriber's premises. Although BT Openreach should not charge for repairing faults in their equipment, they can (and will) charge the subscriber (or the subscriber's ISP) for voluntary upgrades.

In the case of an old-style star-wired installation, BT were responsible for the master socket in its entirety. Consequently, if an old-style master socket develops a fault, BT Openreach must replace the socket at no cost to the subscriber or to the subscriber's ISP.

However, the subscriber will be charged for any faults that can be attributed to the subscriber's own equipment or extension wiring. (i.e. Anything that is connected on the subscriber's side of the master socket.)

If a subscriber has a new style NTE5 master socket, BT Openreach own the linebox. Consequently, they are responsible for faults in the backplate. However, it is a moot point whether BT Openreach will bear the cost, if the NTE5 faceplate develops a fault. Again, the subscriber will be charged for faults that can be attributed to the subscriber's own equipment or extension wiring.

However, the NTE5 linebox does have a test socket in the backplate, which provides an opportunity for the subscriber to eliminate the possibility of faulty extension wiring - before requesting an engineer's visit which potentially, could be very expensive.

In reply to a post by yarwell:

AFAIK Be make a loss, as do Easynet (UKonline). You can't really say a service is profitable by hiding a load of associated costs elsewhere.

I didn't.

In reply to a post by yarwell:

AFAIK Be make a loss, as do Easynet (UKonline). You can't really say a service is profitable by hiding a load of associated costs elsewhere.

Reminds me of the Dilbert cartoon where he gets reassigned to marketing. The lintel over their Grecian doorway reads 'Two drink minimum'

Well when the first rash of charges cropped up in late 2007 to late 2008, the figure usually quoted in posts was £188. eg. this post and this post (ADSL24 in Dec 08) and here
And as long ago as Aug 08.
The earliest I can find which talks about £160+vat (at 17.5%) = £188 in Nov 07. The current VAT reduction would only make this £184.
Even the elite RobertoS generally quotes this same figurebecause of that history. Unfortunately TB does not keep really old posts so I can't find many more in a hurry.

I think I'd also make the point that its not clear (to me) that normal Openreach visits are SFI visits - I think they are just normal visits. So the price may be a different one in the price list. Also the set charge for an NTE5 fit has been frequently quoted by both me and RobertoS and others in the past, but I did note a structural aspect of the pricelist some months ago which could be taken to mean that the price was only for the fitting and perhaps did not include the actual attendance of the OR engineer. Indeed if that aspect is ambiguous perhaps BT have changed how they interpret it. After all they changed the original definition of "charge if there is a customer side fault found" to "charge if a BT fault/fix cannot be spotted by the customer or isp" and "charge if the problem is intermittent and not found when we go".

I believe Entanet and resellers were marking up the SFI charge, which may be the source of the inflated number. The Entanet partner price list does not currently do that, but I can't comment on current reseller practice. BT have only ever charged £144+VAT when the SFI was introduced 01-04-2007

I agree that not all visits are SFI only those arranged via ISPs to resolve a problem. At least one of the callouts in this thread was only to resolve a telephony issue. The original price of the "regularisation" of master sockets was in fact 0.00 and this continued to be the case for disabled customers.

Either way, if someone is charged "£200" they should ask for an itemised invoice to allow comparison with BT's published and regulated price list. If they were told it was free at the point of ordering then they should stick to their guns and ask for the charge to be withdrawn.

Why would they want to compare it to BT's regulated list?

Openreach make the charges and it is up the the communications provider/isp what they charge the end user.

most ISPs claim to be simply passing on BT charges, in which case they should be able to justify the charge to the end user by reference to BT charges.

If the ISP is setting its own charges and rules then its down to them to justify what they are charging and why, especially if it was they who told the end user it was free.

I am reffering to operating profit (ongoing costs vs revenue) so investment costs written off. ukonline and even its parent company easynet seem to have no marketing activity whatsoever so the only significant costs would seem to be the costs in building the network.

I thnk robertos has a good point in regards to O2 as well, they are probably very willing to write off the cost of obtaining customers and only concerned with long term ongoing costs.

asking for an itemised invoice is just common sense really, I will never accept a engineer bill if that situation arises unless I get a written quote prior to the visit which I agree to and I then sign off any diagnosis and work done.

After having relatively trouble free internet connection on line for 5 years, problem began with frequent drops.
My ISP asked me to do quiet line test which I did with BT Technician at the other end.
Then my ISP asked if my second socket gets disabled or not when flap from the Main Socket is removed.
I found that second socket was not dying on flap removal from Main Socket.
Before calling BT Engineer I hired a private Technician who found that the Main Socket has only one wire coming in and not two, and located a junction inside my place from where two sockets were getting independently connected. Both these sockets were termed main by a BT Support on phone though clearly one socket had no flap.
I booked BT Engineer. I had to point it out to him of the existence of junction box. He disconnected the flapless socket and left.
As the problem continued, ISP has booked an SFI Engineer.
Obvious thing is that BT cable coming in from Street Box has become unstable, rusted over the decades.
Would BT do rewiring from the Street Box.
How else could the trouble be rectified

SFI Engineer found fault with the cable between Exchange and Street Box(Junction).
A week before BT Telephone Engineer removed second socket connection that I thought was an extension socket but a BT support on 0800 169 0643 told me subsequently that it was second main socket though without the FLAP on it.
I had carried out quiet line test with BT person at the other end and BT person said there is no noise on the line. The BT Telephone Engineer who removed second socket said noise is removed and yet SFI Engineer found noise and switched cable between Exchange and Socket.

You can have no audible noise (quiet line test) but masses of noise in the frequencies that ADSL uses, which is what the RFI engineer should have been looking at.

BT seem to have lost their way. I have this week had some 11 hours of BT OpenReach engineer to try and sort a very slow BT Broadband connection which occurred after their own engineer installed a new BT master socket. 0.25 meg download speed, on an 8 meg line! The engineers themselves say their call centre (where ever it is overseas), is a complete unmitigated disaster - both told me BT were bringing everything back to the UK - lets hope they do. I am now awaiting an SFI engineer also, although, the last engineer says the fault is 100% at the exchange.
Dealing with their call centre is a complete farce really, if it wasn't so irritating and frustrating to do everything over and over again and at snails pace it would be almost laughable!
Lets hope the SFI sorts out the problem - and if there is any question of payment I will remind them that I have been paying for an 8 meg service for several years now and never received more than 1.5 meg.
Why do I feel a punch-up coming on!
Jon