Bad Install - Low Signal (Some TV, no Net)

OPChap · 15-11-2006, 15:07

We recently had NTL (Sat 11th - TV,BB,Ph) installed into our house in London; 6 weeks after the original install date as proposed by the website!

Anyhow, the guy came on a Saturday and spent 4.5hrs installing it (he was an EU accession country lawyer who could earn more with NTL). He was extremely nice and drank many a cup of tea.

However, he left with our TV service showing some channels (pretty much only Sky One); all the rest are either a black screen (and not the "you haven't subscribed to this service screen) or are very blocky.

The Cable modem will sometimes lock onto a downstream signal but never an upstream one. It'll just keep flashing "Sync" or, go solid "Sync" and flashing "Ready". As such, it won't provide any access to the internet what so ever (but I can access the setup screen via 192.168.100.1).

The phone however, does work. Which is great as the support line is free!

The original install guys said it looked like an amplifier was out but wasn't sure (after replacing the cable from the house to access point). The phone support guy said on one of his many screens there looks like there might be a fault that might be impacting our service, or it might not. The website and service status phone line don't agree that there is a reported fault.

Is there anything that I could do or do I just have to wait it out. Given we've been without TV (no freeview reception), phone and broadband for nearly 7 weeks now I'm not that impressed.

Thanks!

Paul K · 15-11-2006, 15:29

Which model of STB is it? the engineer should not have left it like that. Call them back tonight and or in the morning, your equipment should have been set up correctly and the engineer should have made sure it was fully working before leaving the property. If you have signal issues your BB will not work till it's sorted so calling NTL up is probably the only route.

OPChap · 15-11-2006, 15:34

They installed on Saturday and I called back on Monday night.

This is when I got the story about may or may not have found a fault so leave it for a few days. Will call them again tonight but I'm afraid they are going to make us wait an eternity until an engineer can come out again.

Not impressed. Even before it's working we've drafted a formal letter of complaint

Thanks.

Not sure about which models, but they are seperate modem (it's black!) and STB...

OPChap · 16-11-2006, 15:38

Called NTL and spoke to Broadband support.

The guy said he could see the modem but it wasn't registered. Run the installation CD and everything will be fine. Wasn't overly convinced given that the TV still didn't work!

Needless to say it didn't work given that it couldn't lock onto a signal.

Requested to be put through TV support and ended up speaking to somebody who seemed to know what he was talking about. He couldn't even ping the STB so an engineer will be coming on Monday!

However, not sure if this is true, but the way I understand it, there are two types of engineers; Monkeys and Actual engineers. A monkey is coming out on Monday but the phone support guy reckoned he'd fail and a supervisor would be sent later.

Is this standard practice? Why can't I just have a proper engineer??

Paul K · 16-11-2006, 17:46

Jeez why one earth would the CS/ TS say that

it's not as though he is helping things is he. Without a tv signal lock you were never going to get a BB feed. You may well be suprised at how good some of NTLs "monkeys" are

Make sure the engineer doesn't leave before things are sorted this time, even if it means making him call in to get someone else sent out if he can't get the job done himself.