Suffering and problems with TalkTalk broadband signup

[tomwil01]

Finally, after mailing dunstone, I got a MAC - the process only took about 3 months of no reply emails etc.

I have now signed up for BT broadband, and may find I still get poor service, but as long as I never give amother penny to dunstone I dont care!!

Get away from these people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[The_Gatekeeper]

FREE Satnav From carphone warehouse
Today I went to carphone warhouse and asked to see a tomtom satnav
once i had it in my hands i handed over a letter explaining my dispute over their broadbad service and a receipt for the goods
The receipt stated that the goods had not been stolen but would be returned upon resolution of the dispute.
It was my aim to get arrested so that the court would see that carphone warehouse are acting unlawfuly by refusing to release my line to a new service provider and make carphone warehouse release my line
Things didnt go entirely as planned
Carphone warehouse first called the police
the police however told them that no crime had been committed
I had not taken the goods with the intention to permanently deprive them of it nor had I claimed ownership of it
I had simply ( for lack of a better expression ) taken it hostage
much as carphone warehouse have done with my phone line
the police said it was therefor a civil dispute and that carphone warehouse would have to persue the matter themselves through the courts
Carphone warehouse however do not want the issue made public and are not willing to persue the matter.
carphone warehouse said keep the satnav have finally released my line

[The_Gatekeeper]

Under the Competition Act
it is against the law for a service provider to prevent you moving to a new service provider

If there is remaining contract the company may charge you a cancellation fee
but they are not permitted by law to hold your line until the fee is paid

Any such fee or a debt such as non payment for the service must be claimed like any other debt through the courts

Although it is against the law for them to hold your line to ransom
it is not a police matter
it is a matter for the industry regulators
Unfortunately the industry regulators will not deal with individual cases
The industry regulators monitor complaints
and they will only act when enough people complain about the same problem with the same company
so 200 people need to have their lines held to ransom by talktalk and all of them need to complain to OFCOM before ofcom will address the issue

If only the Police worked the same
I could rob a bank and the police wouldn't bother untill I had robbed enough banks
or untill the same bank had been robbed 200 times

The biggest problem is that too many of the british public have serious problems to address but wont get of their backsides and do something about it.

The british public go to restaurants and get served low quality garbage but wont complain because they dont like to make a scene

many companies know that the british public dont like to make a fuss
and thats why over seas the same companies don't get away with what they do in the UK

You only need to watch BBC Watchdog so see evidense of this
here is just 1 example:

Volvo UK - big problems with cars - wont fix it - customers pay for repairs

Volvo USA - Same cars Same problems - different public that wont take no crap - Product recall all fixed free of charge

[centaur]

Yep, there's a few good things that consumers in the US have got, but the penalty quite often is the kind of loony 'compensation' claim against big business for entirely spurious reasons, thus increasing the product prices overall.

The British car industry and its retailers have a good deal to make up for imo, compared to the US where they won't tolerate the kind of arrogant dismissal of justifiable complaints that we do in the UK.

We're getting better complaining about bad food in the UK restaurants than we used to be....I know I am !

If we could get a proper balance between consumer and supplier we'd have cracked it !

[The_Gatekeeper]

Its not just the car industry that gives the british public a rough deal
its ALL industries

If your TV breaks down inside the warranty period it is unlikely to be replaced
it is far more likely to get repaired ( I use the term repaired reservedly ) hastily patched up by a complete incompetant would be more accurate
If it is beyond repair and you receive a relacement it is most likely to be a Reconditioned unit ( second hand )

I have a website complaintsdepartment.com
I have been sent tales from people who have received goods back from a repair centre in worse condition than it was before it went to be repaired

I heard from one chap who had a large wide screen tv. The tv developed an electrical fault and was sent for repair under warranty. when it was returned the tv had suffered quite extensive damage. The service centre offered to repair the damage but not to replace the tv. They also offered an alternative solution. They offered a 25% discount if the chap purchased a new tv.

One of the biggest problems in the UK is that the government misappropriate vast sums of public money to set up organisations to regulate various industries in order to protect the public.
But then as in my previous message above, these regulatory bodies will not actually do anything.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel
but its a pooly manufactured one that burnt out the moment it was turned on
and nobody is prepared to complain to the manufacturer to get a replacement

[scr]

Hi all

Couldn't agree more about this crap company. I signed up in April this year, all seemed to be going well. Telephone line was transfered and was given a date for broadband to go live, 19th June.
I was pleased with this as I had only used dial up before so to receive broadband *FREE* was a definite bonus.
I then received a letter from TalkTalk stating my broadband would actually go live on 30th May. Wow, what a service I thought, I had not yet receved my modem or installation cd even though the letter they sent was dated 26th May. I thought how long can it actually take for a small modem to come through the post, at worst 5-6 days maybe!!!!!!

