BTINTERNET - A fault or an outage?

Last night I had some urgent work to do. To do this I had to be online between 11:30pm and 04:00 am this morning. Having had a rather pleasant curry, I got home, made a cup of tea and went to connect and commence my task. As I tried to access the site I needed to visit, I got a "BTINTERNET UNAVAILABLE" message and a special screen informing me to ring an 0845 number for a service update (charges apply).

I did this. I got a recorded message telling me the number had changed. So I'd paid a charge and had to ring another number. I rang this number and waited 5 minutes for someone to answer. I explained that we've been having intermittent problems with connection all week. He asked for my name. I said it's Roger Tichborne. He said "That name is completely different to the one on the account". I explained that it couldn't possibly be as I'd had the phone since 1987. He said he could only speak to the account holder. I explained I was the account holder. After much discussion, it emerged that the account had my father's initials (who died in 1987) on it. So in BTWORLD, two initials = completely different. Anyway, having got past the first hurdle, I then asked if there were any service problems. He explained that we had to follow the procedure. The procedure was to plug the laptop into the Ethernet cable and reset the hub password. I duly did this. The connection still didn't work. By now it was past midnight and I was meant to be on the phone to someone. I then asked if he could check the service status. He said OK and then said "Some users are experiencing problems". I replied "I know". I asked if I was one of these users. He said "Yes". I asked when the service would be restored. He replied "BT engineers are working on it". I explained that I was working and had an urgent job to do. I needed to know. He said "It will be at least 4 hours". I asked "How do I get compensation". He replied "You are not entitled to compensation because it is an outage. You only get compensation for faults". I asked "What is the difference between a fault and an outage". The chap, who clearly was working in an offshore call centre helpfully explained "A fault is a fault and an outage is an outage". I helpfully added "Can I explain the difference to you. It is the same as the difference between a BTINTERNET customer and an EX BTINTERNET customer". Luckily for me I have a good friend who I was able to ring, who despite having been at work until 10pm and who just wanted to get to sleep, was able to step in and do what had to be done. I'm going to be treating him to a slap up lunch as a thank you.

By the way, if any BTINTERNET sales people are reading this, I had an email conversation with another friend of mine, Sue this morning. She told me she was planning to swap from Virgin to BTINTERNET. She has changed her mind.

So how has BTINTERNET affected my Friday night

a) I could have had a few beers and enjoyed myself if I'd known I couldn't work
b) I've lost out on payment for a job
c) I've let someone down
d) I've put a friend of mine to great inconvenience
e) I've got to buy my friend an expensive slap up lunch as a sweeetner
f) I've got all the hassle of having to get a new Internet provider
g) I was up half the night anyway, seething with anger

I ask you this. It was broken. Engineers had to mend it. How can it not be a fault. If it was a planned outage, why didn't BTINTERNET ensure all of their customers knew that there would be no service in advance. It's called customer service.

All in all a costly and very frustrating night. Thanks BTINTERNET and adios.