Can anyone beat this record for poor broadband service given by NTL?

OldGiraffe · 18-03-2005, 15:55

NTL claim 'always on' or as some would say 24/7. Well, I can accept that there will be the odd occasion when this is impractical but an average of only 10 hrs in 24 for 8 days at best (and still counting) takes the biscuit!
One day there was a connexion for only three hours and another day zero. Then there were the four engineer visits when each one knew nothing of the other's findings and the dozen or so calls to telephone support where again each 'agent' knew precious little about what was said to and by other support 'agents' and they knew even less about what the engineers had found, or more often not found. Then there are the network engineers in their own mysterious world divorced from the reality of the field engineers and hardly ever spoken to by the telephone support staff! Never the same engineer calls, never the same person on the telephone and no single reference point for the fault in hand. To add insult to injury each time a telephone call is made one has to go through the routine: listen to the music, press this number, press that number half a dozen times, listen to messages telling us how to suck eggs and then when one gets to talk to a real person, listen to the multitude of different 'solutions' for the one problem, many being absurd. Plus the automatically generated emails that follow each telephone call with suggestions that are totally irrelevant. Why not allocate a fault number and give us an early 'press this option' short cut straight to someone with access to the total fault report history?
Come on NTL, let's have some 'joined up' technical support then maybe I will get my broadband back!

19-03-2005, 00:05

My ex girlfriend had a problem with her broadband connection via set top box, engineer came out and said that they needed a new pc, I went round after a few posts on cableforums who helped me easily resolve the problem.

My experience of technical support is check here if you have no look with them and it generally works out well

pazor · 19-03-2005, 00:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by xathras

My ex girlfriend had a problem with her broadband connection via set top box, engineer came out and said that they needed a new pc, I went round after a few posts on cableforums who helped me easily resolve the problem.

My experience of technical support is check here if you have no look with them and it generally works out well

]

so why are the noobs working for ntl ?

Doofy · 19-03-2005, 00:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by pazor

]

so why are the noobs working for ntl ?

I dont see how you come to that conclusion, you can't really say that based on one experience. Some staff at NTL are a bit slap dash but in my experience they really are in the minority. Most of the staff are very helpfull well IMO and experience at least.

19-03-2005, 01:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by pazor

]

so why are the noobs working for ntl ?

And i suppose you are an expert and know it all

.

Doofy · 19-03-2005, 01:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill C

And i suppose you are a expert and know it all

.

Aren't they always

~Dan~ · 19-03-2005, 06:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Doofy

I dont see how you come to that conclusion, you can't really say that based on one experience. Some staff at NTL are a bit slap dash but in my experience they really are in the minority. Most of the staff are very helpfull well IMO and experience at least.

Indeed. Some time last year my internet went off. I tried resetting the set top box which normally does the trick, but not that time. I called technical support and was told that someone would be round to fix it on thursday (that was in 2 days time). An hour later there was a knock on the door, it was someone from NTL who said that the fault was in the box at the top of the street and they were fixing it now. Half an hour later my internet was back.

pazor · 19-03-2005, 08:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill C

And i suppose you are an expert and know it all

.

well no im a total noob myself when it comes to stuff like that...but then again its not my job to know is it.

claret · 19-03-2005, 08:52

Last year when i had issues with my connection dieing, quite a lot, when the engineer came round hetold me that the black set top box, was not strong enough for 1mb and that i needed a modem attaching....never had a problem since

19-03-2005, 09:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by pazor

]

so why are the noobs working for ntl ?

I was not implying from my original statement that their engineers are poor, their could be many reasons, i.e. they are in rush, they simply forget about a certain method to resolve the problem or the fact their an electrical engineer not a technical engineer.

OldGiraffe · 20-03-2005, 08:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by xathras

I was not implying from my original statement that their engineers are poor, their could be many reasons, i.e. they are in rush, they simply forget about a certain method to resolve the problem or the fact their an electrical engineer not a technical engineer.

I started this tread and must say the last engineer that called knew his stuff proving the fault was in the network. Others had tried by changing the STB for a Samsung, upping signal levels and changing taps in the box in the street. In some ways it was luck because it just happened that the same engineer went to a neighbour who was one of several having the same problem. This rarely happens, usually it's a different engineer each time and as I said originally what each one finds does not seem to get passed on to the next.
I am still having trouble, although the lengths of time disconected are shorter, which can be more irritating at times, even though CS say the fault has been cleared. I have obviously written to CS, but past experience shows that is not effective. My letter has been copied to BBC Watchdog who ran a programme on NTL CS. They are still collecting complaints.
I am still waiting for someone to say that they have broken my record.

OldGiraffe.

th'engineer · 20-03-2005, 09:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by xathras

I was not implying from my original statement that their engineers are poor, their could be many reasons, i.e. they are in rush, they simply forget about a certain method to resolve the problem or the fact their an electrical engineer not a technical engineer.

Some NTL techs are poor either because they do not care, are in rush or badly trained .

But you can not tar all with the same brush,

some are good some are excellent Engineers like Bill C, BBking & Ignition .

I do agree with your comments they are applicable to quite a few from experience.

Hang on me sticking up for NTL techs

setch · 20-03-2005, 14:03

Move to one of the CM postal areas, service is pretty crud and has been for several months now. Either no service or one so bad it's hardly worth using.

Only way to get a decent broadband connection is to continually change the proxy server to one that is working on the day.

Setch

**Maggy** · 20-03-2005, 14:34

The thing is that the majority of the time NTL services work fairly well.Most people are reasonably happy.However when things go wrong for NTL they go spectacularly wrong and there seems no recourse but to seek help at CF or to go higher up the chain of command at NTL.

So can anyone actually point to why no one ever seems to record anything about a customer's problem so that when they need to phone back and get more help they have to go through the whole same routine every time?WHY don't they make a note in the customers file?Or has some brilliant spark left that option out of the software provided?

After all they seem to have all the info when the higher chain of command kicks a*se and they come back to you to sort your problem out.