WRONG!!

After several calls to their "customer care" team, I finally got my modem on 4th july.

At last I can now enjoy high speed broadband.

WRONG!!

After following all the installation instructions carefully, I set everything up. Halfway through setup the installation program stopped and failed my PC for having insufficient memory. This came as a surprise as the initial check they do on their website when you sign up passed everything, the installation CD also stated that I needed a minimum of 32MB. I have 96MB but now the installation program wanted me to have 128MB. Oh well, a trip down the local computer shop as I've been promising to upgrade for ages.
Once installed I clicked the connect icon on my desktop and hey presto! my broadband was connected.
I began to surf and download, faster than ever before as I only had 56k dial up before, this was fantastic, I would happily stay on my computer forever at these speeds. Missus might leave me but I got my supafast broadband ha ha!
After about half an hour of googling and downloading I suddenly found that all data transmission had stopped, webpages failed to load, downloads stopped etc. I thought ok i'll disconnect, reboot my pc and try again.
I tried to connect again but constantly getting error 650. I could not connect again for the rest of the day. Tried re-installing modem and managed to connect again for about 15 minutes.
I ran out of ideas so I called "customer care", the guy on the other end offered me all the solutions he could think of, checking for conflicts, checking all connections, diconnecting all other telephony equipment from the line etc all of which I had tried, Nothing worked.
I called them again on the following day, spoke to someone else. This guy was even more useless than the first guy, I don't think he'd even used a PC before. He offered to get me a callback from technical support but didn't tell me how long so I assumed within the next couple of hours. Three hours went by so I called again, next guy at least offered a little help but still could not fix the problem so he offered to get me a callback but he also offered me a time slot. I thought I was finally getting somewhere and all would be sorted by the evening until he told me it would be at least 48 hours before I get a call.
Back to dial up for now.
I started to search for information about this problem in an attempt to fix it myself but I discovered this thread first and read the horror stories.

What have I let myself in for!

I need to get away from this company fast before I go insane, do you think I can use the problems I have experienced up to now as breach of contract and get out now before its too late. I know this is relatively minor compared to other peoples problems but it's leading to the same point, ok the broadband is supposed to be *free*, (a marketing ploy) but I still only switched to TalkTalk for the broadband anyway.

Anyone thinking of joining this company should beware!

[centaur]

My brother went 'live' with TT last month after having to wait 3 weeks due to the huge demand to join up to this ISP. He has had no problems so far...but will keep you posted if he does.

Meantime, SCR may like to investigate this link for some help instead of overreacting to his apparent problem.

http://www.modemsite.com/56k/duns650.asp

[scr]

Hi
Thanks for the reply.
I don't think i'm overreacting after reading all the other horror stories about this company, however time will tell. I firmly believe that if I am offered a service by a company, whether a freebie marketing gimmick or not, I should receive that service. The reason for my reaction to their service is not because of the lack of connection but the abysmal lack of knowledge by the staff who are supposedly trained to deal with minor hiccups and teething troubles.
I have checked out the website you posted but it is of no help, I have tried everything on the page you directed me to and i'm still on my old 56k dial up. Any other suggestions gratefully received however!

Regards

Stuart

[centaur]

Looking at your description of the interrupted installation process, it rather looks as if uninstalling it and reinstalling might be a sensible move.

I agree about the level of (in)competence offered by 'support' people, but in my experience it's a widespread problem throughout ISP's with only a few notably competent exceptions. Generally, the cheaper end of the market offers least competence all round, not just technical !

[Zer02004]

What modem is in use here. If you like, we'll go through the procedure after removing any remnants of currently installed drivers etc and ensuring a clean system.
If you want to go down this route though, please start a new thread.

[scr]

Thanks for the offer of help but due to the amount of crap I had on my system I decided to format and reinstall everything. Any tips on how to stop kids messing up my pc? lol
Hopefully its all sorted but if I do get any problems I'll give you guys a shout, still heard nothing from talk talk though and i ain't holding my breath!!!

Thanks

stuart

[Zer02004]

Please start a new thread under "PC Security" stating your OS, anti virus and firewall etc and we'll go from there.

