Is this typical?

[mollymowler]

After rebooting the Pace STB a dozen times and still getting 'tune' on the front, with no pic or sound (just the NTL 'we're currently upgrading your box...etc, etc) I finally phoned NTL customer services last night (Tuesday) to get another box.

They can't get an engineer out until next Wednesday! As I live in Cambridge, and I'm pretty certain there are still some engineers left working out of Waterbeach near Cambridge, I can't believe it's going to take them over a week to get a technician out. If they gave me another box (Samsung please...this is the third Pace box to go) I'd fit the !!$** thing myself.

Is this a 'typical' wait time now that NTL seems to have shifted most of its stuff to India or somewhere? Is the merger with Telewest/Virgin Mobile going to mean even worse customer service?

Also, has anyone successfully had a rebate on the monthly payment for being without service for this long?

James

[hairy_mick]

fraid so better get used to it

[Pinkypants]

Try an engineers reboot:

1. Switch the power off at the mains
2. Put and keep your finger on the channel up button (arrow up button on some boxes) on the front of the STB.
3. Switch the mains power back on keeping your finger on the channel up button.
4. Keep your finger there until the standby light comes on permanently (you may notice it flicker on and off.. wait until the light is sturdily on) or a channel number is displayed.

In some cases, this will bring the channels back temporarily until the engineer arrives. In others it will bring a 0 to the front screen of the box, in which case you will need to wait until the engineer arrives. Faults can send signals down to fix 0 on the box (which will take two hours to clear), but the likelyhood is, there is a problem with the box itself and the box wont respond to signals.

If this trick works, make sure there is power going to the STB until the engineer arrives. If you switch it off, it may go back to TUNE agin. If it works or not, please keep the engineer appointment. TUNE problems will come back!

Hope that helps

[hairy_mick]

If this is the third pace box you have had then i hazard a guess its a levels issue so getting a samy wont improve that, tell the engineer to get the levels right and the next box will be ok.

[smiffer]

i'd say fairly typical service i live in Nottingham and my NTL box went down on Monday. THought i had it bad enoug having to wait till friday for an engineer.

But was a bit stroppy with te CSperson and asked about compo and he said that i wouldn't get charged for the days that i didn't recieve the service.

[James Henry]

Yeah it's pretty typical, takes a while for the engineer to get from Bangalore ya know

[davidoc]

had same problem and had to wait 11 days for engineer to turn up...he then said he had fixed it and we had same problem the following day and we had to wait a further 6 days for them to come out again.....yup i'd say that it is very typical of ntl....we now have what they call "aspect ratio" problem as when there is writing on the screen we cannot see most of it it is as though the picture is too big for the screen they just tell us to go to channel 600 and then click the back button on remote and that will sort it out but it never works..and i am now fed up of calling them and all this with a new samsung stb....

[budwieser]

Originally Posted by mollymowler

After rebooting the Pace STB a dozen times and still getting 'tune' on the front, with no pic or sound (just the NTL 'we're currently upgrading your box...etc, etc) I finally phoned NTL customer services last night (Tuesday) to get another box.

They can't get an engineer out until next Wednesday! As I live in Cambridge, and I'm pretty certain there are still some engineers left working out of Waterbeach near Cambridge, I can't believe it's going to take them over a week to get a technician out. If they gave me another box (Samsung please...this is the third Pace box to go) I'd fit the !!$** thing myself.

Is this a 'typical' wait time now that NTL seems to have shifted most of its stuff to India or somewhere? Is the merger with Telewest/Virgin Mobile going to mean even worse customer service?

Also, has anyone successfully had a rebate on the monthly payment for being without service for this long?

James

I`m in Cambridge too James and we had the same problem a while ago!
They had to swap out the box but in the meantime, have you tried taking the card out of the front and wiping it with a cloth then putting it back in again?
This helped for a while.