Problems with BT and access to broadband

This is my uncles story. As many may be able to appreciate, there are loads of people out there without any technical knowledge about computers, let alone connecting the internet....that's where I came in.....

A month or so ago my uncle decided to cancel BT, and go with Talk Talk, as the deal was cheaper.
About 2 weeks ago he then received a letter from BT saying basically "We understand you want to leave us, give us a call"

So he called BT, and they offered him the deal of 12 months at half price. So he took it.

He assumed that the deal with Talk Talk would be cancelled, and would continue his service with BT as normal.

Come the day that he was due to leave BT, his internet connection seemed to not work anymore.

He has a Voyager 210 ADSL router connected by ethernet cable.

He phoned BT, and spent nearly 2 hours going through checks on his computer etc, but to no avail.

They said everything is fine, and there are no problems with the connection etc.

So he called on my help.....I went round last night and had a look.

Everything looks fine....all the LED's on the router are on as they should be.
The router diagnostiics say it's connected to broadband etc.

But if you ping anything, there are no results.....100% loss on pinging everything.

So we phoned support, and I spoke to India or somewhere siimilar for over half an hour.

Went through loads of tests, reset IE etc.

He then asked me to run: netstat -na

Am not sure what that is supposed to show us, but the man on the phone said that if there are more than 15 entries, then that means the computer has spyware on.....and that he can't give me anymore help.

Now I personally don't think that is the problem, as prior to phoning the helpdesk, I connected my Netbook to the router, and couldn't get connected with that either.

So I said to my uncle that I would take his PC back to my place, and do a few checks.

Since having his PC here, I have successfully connected to the internet with it using a wireless connection, and I have used both SpyBot and Adaware and discovered there is no Spyware found.

Does anyone have any ideas where I can go from here?
From what I can see the PC is fine, and to me there seems to be a problem with the broadband connection

Also I've just done a broadband check from my house on my uncles phone number.

The BT Broadband site doesn't recognise his phone number as a BT line.....could this be part of the problem?

ie, he was going to change his phone over to Talk Talk too.....so could his line have been converted?

In reply to a post by ironeagleuk:

This is my uncles story. As many may be able to appreciate, there are loads of people out there without any technical knowledge about computers, let alone connecting the internet....that's where I came in.....

A month or so ago my uncle decided to cancel BT, and go with Talk Talk, as the deal was cheaper.
About 2 weeks ago he then received a letter from BT saying basically "We understand you want to leave us, give us a call"

So he called BT, and they offered him the deal of 12 months at half price. So he took it.

He assumed that the deal with Talk Talk would be cancelled,

Why did he assume that? Had he placed an order with TalkTalk?

Yes he had....I don't know if he contacted Talk Talk to cancel though, as I believe he thought that his current situtation with BT would remain unchanged.

He was with BT, but signed up to Talk Talk, BT contacted him, he contacted BT and agreed to stay with BT

Did he actually order TT? If so, he could be in real trouble; both phone & BB.

Does the Router status show that it has an external IP addy (not the 192.168.x.y one)? If so, look it up on some whois (e.g. http://whois.domaintools.com/) and see who it belongs to. BT or TT?

In reply to a post by ironeagleuk:

He then asked me to run: netstat -na

Am not sure what that is supposed to show us, but the man on the phone said that if there are more than 15 entries, then that means the computer has spyware on.....and that he can't give me anymore help.

Someone's talking thro' their back orifice. I've got over 40 connections and I'm only running 2 net programs.

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

Did he actually order TT? If so, he could be in real trouble; both phone & BB.

Does the Router status show that it has an external IP addy (not the 192.168.x.y one)? If so, look it up on some whois (e.g. http://whois.domaintools.com/) and see who it belongs to. BT or TT?

In reply to a post by ironeagleuk:

He then asked me to run: netstat -na

Am not sure what that is supposed to show us, but the man on the phone said that if there are more than 15 entries, then that means the computer has spyware on.....and that he can't give me anymore help.

Someone's talking thro' their back orifice. I've got over 40 connections and I'm only running 2 net programs.

That was my thought.....and especially as the Netbook had less entries than that and still couldn't connect.....but he was adamant....I guess that was the end of his Yes/No checklist script

Also I forgot to add to my original post that they performed a line test, and that came out fine

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

Did he actually order TT? If so, he could be in real trouble; both phone & BB.

Does the Router status show that it has an external IP addy (not the 192.168.x.y one)? If so, look it up on some whois (e.g. http://whois.domaintools.com/) and see who it belongs to. BT or TT?

Sorry didn't see this bit of reply.

I believe it showed an external connection.
I would have to take my netbook round there and check via mobile broadband to verify what you suggest. Doubt I can get round there til either late this evening, or tomorow evening

If he did actually sign up for TT, chances are they have taken over both his 'phone & BB. Then the router is connecting to DSL but not the Internet, cuz it has not successfully authenticated with the TT network, cuz it has the wrong username/password & other router settings in it.

Did he receive any correspondence from TT? In particular, router settings or a setup CD and maybe even a router? You said the date of migration passed, so he must have received something from TT beforehand.

Or, alternatively, he did get this stuff from TT and did set up the router for TT and now it has wrong settings for BT and won't connect to BT; BT having not released the line to TT because he agreed to stay with them. Maybe!

Can't you instruct him over the phone to login to router and get the status page?

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

Can't you instruct him over the phone to login to router and get the status page?

I have his PC here with me at the moment, and he's at work til 9pm

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

If he did actually sign up for TT, chances are they have taken over both his 'phone & BB. Then the router is connecting to DSL but not the Internet, cuz it has not successfully authenticated with the TT network, cuz it has the wrong username/password & other router settings in it.

Did he receive any correspondence from TT? In particular, router settings or a setup CD and maybe even a router? You said the date of migration passed, so he must have received something from TT beforehand.

Or, alternatively, he did get this stuff from TT and did set up the router for TT and now it has wrong settings for BT and won't connect to BT; BT having not released the line to TT because he agreed to stay with them. Maybe!

I will have to find out if he has any correspondance from TT.....the router we were using was the BT one he had been using all along.

So your theory about it trying to connect to TT internet could be correct.

Just hope he's not going to end up paying twice, but it's not looking hopeful