[scr]

Please start a new thread under "PC Security" stating your OS, anti virus and firewall etc and we'll go from there.

Originally Posted by Zer02004

As I said zer02004 I don't need to now as I sorted the problem. For future reference my op sys is win ME, I use avg antivirus and zone alarm. The problem was caused by the software I had been supplied with by talktalk, I downloaded a driver from the modem manufacturers website and I could then connect with no problems.

As I stated in my previous post the problem I have is not the fact that i'm not connected but because the cutomer care people do not have a clue how to sort out the most basic of problems. I have now sorted the problem myself but would warn anyone who joins this company that their support is very limited.

Thanks for the help anyway.

Stuart.

[Zer02004]

I was referring to this:

Any tips on how to stop kids messing up my pc? lol

Originally Posted by scr

[CosmicTigger]

I received a letter from TalkTalk advising me that my connection would "go live" on 20 June. Owing to the facts that I live alone, do not get postal deliveries until 11am or later, and the sorting office is some distance out of town, I did not receive the modem until 1 July. Twelve hours later I was still trying to get it to broadband. Nearly two weeks, a great many unanswered phone calls (at 10p a minute - one of which hung on for 30 minutes saying "your call is important to us" before I gave up), two emails and a LETTER (one of those medieval things with paper and ink!) to their Head Office, I have still not heard a word from them.

They seem to think I'll be paying the first month's fee on Monday.

I don't think so...

[scr]

I was referring to this:


Any tips on how to stop kids messing up my pc? lol
Originally Posted by scr

Originally Posted by Zer02004

I don't believe there is any method of security which will stop kids hitting the wrong keys,dragging files to unknown realms and deleting essential files. Kids will be kids, just as well my pc is only for general home use and not business.


Just a quick update, I am still waiting for my call back from Talk Talk which I was supposed to receive within 48 hours. I am still having problems altough I can stay connected for between 45 minutes and 3 hours before data stops transferring. I have found that if I disconnect and then unplug the modem for a few seconds it will let me reconnect again, is this a modem fault?

I agree about the level of (in)competence offered by 'support' people, but in my experience it's a widespread problem throughout ISP's

Originally Posted by centaur

I have to agree after reading about other ISP's but this is my first experience of broadband, I previously used Ukonline for my dial up service and never had any trouble with them, even when I did have technical problems all it took was an email to technical support and they sorted the problem for me.

Maybe this will teach me not to jump in for cheap marketing gimmicks in the future, I wouldn't mind an email address for one of the top guys at Talk Talk if anyone has one so I can tell them exactly what I think of them. I've looked on the website but can't find specific contact details for anyone.

Stuart.

[Zer02004]

I don't believe there is any method of security which will stop kids hitting the wrong keys,dragging files to unknown realms and deleting essential files.....

Originally Posted by scr

Set up a very limited account for each or all of the kids and use a strong password on your account. Job done!
You're the administrator - Administrate!

[Ourania]

Firstly I cannot believe the amount of horror stories there are on this forum about this abysmal company. I empathise and sympathise with every single one of you as I am encountering these exact problems with the company too.

We've had broadband for almost 2 months now and from the start it has not been right. I was pretty excited about it coming, we got our modem pretty soon after going live which was brilliant or so i thought! When we first installed it, there was a problem with connecting which was soon sorted after a phonecall, lasting over 30 minutes. We thought this would be the end to it but it was only the beginning.

Over the past 2 months, out broadband has always disconnected us, I can think of about 3 nights where it has not disconnected us. The whole reason for having broadband was so it would be faster which it is, and not disconnect us, which it isn't. This has been a huge problem for us, something we've tried to sort out with talktalk.

First they told us it was the sky box, we disconnected it, still the problem. Then they told us it was the telephone cable, we got someone in to sort it out, still the problem. Then they told us we needed some spyware on the pc, we got that and still the problem. So after all that and numerous calls to the company, they insist it has nothing to do with them and that somehow it is our problem as 'the line is fine'.

Now I don't believe someone who works in a call centre for a sham of a company who says he has tested the line when in fact he could be saying that so he can get us off his backs. They promise to ring back as of the cost to us, hollow words. They've said their supervisor will ring us, nothing. I know that these people in the call centres are only doing their jobs and it's not their fault we're having these problems but they don't seem to particularly care. Oh and another thing, when we've been on the phone waiting to get through, a few times we have been cut off when it's started to ring, so we have to start all over again! It just frustrates me so much! The fact now that we have been trapped in a year and a half contract they can treat us like dirt!

