BT Phoneline and Broadband
We have the great misfortune to be a customer of BT.
Unfortunately, being fairly rural, we don’t really have any other realistic
options and believe me, we have searched.
These are the options we looked at:
Wireless Broadband:
We approached AB Internet and Xwavia Ltd. AB
Internet were polite and helpful and sent out one of their technitions to see
if we were in a viable spot, o receive a signal from their mast. Unfortunately,
as it turned out, the signal would be too weak. Xwavia didn’t even bother to
respond to any of the emails sent to them. Well, if they don’t respond to
potential new customers, I doubt you would want to be one of their existing
customers.
Satellite Broadband
It seems there are two main players in this game: Avanti and
Tooway. From what I could see from their on-line packages, Avanti offer more
packages and it looks to be better value for money. The trouble is that, whilst
it looks like a great option, it turns out not to be once you have spoken to
them. VOIP calls would have a 1.5 second delay, which means, we would still
need a BT landline and the minimum average speed they claim to provide is based
on an average of all their customers, so not at all area specific. They also
admit they will throttle the speeds during peak or high usage times and that
your speed could drop to less than 100 Kbs instead of Mbs. Also, having researched some
reviews of satellite broadband, I was struck by one person saying that
satellite broadband should be called “last resort broadband”. Perhaps, it is better
the devil we know, which leads me back to BT.
So, I bet you are wondering what the problem is? Well, the
phone line has never been particularly good nor has the broadband but 8 years
ago, I accepted that a speed of 1.5 Mbs was as good as it was going to get.
Roll on 8 years later and the speed is now 0.8 Mbs on a really good day and
tends to vary between 0.3 Mbs and 0.8 Mbs. Acceptable? I think not. As far as
the phone line goes, we have had multiple faults. We have also in the last year
had the local Pheasant Shoot come through the area and shoot out the phone line.
BT finally got off their arses and did a ‘temporary repair, which involved a
piece of plastic being taped round the break in the line. Once I had complained
about the plastic bag repair, it was then replaced with black insulation tape,
which slowly unravelled itself. Apparently, according to BT, this was a
perfectly acceptable repair, despite the fact that condensation gathering
amongst the tape made the phone unusable in the morning until about 11 am. It
then took 6 months of arguing with various BT robots and Lord only knows how
many engineer visits (I lost count at 13), to get them to replace the section
of cable that needed repair. I might add that, the neighbour was also subjected
to all this BT Bullshite.
Now, we are back to square 1 again…. The phone line has gone
down…unfortunately during a Pheasant shoot. I’m not sure yet if the shoot is
responsible for my line going down or if it is merely co-incidental. We shall
find out when I finally manage to get someone from BT to take interest. You
see, it could have actually been solved quickly because a BT engineer has come
out to deal with a fault on the neighbour’s line, which just so happens to be
the problem we are experiencing. I told this to the engineer, including the
fact that the neighbour’s line and my line both went down at the same time. His
response was “You are not on my job list and your neighbour is not in.” So, the
lazy bastard sat there for 10 minutes in his van and then buggered off, not
having fixed anything. I really have to wonder at the sense of logic. Surely,
even to someone with only 2 brain cells, it’s obvious that it makes sense to
schedule jobs in the same area for the same day and that if the 2 jobs happen
to be next door to each other, that there might be a common fault?
I can only conclude that BT basically doesn’t give a
continental hoo ha! Really, why should they? They have a monopoly and enough
separate entities, that there doesn’t actually have to be any real ownership of
a problem. After all, you call a call centre, which is clearly not based in the
UK and then depending on your problem, they call Openreach or BT Broadband
Boost or whatever other part of BT they can foist the problem on to (this is
all assuming you can get them to acknowledge there is a problem*). Then you
start on the to and fro of trying to get an engineer to actually show up or to
actually fix a problem.
*Getting BT to acknowledge a fault is extremely trying. They
basically seem to think that if you have a dial tone you have a service, even
if every phone call involves a crossed line or a line so bad that they cannot
hear you! I once had a BT operative telling me she couldn’t hear me and then in
the next sentence telling me there was an acceptable level of noise on the
line. BT….. go figure, I certainly can’t.
