Talk Talk broadband scam

[simonmcl]

Is anyone else experiencing problems with the latest offer from Carphone Warehouse and Talk Talk? In a nutshell I was talked into signing up for phone package which included free braodband for life. I got all the confirmations and was infored that the entire process would take about three weeks. With this in mind I placed the order in March 2006 and waited for the modem. After three weeks nothing happened and no communication was received so I contacted Talk Talk via email to ask why I had not been connected yet. The reply I got back was rather disturbing.

It appears that Talk Talk dont seem to want to tell you that they will quite happily sign you up for their top phone package, charging you an extra £9.99 a month but expect you to continue paying this extra money WITHOUT getting the free broadband service. I have been informed that I would have to wait until AUGUST until I MAY get my modem and broadband service on line, but 'due to excessive demand' may not be available until the end of the year.

Dont bother trying to ring them as they do not answer the phone, emails just get a copy and paste reply from their web site which states that 'there may be a slight delay in getting broadband connected' Slight delay I can accept, but a minimum of FOUR MONTHS is totally unacceptable.:o

Does anyone have any advice on the legal standing on this matter. AS far as I am concerned I was deliberately misled by Talk Talk into entering a contract, a large portion of which they cannot uphold and adhere to. Please help.

[StoneLaughter]

Me too - the guy said "oh, you're lucky! You got your modem coming in three weeks... most people are waiting until August!"

Still nothing.

Thankfully I was already on Talk 3 - I've just added the word "International" which comes free, and added 18 months to the contract.

However, if I get it in writing from them that I may be waiting until August or even the end of the year I will find them in breach of contract, any way I can... and will refuse to be bound by the 18 month tie-in.

[Rich44]

Sorry to hear that guys but it was only a matter of time till people started getting shafted by them, as I said to someone in another thread who was loving them and their service.

Well seeing as they havent provided you with broadband they havent completed provision of the contract so I think you have every right to cancel

You should complain to OFCOM

[StoneLaughter]

I don't think it's got to that stage yet. It was me you were talking to - and while I'm unforgiving most of the time I still have broadband internet from NTL and I've paid nothing extra so far so I'm not suffering anything at the moment. However when they start introducing significant delays they are in breach of contract and I shall hold that in reserve for when I really need it.

[aaronmcl]

You do have the right to cancel the contract before you've gone live. Personally my experience has been ok, have got through to speak with someone any time i've called without too much of a wait.

[Rich44]

Ahh I couldnt remember who it was thought you were live with them. I guess its ok if you already have broadband from cable but it does seem what is happening is they are transferring the line over to them meaning any existing ADSL dies (requires BT line obviously) and then they are not providing their ADSL line as the relevant kit isnt in the exchanges yet. I have heard this happening quite a bit and I would advise anyone wanting the service to wait until after September before signing up if possible to minimise the risk of downtime to your broadband.

I still think you get what you pay for especially in terms of broadband but that still does not give them the right to run over you and mess you about like this if there was to be a delay they should have told you.

Installing DSLAMs and MSANs in BTs exchanges is a time consuming process and once its in they then need to book a date to get a BT engineer back in there to rejumper you onto the correct piece of kit away from BTs equipment and I guess there are only so many BT engineers qualified to install the kit and as such they are having problems hitting the RFA dates for the relevant exchanges.

Or a cynical person could think that they were taking sales to see which exchanges to cherry pick and unbundle first leaving the high risk/low return/low sales exchanges till later.

ie sign up 200 people on one exchange then you know that LLU'ing it is going to make it pay whereas why LLU the one with only 50 customers signed up on it rather than wait a little longer and see if more people sign up from it.

It's similar to BTs old demand tracker which would trigger off the original ADSL provision to each and every exchange. I would be very suspicious that this is what they are doing

[StoneLaughter]

Fortunately I'm already LLU and already connected to TalkTalk on their Talk3 International Plan... so the only thing I'm actually waiting for is the modem and settings.

[reeves_mortama]

Ive just registered for it to, and strange as it may sound already had broadband with talktalk at 14.99 a month and talk plan 1. Only found out about this 9.99 package 2-3weeks ago, of course they didnt tell me cause i was paying more sounds like a bank lol.

and why wait for the crappy usb modem, when you could buy one for £10 from most retailers. If you already have a modem/router just ring support they will give you any details that you need.

[StoneLaughter]

Originally Posted by reeves_mortama

Ive just registered for it to, and strange as it may sound already had broadband with talktalk at 14.99 a month and talk plan 1. Only found out about this 9.99 package 2-3weeks ago, of course they didnt tell me cause i was paying more sounds like a bank lol.

and why wait for the crappy usb modem, when you could buy one for £10 from most retailers. If you already have a modem/router just ring support they will give you any details that you need.

