Preparing for a BT Engineer

Not sure if this is the right section to post this on

Bit of background. I'm with xilo broardband on their cable and wireless package. All has been brilliant post migration from jan feb time till about two weeks ago when I suddenly started syncing at 2mb instead of 5-6. My line stats were near identical to before and nothing had changed in the house or the area. I contacted xilo and they got c and w to test the line and concluded that there was an earthing problem and some battery on the line.
Xilo asked me to contact bt as the fault is theres with the line between me and the exchange. Bt were as useless as ever on the phone and just kept saying my line is ok as the voice is ok, I tried explaining it was the broardband being affected but was still an issuie with their line. But they kept telling me to contact my isp. Xilo managed to get me a BT engineer visit, so I'm posting to ask what I need to do to prepare for his visit, especially to avoid any charges for the call out.

I disconnected the bell wire in the master socket, will I need to reconnect that?
Do I need to do anything specific with my hardware?
Will he go up the pole which is in my neighbours front garden, i.e do I need to contact him ?

Plus any other helpful advise anyone has.


Thanks

If the fault exists when using the test socket then should be immune from call out charges (not should is not a 100% word)

I would contact neighbour before hand as he may want to look at pole.

If Xilo have submitted the right request then the engineer should be broadband aware, so understand the removal of pin 3.

I have recently had a Phone line problem. No telephone but very slow broadband.

A BT enginner came and he was advised that I had removed the bell wire and that the fault still exsisted even when trying the test socket. He did not bat an eyelid. He went straight to the master socket to test. He found a fault on BT`s network.

The internal telephone/dsl wiring is your responsiblity. BT are only interested in making sure your connection is good from their network to your master socket any problems beyond that are yours. If they do find the problem is on yourside and not BT`s you will probably be billed around £100.

Bob C

Nearly forgot, if the problem is on your side of the master socket they will not repair it but you will still be charged for the call out.

Bob C

In reply to a post by Jammy_Dodger:

Xilo asked me to contact bt as the fault is theres with the line between me and the exchange.

That's wrong! They shouldn't do this for a BB fault.. The line to your exchange is the responsibility of BT Openreach (not BT Retail who you would have contacted) who handle the line for all CPs and can only be called out by the CP, not the customer.

My wireing is really old pre 1980 I reckon since my master socket has no test socket and is beige with the t logo on the front. So bearing in mind its this socket I opened a removed the bell wire from, will I get charged for tampering?

There is no point touching the bell wire prior to the engineer visit. The bell wire has always been there and I can't see as the cause of a sudden dramatic drop in sync.

eta: My mistake, I see you mean should you put it back. I've no idea.

Edited by deleted (Thu 21-Jul-11 15:14:55)

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

In reply to a post by Jammy_Dodger:

Xilo asked me to contact bt as the fault is theres with the line between me and the exchange.

That's wrong! They shouldn't do this for a BB fault.. The line to your exchange is the responsibility of BT Openreach (not BT Retail who you would have contacted) who handle the line for all CPs and can only be called out by the CP, not the customer.

It certainly is wrong, but xilo are not alone in doing this most isp's are taking the pass the buck attitude to faults, just because their useless remote tests or monitoring fail to pick up on anything does not mean that there is no fault on the ADSL part, and even if there is a case of really bad interference causing problems the isp IMO should at least investigate it further by getting bt involved and escalating it within bt , for a REIN engineer ect , not just offer to cap the connection and make it no longer viable to have adsl

I contacted xilo and they got c and w to test the line and concluded that there was an earthing problem and some battery on the line.

Bt were as useless as ever on the phone and just kept saying my line is ok as the voice is ok,

So C and W say theres earth and battery on the line, and yet BT state line tests OK. Someone is lying. BT are not responsible for your broadband, and since this is what you are trying to report as faulty, they were right to refer you back to your ISP.

Let us know the outcome, I would be interested to hear if the engineer that comes is out on an SFI task (BB fault raised by the CP) or just as a PSTN engineer, who will be out on a 'line tests OK' fault. If the later, and no fault found, you may well get a bill.

Don't worry about the bellwire, it's yours to do with what you will. See if the engineer will fit a proper NTE for you.

Sorry but that is not true. C&W refuse to raise faults like this because the issue is seen to be on the copper line, which is not something they provide.

We've seen countless errors (not just with C&W but Opal, BTW and so on), where they state one thing but the telephony provide (usually BT Retail) state there is no issue. Even BT's own systems report to us "report to telephony provider".

You'll be surprised just how many times that BT Retail will state no problems until they get an engineer out to site to magically find the cause of the issue.

Regarding a REIN engineer, you do realise that getting an engineer that does that specific work is extremely difficult and there are certain procedures that BT make us follow such as firstly arranging an SFI who then has to refer it back as a REIN issue, and so on.

Matt

Edited by uno (Thu 21-Jul-11 23:40:06)