Fast Forward a bit: an engineer came out and looked at the line, turns out the line had been shot in several spots, which meant a section of line needed replacing. Several days later, BT came out with their hoist and replaced the section of line and buggered off again, without coming in to check if it was actually working. As you might have guessed, it wasn't. We had a crossed line and what sounded like an angry swarm of bees on the phone line. So the next day, they came out yet again and scarpered off as quickly. Well, the phone line was up but the broadband was still not working - I might add that by this stage we have reached day 15.
We got hold of BT again and a Broadband engineer came out. He basically said that as the line quality is so bad (although it falls within BT's range of acceptability), he was going to sync our broadband speed at 500 kbs to stabilise the line and that, the most we can expect is 610 kbs. This is despite our neighbour getting 1.3 mbs. Fair enough, I thought, if it stabilises the broadband, we will just have to live with it, except it hasn't. Our broadband has been up and down like a yo-yo. We cannot maintain a connection and sometimes the connection drops for hours.
So, I phoned BT yet again. I have explained that we have several pairs of lines coming into the house and if the pair they are currently using is so bad they should consider changing it. Apparently, an engineer is coming out in a week. So, we wait and see.
Update:
The promised engineer arrived promptly at 8 am, despite getting lost, which is easily done on our lanes. He spent a couple of hours clearing various noise issues on the lies and lo and behold, we now have a 1.25 mb connection!! In addition, BT have agreed to monitor the quality of the phone line and the broadband connection for the next few weeks. They will be calling me once a week, to check on the telephone line and broadband stability and quality. Fingers crossed it stays stable. I will update again in a month.
Another Update (7/01/2016)
Line is down again (seem to have a crossed line and loads of crackling noise) although we have broadband... well some of the time. It went down on the 27th of Dec, came back up on the 30th and back down on the 1st of Jan. Apparently, it is scheduled for repair by the 11th.
I think there is water getting into the line joint.... who knows?
Line repaired on 9th of Jan. Let's see how long it lasts this time.
Further Update (9/5/2016)
We have been placed onto a new pairing of wires as the phone line is very crackly and the Broadband is down more than it is up. Bizarrely, if the BB is actually working and someone calls on the landline, the call will knock the BB off. also our downstream is approximately 1.8 Mbs but the upstream varies between 64 Kbps and about 128 Kbps. Very odd. Next engineer visit booked for 19/05/2016, as the problem is still persisting
Update: 19/05/2016
BT have not turned up.
Mini Rant: I see the twats in Government have decided that people in rural areas don't need or want Broadband. Knob-heads! Why does it not surprise me that they are going back on an election promise....?
Update:
The promised engineer arrived promptly at 8 am, despite getting lost, which is easily done on our lanes. He spent a couple of hours clearing various noise issues on the lies and lo and behold, we now have a 1.25 mb connection!! In addition, BT have agreed to monitor the quality of the phone line and the broadband connection for the next few weeks. They will be calling me once a week, to check on the telephone line and broadband stability and quality. Fingers crossed it stays stable. I will update again in a month.
Another Update (7/01/2016)
Line is down again (seem to have a crossed line and loads of crackling noise) although we have broadband... well some of the time. It went down on the 27th of Dec, came back up on the 30th and back down on the 1st of Jan. Apparently, it is scheduled for repair by the 11th.
I think there is water getting into the line joint.... who knows?
Line repaired on 9th of Jan. Let's see how long it lasts this time.
Further Update (9/5/2016)
We have been placed onto a new pairing of wires as the phone line is very crackly and the Broadband is down more than it is up. Bizarrely, if the BB is actually working and someone calls on the landline, the call will knock the BB off. also our downstream is approximately 1.8 Mbs but the upstream varies between 64 Kbps and about 128 Kbps. Very odd. Next engineer visit booked for 19/05/2016, as the problem is still persisting
Update: 19/05/2016
BT have not turned up.
Mini Rant: I see the twats in Government have decided that people in rural areas don't need or want Broadband. Knob-heads! Why does it not surprise me that they are going back on an election promise....?