Apart from the broadband side of things, when we received the last bank statement, Ntl, our old service provider, had taken some money out of our account. When we runf Ntl up, as far as they knew we were still with them as no one had informed them we would be moving to talktalk!! Oh it just gets worse and worse!

So after 2 months, we are no nearer to getting the broadband problem sorted. We only wish that Ntl had done broadband in our area so we could be with them instead of this company who couldn't give a damn about their customers.

[chopperRus]

Hi all

I was having problems with TalkTalk and could never get in touch with them so I emailed Charles Dunstone DunstoC@cpwplc.com and kept emailing him (500 times) and also emailed every other dept I could find whether it was the carphone warehous or talktalk as each complaint gets a number so it wont look good when they look at the stats for the shareholders. Here is what I kept sending:

For the attention of Charles Dunstone or any other clown employed by
TalkTalk that cares to read this!
Today's update: I called yourselves again last night and was put on hold for
1 hour 17 minutes then someone decided to hang up, is that a record, do you
give prizes to your minions for this?
I then called your help desk again this morning and was put through to
cancellations. I was told that if I made a further payment of £72 the
suspension on my line would be lifted, so, I have paid my bills over the
counter at the bank because you never took the money from my account so you
suspend my line and then because of your mistake I now have to pay another
£72, I am sure there is a logic in this but I must be to thick to understand
it, that's probably why I signed up with TalkTalk! I was then told that if I
did not cancel I would be sent another modem as I had not received the first
one and it was more than 8 days since it was sent. Now we both know that the
likelihood of me getting this modem in the next 7 days is a joke if you
could not get the first out in that time so I declined this offer. I was
then told that you are providing the cheapest package and I agree you are, I
don't think any other telecommunications company charge £21 a month for
nothing, no broadband and now no phone, so yeah, I think you should be
really proud of that Charlie! I am now going back to BT and will be telling
them all about your scam in the hope that they can use my story in
advertising why people go back to BT. I would rather pay more for a service
than pay less to you and get nothing in return.

Dear sir
Please could you advise me when I will be receiving my broadband equipment
from your company. I have tried calling your helpdesk if that's what you can
call it and each time I am told something different so I thought I would cut
out all the clowns you employ and ask you seen as your supposed to be the
brains behind your scamming company! I don't expect a reply as that seems to
be the normal with Talktalk (ha ha) but hey, feel free to prove me wrong. I
no longer have an order number as I gave up looking at your website to track
it so you can maybe use my home number 0191 3982106.
You may be free but god how I wish I had stopped with my other ISP who
charged £24 per month and after 2 years I never had any problems with them
at all.
Now I find that whilst I was writing this email you have suspended my phone
line for none payment. I made a payment on Monday although I had set-up a
Direct Debit twice with you clowns. This surely has to be a record for
incompetence on your behalf, do you actually care what your doing to your
customers? I now want to cancel my account with you and go back to BT and I
will be taking out a small claims prosecution against you for not providing
the service I have paid for. I am also posting all this onto the NHS website
and hope that this will deter the honest people in this country to stay well
clear of Talktalk and carphone warehouse and as the NHS employs roughly 1.2
million people I reckon that could be a big loss to you.
Totally unhappy with you and your dodgy firm and I am sending a copy of this
email to Oftel, Watchdog and my local MP to see if they can help.

I then got an email from Chaz:

Dear Mr Lynch

Many thanks for your email, I am very sorry that you have had to contact me to get this issue resolved. I have got someone investigating for me and we will be back to you shortly. In the meantime please accept my sincere apologies.

Regards

Charles Dunstone

I then got a call a couple of hours later and they offered me a refund and cancelled my account without any charge so i reckon thats a result. So my advice is to bulk email this clown and dont take any rubbish from his agents, deal with the top dog and get what you want.

Hope this helps

[scr]

Set up a very limited account for each or all of the kids and use a strong password on your account. Job done!
You're the administrator - Administrate!

Originally Posted by Zer02004

I may do that if I ever figure out how!!
Easiest way is to banish them from my PC forever, they've got their own even though it's an old pile of crap p75, but it plays a few games which is all they want mine for. S'pose I'll have to get them a new PC.

Still waiting for a callback. I kinda get the feeling I ain't gonna get one! I lost my connection yet again during the time it took me to write this, getting very fed up now. Might just email that Charles Dunstone geezer and tell him what I think of their support.

try this.
ring carphonewarhouse, not talktalk. ask for a supervisor and explain the problem. ask them to log the call and them to escalate it due to the time scale involved. tell them that you need a call from "first line support".
i did this over the weekend and am back on running after a month of chasing my own arse!

