Imagine my delight today when I discover at last BT ADSL is available to me. (NO cable in my neck of the woods).

So I think, cool, must upgrade my ISDN line to ADSL, it's only £39.99 plus £11 BT Together, vs £41 plus £15 BT Anytime.

Ring up, speak to a very helpful guy at BT Openworld who advises me £150 for the ADSL Install (can just about live with that as £111 in credit on my account) but £49.50 to downgrade from ISDN!!!! Maybe more if I'm less than 12 months.

Absolute horror! I remember nothing in the BT pack about this. I signed nothing either, just bought a box off the shelf.

Anyone had any experience of this and is there a cheaper way round it. Did do a search, but didn't give me specifics to this question.

Bloody daylight robery!!!!

Very annoyed.

Dave

 

I thought it had come down to £75 for the install and about £35 a month now for adsl.

 

I had the exact same problem over 12 months ago, when i wanted change my isdn2e at home to 2 meg adsl.

Here was the easiest way around at the time.

The isdn was outside the contract period so i could cancel it without forfeit.
I then had an analogue line installed under some special deal for £50.

Then order adsl for about £150 (this was over a year ago bear in mind).

The problem seems to be two fold.
One is they have problems convertings isdn/home highway to adsl (well nor ptoblems, but lets just say they realise that they are not going to be making money hand over first like they were on isdn.)

My isdn2e bills were £1200 per quarter ish.
Have now got 2 meg adsl for £200 per month.

 

m8 of mine recently had it installed - cost him £150.

i'm pretty sure BarryK on here is having the same issue you have - he's currently got Home Highway and i believe they want £99 to remove this in preparation for installing ADSL ?

steve

 

Is

 

Yep they suddenly invented a charge of £99 to downgrade Home Highway. I have e-mailed them to tell them they can shove that up their bum! They are feigning technology and expertise where there is none. When the wires come out of the Home Highway box, it is downgraded. They can then re-use an additional 2 numbers. 99 quid for ten minutes work. Nahhh!

I registered early for the free installation, but who can tell if I will get it on the HH number I didn't register but want to keep?

Then there is the siting of the splitter farce. What difference does it make where the box goes in your house, you gotta have wires around wherever you put it and after the 3 mile trail from the exchange, 100 feet won't make much difference.

Easier for them if they are all in roughly the same place though.

 

Hello

I suggest you go and look here:

 

BarryK

To "downgrade" the HH, they also have to repatch your wires at the other end in the exchange from the ISDN circuits to the PSTN circuit. So far more like 30 mins work

 

Oh. Thank God for that Deano, I thought they were just taking the pi$$.

 

Barry,

I was told £49.99 outside of 12 months more inside. The thing that I find weird is I just bought a box off the shelf at teh BT shop. Didn't have to sign anything so I don't see how I'm beholden to a contract. It wasn't like a mobile phone...

Dave

 

Cheers Dave, I will pursue that because I have had HH over 2 years. I have had no response to my e-mail of last Tuesday yet.

 

Barry K, do you want to mail me and we'll work tactics together. I just logged onto bt.com and have the following link that may be of interest to you. It is

 

Dave

Couldn't see anything in that page that helped ?. I have HH and will oneday I guess want to convert to adsl. So am interested in the outcome.

Section Z says that <I>conversion</I> charges will apply but if longer than one year no <I>cessation</I> charges.

Seems to tie in with what you've been told ?

Deano

 

Dave,

Sorry I forgot to e-mail you.

I moaned about the exchange not being ready and this trumped up £99 charge. I got an e-mail back apologising about the dealy and telling me not to worry as my installation will be free. The HH conversion charge will not be levied. Well, I'll believe it when I see it.

Now all I have to do is wait until they reorder and give me a new date. How long should I wait do you think?

 

Barry,

Did you moan by mail or by phone?

Well done anyway. I have a mail outstanding with them, sadly no reply, suprise suprise.

Give me some tips, coz I have no intention of paying the 49.99, it's extortuion and isn't mentioned anywhere.

Dave

 

I know it probably doesn't help you much, but NTL Cable is 25 quid install and 25 quid a month (including cable modem rental, or 20 quid a month if you buy the modem). 'They' say that it's unsustainable and not a valid marketing model, I say it works fine for me and I'll ditch it when it doesn't. 512 kbit/s...

 

Ironically, Martlesham is one of the places you can't get ADSL (or cable).

 

Is it really?

Fascinating.

 

And to really rub salt in your wounds Dave, if you goto somewhere like Germany, they will happily put your ADSL connection down an ISDN line. It is all to do with the frequency ranges used. I believe from my time at Martelsham testing ADSL routers with BT that it would be technically possible to use an ISDN line in the UK if there was the will from within BT. At the moment, you will have to sallow their charge, crap though it is.

Chris

 

I moaned by e-mail about their service, ie e-mail not responded to, phones permanently on hold etc. and pointing out I'm not even a customer yet and was less than impressed. I made a veiled threat about telling them to stick it and staying on HH. At no stage was I rude or untruthful, merely underwhelmed.

But the burster for me was that their locator thingy indicated it was available and they accepted my order, then discovered in reality it's not available until October sometime. Ooops!

Guess what they didn't respond to my e-mail.

So I sent it again, meekly saying I would appreciate a reponse please.

Now personally, I will reply to somebody who appears to appreciate my help, I will do my best to ignore somone who is cocky and patronising. It appears the folk at Openworld are the same! Lay it on thick about how you feel for them (personally!) with the unjustified stick they are getting blah blah.

Oh and I should add, the next git with access to cable who tells me how marvellous it is......grrrrr.

WE HAVE NO CABLES WHERE I LIVE!!!

[This message has been edited by BarryK (edited 19 September 2001).]