I would require an Ethernet based modem ANYWAY because I'll be connecting my router to it. Do they only supply USB modems? It would surprise me as this makes an 8Mbit connection (if it ever becomes available that high) extremely unlikey; you'd be lucky to get 4.

[Rich44]

The USB modems will do 8MB the slightly olders ones require some tweaks but the newer ones will work theyre still crap tho and not worth touching.

Why these companies still give away something that isnt really fit for the purpose is beyond me esp when a single port router costs about the same esp in bulk.

As for the other I would stump up the cash and go for a quality all in one ADSL router so you have a single box solution esp something like a Belkin 7633 or a Speedtouch 585 or 716 if you want VoIP at a later date. Those 2 are also particularly good at hanging onto high noise/attenuation lines.

I guess they are probably going on the fact that a lot of people wont sync anywhere close to the full 8064Kbps

[Karnevil]

i have an adsl router from linksys and its very good. i have it set up for wireless as my computers in my shed at the bottom of my garden (its a big officey shed) and the phone points in the house. but it has spaces for 4 ethernet cables i think (yellow ones ?)


i'm on bt broadband but am thinking of changing over to a cheaper option.
I'd avoid talk talk - bad experience with their phone service......

I'm using skype for free calls (I got all my friends (not many I admit!) and my family to get on it - my brother lives in sweden and we chat on the typey chat thing all the time!) but my broadband is like £29.99 a month ! I do upload quite a bit for my website (and yes I have linked to CAG on my index.htm page) so the broadband needs to be decently fast.

so what do you think of the ntl bungle thingy ? phone, tv and broadband ? £15 for 3 months then £31 after ? do i still pay bt for line rental ?
oh forget NTL - they dont do my area ! Any one any other ideas (other than talk talk)
dont think i'm hijacking ???move me if I am

[callumsgran]

Originally Posted by aaronmcl

You do have the right to cancel the contract before you've gone live. Personally my experience has been ok, have got through to speak with someone any time i've called without too much of a wait.

lucky for you i say, ive been with talk talk since jan 30th, they suck basically it took them nearly four months to send my first bill which was a low one but then thats cos they only charged the rental, 2 weeks later i got abill for all the calls. Disgusting service, when you ring they rarely answer before 12mins and you can only ring between 8&6, what good is that to anybody? have cancelled contract and gone over to cable

[Rich44]

NTL can be a bit of a gamble if you live in an area where the UBRs are not overpopulated and has had some money spent on it then it can be good if you are in an oversubscribed area where the network is fooked (like here) then its ok during the day but terrible when everyone gets home in the evenings.

Try to find someone near you who already has it and see if theyre happy and see if you can run some speedtests etc

As for BT no you ditch them totally

[StoneLaughter]

I already HAVE a wireless router which will work on ADSL... but it doesn't have a built-in modem. It needs to plug into the modem via RJ45; it has no USB.

So - I need to either convince them that they need to send me an ethernet based
modem or I need to buy one...

[Rich44]

I was referring to reeves_mortama not you

The point I was trying to make as well if you look those are ADSL routers with built in modems AND are ADSL2+ compatible for if they unbundle your exchange so you wouldnt then need to go buy another one at a later date.

Also setting up router through a modem CAN be a time consuming and tricky thing to get right and doesnt always work as well initiating a PPPoE connection via your router on what should be PPPoA is usually ok but sometimes can cause slow throughput and other problems.

I have a similar setup using a Linksys ADSLMUE2 modem and VoIP router and it was a complete sod to get working 100% the way it should whenever I dropped the modem into bridge mode it then defaulted to the wrong Mux setting and then wouldnt work, on top of that once in bridge mode the modem then doesnt have a private IP and you cant then log into it to change anything without messing about.

The initial reply wasnt actually aimed at you but I was responding to the comment about buying a modem and if you're going to spend your hard earned cash doing that then you may as well just buy a new router (as per above) and then ebay the old one, with the added advantage of the new one being new and under warranty etc and 2+ ready and being a single box solution which is always preferable not to mention that I also said that these routers are specifically better at holding onto high sync on long/noisy lines.

There are many cases of people on Bulldog who I have spoken to stuck on about 5MB who changed to the Belkin and then shot straight up to the magic 8MB and when moved to 2+ get about 19MB very nice.

Anyway I was just trying to point out that it might be worth thinking about a new router rather than just jumping onto buying a single port ethernet modem (which are overpriced for what they are)

[StoneLaughter]

Interesting analysis. My router is the Buffalo Airstation WHR-G54S... know anything about it? P.S. I have no intention of decomissioning my NTL line until the TalkTalk is working well and delivering a reasonable throughput.