OK. so i braced myself and bravely plunged once more into the fuckwitt jungle that is BT support, to try and find out whether or not cancelling my phoneline and then getting a new number would remove the super-glued on broadband tags left there by fuckwitt coop er… i mean phone coop. [previous story]
after merely twenty minutes on hold, i was rudely awakened from my slumbers by the sound of someone at BT actually answering the phone!
i spoke to the girl in question and explained my problem; as expected she didnae know what i was on about, so put me through to someone in their broadband department. that lass listened to my tale of woe and went off to consult with “another team, who know about this sort of thing”. another few minutes on hold and she was back on the line, telling me that ceasing my BT line and then getting a new one would not work to remove the broadband tags. she offered to speak to yet another “team” and find out what was my best option. so i plumped up my pillow again and settled down to hold for another five mins or so.
this time when the girl returned she was bearing tidings of great joy; “i’ve checked with our broadband people” she gushed “and there are no broadband tags on your phone line” she then neatly segued into a sales pitch which seemed to assume i would then sign up with BT for broadband, on the spot.
myself - being the cynical shell of a man, that years of dealing with corporate fuckwittism on a grand scale, have reduced me to, remained unconvinced. i asked the support girl several times was she absolutely sure the broadband tags were no longer on my phoneline, as i’d been checking them via online checker every day for the past three months or so, and it was always showing that my line had tags on it. she assured me that the line was clear and then slipped smoothly into her patter again, reminding me that i was now free to sign up and BT would have me ‘broadbanded up’ within five days.
still unbelieving i thanked her for her help and put the phone down on her sales pitching.
“oh well. let’s have a look” i thought, more in idle curiosity than hope and, sure enough, when i went on the online checker there was that familiar message that i’ve come to know almost off by heart over the past few months;
“[although] ….Your line seems suitable for ADSL, it actually either has an ADSL service already running on it or an order for ADSL has been already placed. Until this order has completed you will be unable to order or migrate an ADSL connection”
so, i’ve gone ahead and ordered broadband through demon again anyway. no doubt in about a week’s time i’ll get an email off them like last time, telling me that they couldnae proceed with my order because “…Line tests have shown that you may have incompatible products on your current BT line. ”
until then, i must in the interests of fairness defer the award of yet another mention in fuckwitt despatches to BT support staff, but i’m not holding my breath about it!
31 December 2005 at 07:38
Sorry to hear your tale of woe. From experience, you can do what you like with your
phone number but ADSL is enabled on the wires. Even closing your account with BT so
the line is no longer useable for calls, ADSL is still enabled on it. Neither does
changing the details of the account disable ADSL. In fact, sweet FA disables ADSL
except for the word of the ISP controlling it. BT can’t/won’t override that control.
01 January 2006 at 15:38
yep! - it’s really a fucking ridiculous system. to all intents and purposes my former ISP [the ones who put the broadband tags on my phoneline] might as well not exist - yet they are the only ones who can have the tags removed.
typical BT. some fly-by-night outfit who they’ve dealt with [regarding my phoneline] for about a nanosecond has total control over the status of my line for all eternity, whereas i - the poor sod who’s been paying them rental for the bloody thing for about the past twelve years - have no say in the matter at all!
how i loathe that company!