Getting totally fed up!!

Reddevil63 · 19-09-2003, 00:39

Who else is getting tired of the service from NTL.

Twice now in the last 3 weeks there has been faults in the Swindon area and yesterdays one the latest.

People who are dependent on the internet must fed up with all these outages all the time.

Am thinking seriously of looking elsewhere for my BB needs as think NTL just can't provide a decent enough service.

Everyday when you look through the service status its always the same thing...email not working, outages in all diff areas.

And its always the same apology from NTL...sorry for the inconvience....yeah right!

Its too easy for companies and the like today to mutter those words and we customers seem to sit back and accept it.

Well we shouldn't, we should demand a reduced monthly bill for BB use.

19-09-2003, 08:47

I'm not critiscising here, but has anyone checked into th eamount of faults BT have with ADSL?

Might be interesting to compare them.
Faults happen, maintenance needs to occur, The email debacle is a bit much mind and it should have been fixed properly rather than seemingly bodged everytime.

orangebird · 19-09-2003, 08:51

Quote:

Originally posted by timewarrior2001
I'm not critiscising here, but has anyone checked into th eamount of faults BT have with ADSL?

Might be interesting to compare them.
Faults happen, maintenance needs to occur, The email debacle is a bit much mind and it should have been fixed properly rather than seemingly bodged everytime.

True - and as per the t&c's you agree to by taking the service, you agree to ntl not guaranteeing a fault free service. Therefore, you're not entitled to compensation or reduced bills - although these are given discretionally in extreme circumstances.

Dooby · 19-09-2003, 09:47

yeah, I hate to disagree with you here RD, but if people are 'dependent on the internet' then maybe they should be paying for a service with guaranteed uptime.
The only people I know who are dependant on their internet access is those who use it for business.
HOWEVER, just because it isnt a commercial service doesnt mean that in extreme cases you shouldnt be entitled to refunds/compensation. The phone service is similar, but if you lose that for more than 2 days or something arent you entitled to a reduced bill? I dont see why the net access shouldnt be the same.

oh and using XBox Live is _not_ being dependant on the net RD

MikeyB · 19-09-2003, 11:53

I live in Swindon too, and have never had it go down once, unless it goes down when I'm at work so I never know about it!!

A mate of mine who lives less than a mile away did have problems a couple of weeks ago, and on Wednesday I think, but mine was working fine at these times.

I'm very happy from the service I get from NTL.
I don't have the email problems as I don't use their email servers (I used to but have re-routed my email away from NTL due to the amount of spam)

The only time I experienced problems with NTL for the internet was not long after they started their completely free dial-up service, was very difficult to get connected for a couple of weeks.

**Chris** · 19-09-2003, 12:13

Quote:

Originally posted by orangebird
True - and as per the t&c's you agree to by taking the service, you agree to ntl not guaranteeing a fault free service. Therefore, you're not entitled to compensation or reduced bills - although these are given discretionally in extreme circumstances.

But NTL is compelled by law to provide a reasonable level of service. We have to allow for things to go wrong, but if service levels become atrocious, a court can decide that they have failed to provide reasonable service, as defined by trading standards legislation, and take action accordingly.

The absence of a Service Level Agreement in the T&Cs is not carte blanche for NTL to provide thoroughly unacceptable levels of service. I accept when I sign up that I am not guaranteed a certain level of uptime because I know that I still have the backing of the law if things go completely wrong.

I have no particular incident in mind here - just discussing in general terms the laws that all companies must adhere to re service quality, and which they cannot exempt themselves from by imposing terms and conditions of service.

orangebird · 19-09-2003, 12:19

Quote:

Originally posted by towny
But NTL is compelled by law to provide a reasonable level of service. We have to allow for things to go wrong, but if service levels become atrocious, a court can decide that they have failed to provide reasonable service, as defined by trading standards legislation, and take action accordingly.

The absence of a Service Level Agreement in the T&Cs is not carte blanche for NTL to provide thoroughly unacceptable levels of service. I accept when I sign up that I am not guaranteed a certain level of uptime because I know that I still have the backing of the law if things go completely wrong.

I have no particular incident in mind here - just discussing in general terms the laws that all companies must adhere to re service quality, and which they cannot exempt themselves from by imposing terms and conditions of service.

Which is why I said at the end of my post - 'although these are given discretionally in extreme circumstances'.

**Chris** · 19-09-2003, 12:35

Quote:

Originally posted by orangebird
Which is why I said at the end of my post - 'although these are given discretionally in extreme circumstances'.

Agreed - NTL, I'm told, does give 'discretionary' refunds as a matter of good practice when it recognises that its service levels have fallen below 'reasonable' levels. (I have neither suffered not been paid for service that got that bad) They say 'discretionary' because lawyers get twitchy when they think someone might be admitting liability for something, but they know that they are in a legally difficult position were things to get to court.

Other less scrupulous companies might sometimes attain similarly poor service standards, fail to placate the customer with a 'discretionary' refund, and then fund themselves up before a judge who not only makes them give a compulsory refund, but draws a line in the sand making it very much easier for that company's poor service to be judged in future.

Thus 'discretionary' payments are a very sensible strategy when things go belly-up!

dialanothernumb · 19-09-2003, 12:42

The policy of discretionary refunds is one that NTL apply very fairly, in my experience, although treating whoever one speak to at NTL on the phone like a human being, ups the chances of discretion being considered

The other consequence of substandard service is that customers leave... this can also be highly effective, but shouldn't be threatned unless you can accept the consequences (maybe the grass isn't greener, the hassles of another setup etc.) I threatened to leave a while back and could almost see a rattle fly out of my pram...

Buzzby · 19-09-2003, 18:33

Don't whinge & whine so much. It just brasses off everyone.

Keep in touch re service at diferent times, some work days others not. Keep a running log of service accross a group of you ( not so easy to blame PC faults ).

Contact OFTEL and submit the logs. Maybe, just maybe the matters highlighted in your logs would be queried of NTL by oftel.

Don't hold your breath.

albone · 19-09-2003, 20:03

That isn't a bad idea, in veiw of all the threads of late about the way things are at the moment. Maybe then NTL would see the truth of the matter and realise we are genuinely cheesed off and rightly so and do something to improve. We can but hope!

Reddevil63 · 20-09-2003, 01:16

Quote:

Originally posted by Dooby
oh and using XBox Live is _not_ being dependant on the net RD

I didn't say anything about Live in this subject.....this has been happening when I need to use my computer on the net.

Oh and isn't Live and BB part of the BB/console package from NTL?

So in effect this affects Live users also, not just net users only!

It's the typical British way of things to let big companies to walk over consumers. Always has and always will unless consumers make a stand.

20-09-2003, 17:43

It has always been thecase in my franchise (which we deal with Swindon) that any cases where the service has been down for more than 24 hours we will credit the account with the exact amount that the service costs for the down time, i.e if it is down for three days we will credit back for three days. The customer does need to request this through customer services though

Reddevil63 · 20-09-2003, 18:58

Quote:

Originally posted by col d
It has always been thecase in my franchise (which we deal with Swindon) that any cases where the service has been down for more than 24 hours we will credit the account with the exact amount that the service costs for the down time, i.e if it is down for three days we will credit back for three days. The customer does need to request this through customer services though

Have you tried to get through to CS? It's a joke!

paulyoung666 · 20-09-2003, 20:02

Quote:

Originally posted by Reddevil63
Have you tried to get through to CS? It's a joke!

rather a sweeping statement that , my mate , in my area the longest i usually have to wait is 5 mins , and the call is free :p