[Zer02004]

I may do that if I ever figure out how!!

Originally Posted by scr

It's quite easy really. If you'd like to know how, start a new thread in PC Security.

The service is cheap and its cheap for a reason. Unable to connect to the network for more than 10 minutes during the entire 3 week period during which we had their very tacky modem installed. And that was after waiting over a month for the thing to arrive

Customer service is non-existant and relies on call centres in India. Hours spent sat waiting for them to answer and the suggestions made failed to sort out the problem To get technical help you dial a different number which charges 10p a minute so you are paying them a small fortune for them to explain to you why their service is so useless-if you can actually get a reply, which I couldn't.

Do not consider using Talk Talk under any circumstances-if you are with them already cancel your direct debit-they cannot sue everyone.

Charles Dunstone of carphone warhouse has an e-mail address which is 'cdunstone@cpw.co.uk'

Why not contact him to tell him what you think of this mess and also send him plenty of junk e-mail-if they want to mess you around you have to mess them around.

[Guy]

Alas, I am experiencing the exact same problem that SCR has described above.

I managed to register with Talk Talk and surf briefly at broad band speeds, then the connection dropped. I removed the modem and rebooted which briefly got me back on line but the problem recurred and this time rebooting didn't work. I reinstalled the modem but subsequently all I have been able to get is "error=650" when I try to connect.

Talk Talk have not even bothered to respond to my e-mail, let alone provide any help. And this thread is the only description of this problem that I have been able to find online.

If anyone could provide any suggestions of how to fix this without reformatting my hard disc, which I really, really don't want to do, I would be more than gratefull.



PentiumII 667, 128Mb, Windows 98SE, Speed Touch 330 Modem, Sygate Personal Firewall, AVG Anti Virus.

[scr]

Hi
Are you using the drivers on the CD, if so I found that to be a major problem.

Try downloading new drivers from HERE.
Its still not perfect but usually now I can stay connected for 2-3 hours, sometimes longer and when I lose my connection I just close the program, disconnect the modem for 30 seconds then reconnect it and nine times out of ten I can connect again.

HTH

Stu

[Zer02004]

Try the high speed drivers as suggested above but error 650 is a RAS not responding error. The cure may be to move to a reliable ISP as this error is most likely caused by a misconfigured server.

[scr]

Try the high speed drivers as suggested above but error 650 is a RAS not responding error. The cure may be to move to a reliable ISP as this error is most likely caused by a misconfigured server.

Originally Posted by Zer02004

It has improved things slightly for me but the main problem is TalkTalk have us by the B******S for 18 months so unless we can find some get out clause then changing ISP isn't an option. Maybe endless complaints to Dunstone like other people have done might help!

[Zer02004]

There are consumer laws and organisations that will help to enforce those laws - Use them. Companies like TalkTalk will not want to appear in a court and will capitulate if they think that you are sertious about bringing actions against them.
Many of the options won't cost you anything except a little time and some record keeping.

[centaur]

There are consumer laws and organisations that will help to enforce those laws - Use them. Companies like TalkTalk will not want to appear in a court and will capitulate if they think that you are sertious about bringing actions against them.
Many of the options won't cost you anything except a little time and some record keeping.

Originally Posted by Zer02004

Absolutely agree with Zero. However, you MUST clearly have sufficient cause to complain of 'Breach of contract' due to unacceptable service levels...so it's important to keep good records of the problems found.
DON'T be 'browbeaten' or 'fobbed-off' by the ISP.

[scr]

There are consumer laws and organisations that will help to enforce those laws - Use them. Companies like TalkTalk will not want to appear in a court and will capitulate if they think that you are sertious about bringing actions against them.
Many of the options won't cost you anything except a little time and some record keeping.

Originally Posted by Zer02004

I've seen that from reading various threads on this site and other similar sites, people who have complained to the top man and been released from the contract. I'm sticking with it for the time being as I've read just as many horror stories about other ISP's so I may as well stick with the cheap option until a virtually flawless ISP comes along.(I won't hold my breath!!!)
This is my first time on broadband, as I told you before Zero i'm stuck in the dark ages lol. It may not be perfect but it's a definite improvement from dial up and I'm still keeping my dial up provider as back up, but its horrendously slow in comparison.

Just for the record though I'll keep a note of all the problems and if it gets too bad I'll do something about it.

Stu