NTL Customer Services: Your personal experience

[desperatemeasure]

9 engineers, 6 weeks, 40 odd phone calls to them, 20 odd back, several shirty emails and I'm up and running!
It was finally put right by a subcontractor who said "For a communications company they're not very good at communication."
I can only agree. I don't know how their call centres are arranged, but I get the impression that for all the automation and entering your phone number, etc. that you have to do, very little is correlated at the other end. Every time I've called the person I've spoken to has been staggered at the number of entries next to my name and the length of time the call has been open - so they must have a record of who I am and what's going on, and yet I still had 2 engineers turn up unaware of each other last weekend, one completely unprepared for the job in hand.
Still, at least I can complain on the internet now.

[jakeanders]

My personal experience is that it depends who you get through to. Get someone in their Indian call centre and its nowhere near as quick to get your issue solved but the guys in the UK one seem to go that extra mile, or at least have for me. That may sound slightly racist, but I assure it is not meant as such, and it may be just the people I've dealt with, including the brilliant guy in their Indian centre who used a very special version of the phonetic alphabet including "R for Rajinda" and "B for Bhaji".

[desperatemeasure]

Was that as in:

R for Rajinda,
U for Urdu,
B for Bhaji,
B for Bhuna,
I for India,
S for Sari,
H for Hindu?

[Adcuz]

Originally Posted by desperatemeasure

Was that as in:

R for Rajinda,
U for Urdu,
B for Bhaji,
B for Bhuna,
I for India,
S for Sari,
H for Hindu?

thats a bit harsh! CS isnt that bad. as long as you speak clearly then its fine.

[Russ]

Originally Posted by Adcuz

thats a bit harsh! CS isnt that bad. as long as you speak clearly then its fine.

Why should I have to speak clearly? Why shouldn't I be able to speak like I'm having a chat with someone?

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by Russ D

Why should I have to speak clearly? Why shouldn't I be able to speak like I'm having a chat with someone?

Because you want the CS Rep to deal with your query quickly and efficiently? He can't do that if he can't understand you.

[Russ]

Originally Posted by Stuart C

Because you want the CS Rep to deal with your query quickly and efficiently? He can't do that if he can't understand you.

But it's not my problem the Indian people can't understand me. I shouldn't have to modify the way I speak because of where they've outsourced their people to.

[Billj]

Truly, they are awful. After moving two and a half years ago and taking TV/Telephone service with me, they were unable to provide me with a telephone line because "there weren't enough in the street", but was promised that this would be resolved soon. After numerous calls over a year and a half of being "ping-ponged" back and forth between sales and technical services I gave up the ghost.

In February this year, despite my aversion to Murdoch I subscribed to Sky TV+ and informed NTL of termination of my cable TV contract. Unlike the NTL subcontract installers, the SKY man was local and a SKY employed technician. He was punctual, courteous, clean and efficient. He was done in less than an hour of arriving FOUR DAYS from when I ordered online.

That's when it really went down hill with NTL. After noticing I was still being billed I cancelled my Direct Debit with my bank rang CS to make them aware of the situation. They acknowledged that I had notified them of my cancellation and the fact that they owed me two months rental. I was told that I was no longer active and that I would receive a cheque within 30 days.

I was told the same thing in Aprill and that it was an administrative oversight and then the same thing again this week, with the little rider that my account was still "live" and that it takes 30 days to deactivate. Coincidentally, it takes 30 days to issue the check. Am I going to wait another 30 days to be told the same thing again? Am I heck. They provide you with no real access to their organisation other than through their customer service numbers and those operators will lie to you and refuse to put you through to supervisors/managers. So what are the options?

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by Russ D

But it's not my problem the Indian people can't understand me. I shouldn't have to modify the way I speak because of where they've outsourced their people to.

I wasn't having a go at how you speak, and I personally don't like foreign call centres. Just seemed logical though. Whatever the nationality of the person you are talking to, it does help if they can understand you.

[Russ]

Originally Posted by Stuart C

I wasn't having a go at how you speak, and I personally don't like foreign call centres. Just seemed logical though. Whatever the nationality of the person you are talking to, it does help if they can understand you.

No, I know you weren't having a go

None of the people I've spoken to at any of ntl's callcentres have indicated they have a problem understanding me. When I end up speaking to someone in India, more often than not they ask me to repeat things. I didn't ask them to outsource, I wasn't even asked. So why should I have to change the way I do someone when the decision which causes the problem in the first place is down to a company I'm paying £70 a month to?

[Neil]

Oh dear.....

http://www.contact-centres.com/newsletter.16.06.06.htm

[Chris W]

Originally Posted by Neil

Oh dear.....

http://www.contact-centres.com/newsletter.16.06.06.htm

although i appreciate the comments, the guy shouldn't really be running a business from a residential connection should he? If he paid for a business connection there would be much better SLAs and i'm sure much faster responses for engineers

Originally Posted by www.contact-centres.com

The outcome? Obviously I could not accept an appointment for 9 days after the fault was reported as without the internet as a company we canââ‚Âà ‚¬ÃƒÂ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚¢t function

[Pinkypants]

Originally Posted by Chris W

although i appreciate the comments, the guy shouldn't really be running a business from a residential connection should he? If he paid for a business connection there would be much better SLAs and i'm sure much faster responses for engineers

I agree - if you want a reliable business service with fast SLAs you should have and pay for a Business line. End of.

[Argster]

they ruined my house fascia to install the ntl box, they made a mess indoors (a rainy day and technician's feet smelled), and got off me £130+ monthly for 7 years.

Their favourite trick: Deactivating without letting me know my International Calling plan (due to unidentifiable technical fault) resulting to international calls bearing original costs. Very nasty if you ask me.

Another thing they do is NOT turning up at appointments in concecutive attempts to get them there.

Just being forced to switch to BT. Let's see if they are any better.

Originally Posted by Argster

they ruined my house fascia to install the ntl box, they made a mess indoors (a rainy day and technician's feet smelled), and got off me £130+ monthly for 7 years.

Their favourite trick: Deactivating without letting me know my International Calling plan (due to unidentifiable technical fault) resulting to international calls bearing original costs. Very nasty if you ask me.

Another thing they do is NOT turning up at appointments in concecutive attempts to get them there.

Just being forced to switch to BT. Let's see if they are any better.

to the forum I do hope you have better luck with BT