News:

"The phone is a remarkably complex, simple device,
and very rarely ever needs repairs, once you fix them." - Dan/Panther

Main Menu

very irritating "Virgin Cable Broadband"

Started by gpo706, April 14, 2012, 07:02:28 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

gpo706

A month ago my brother, in who's name the phone bill is decided to get rid of BT ADSL and switch to Virgin cable broadband.

Luckily I had the day off the idiot from Virgin showed up to connect the phone and broadband.

He asked where the phone line was and was directed to the BT twin copper pair box in the hallway.

He then hummed and haughed, I said to hime the old disconnected cable phone actually was lashed over the roof and terminated at a socket in my bedroom.

Happy with this he then found a secondary cable, which must have terminated to an old socket in the downstairs living room, he asked me where it went and I said I hadn't a clue as it was 20 years since we used the cable phone service, he then puzzled about a TV cable box with his midget mate, who's whole job consisted of standing about waiting for to barked at to hand him tools from a large toolbag.

Naturally when he got up to the socket to my bedroom he nearly flipped, with all the phones and cabling strewn about, asking me if I had a circuit diagram or labelled my extensions from my Pana 616.

Anyway I managed to get the bumbling duo to get the cable broadband up and running, but this arse couldn't get a phone to work, so he fumed off saying him and mini-me would be back in a couple of hours with another guy to sort it out.

So then a few hours later, the 3 Stooges turn up, and Moe manages to get a dial tone downstairs, after I explained to him my PBX was on extension straight from the BT line - the direct line to the living room phone is not through the PBX.

Then Curly (No1 arse) basically said the Pana was drawing to much juice from his line, and this was causing all his hassle and causing him to tear what little hair remained on his balding pate.

Much muttering and veiled threats were made of £100 a call-out for "dodgy" extensions linked to a PBX, and I explained it outputted 4 ren, they accused me of draining the current!

I said 4 REN an extension, not 4 REN to the Pana!

So i shut it off and had a line to one phone in the living room, when they left I just reconnected it and all was fine, except they had routed the PBX extension to the living room on 24 and subbed it run into the original BT copper pair box in the hallway, the same darn connector box I had used with BT!

These boys what didn't know what they were bloody doing, and obviously never seen a PBX in their lifes.

Sorry taken me a month to get this off my chest, just needed a release, and these guys are meant to be "professionals"?

So now I have lost the living room extension, because they have used it for the connection to old BT box, and will have run another cable through the floors to get it back!

Bloke didn't have a clue... >:(









"now this should take five minutes, where's me screwdriver went now..?"

twocvbloke

When it comes to NTHell/TelePest/Virgin, it's better to do the work yourself, be it the cable line, the phone lines or extensions, that's what I did when we were in a cabled area... :D

AE_Collector

Didn't their advertising say "Complete with Professional Installation" like most advertising for similar services in North America does? Then when the installers arrive the company hopes you forgot the part about "Professional Installation" and really heard "We will do what ever we have to to make it work for at least 5 minutes after our Installers leave the premises".

My bud at work and I were just talking yesterday how they have totally killed any level of tradesmanship in the Telecom business the way things are done now.

Terry

gpo706

#3
Well its all up and running now, I hope bro doesn't want to change anytime soon as I will be there with a GPO 280 butt or a WE 500 to "reset" their skulls.

Added to that he asked for the BT landline number to be retained when he ordered and numbskull No.1 said "its not on my sheet so take it up with Virgin or BT", so I left it my long-suffering brother's lap, I even put an extension into his room so he could phone at his leisure.

So we had a "temp" Virgin number for 4 weeks till they and BT knocked heads and re-instated the old number, great when the doctor is trying to get in touch....



"now this should take five minutes, where's me screwdriver went now..?"

gpo706

Quote from: twocvbloke on April 14, 2012, 07:19:20 PM
When it comes to NTHell/TelePest/Virgin, it's better to do the work yourself, be it the cable line, the phone lines or extensions, that's what I did when we were in a cabled area... :D

Funny that 2CV the cable was originally United Artists, then TeleWest, then we got rid of it and then Virgin devoured the cables...
"now this should take five minutes, where's me screwdriver went now..?"

gpo706

Quote from: AE_collector on April 14, 2012, 07:21:23 PM
Didn't their advertising say "Complete with Professional Installation" like most advertising for similar services in North America does? Then when the installers arrive the company hopes you forgot the part about "Professional Installation" and really heard "We will do what ever we have to to make it work for at least 5 minutes after our Installers leave the premises".

My bud at work and I were just talking yesterday how they have totally killed any level of tradesmanship in the Telecom business the way things are done now.

Terry

Thanks Terry,

Apart from the fact I don't like folks crawling around my room all day, and me having to keep an eye on them, the "service" was lacking to say the least, I mean I was getting accused for their failures by having the "arrogance" to have my own PBX!

I should have hung a sheet over it, or blindfolded the irritating "engineer"...
"now this should take five minutes, where's me screwdriver went now..?"

AE_Collector

#6
Besides working for the Telco here, I have my own security alarm business. It never ceases to amaze me the number of my alarm customers who have their alarm left completely disconnected from any sort of "dial tone" after my customer switches from Telco to "other dial tone provider". I would think that "other dial tone provider" would have had his $*&@ sued off by now. Initially it was AWFUL and then it seemed to be improving as they must have come close to legal action. Lately though, apathy seems to have returned and I've had several problems again more recently.

I know that I work for the Telco (so I may be a little biased), and many of them (Telco's) aren't what they used to be either. However, I still think the "general rule" is that if you want the most reliable service, best of the bunch installers, best sound quality, most likely to continue working through storms or other natural disasters, stick with the Telco. This is definitely a generalization but IMHO that is my opinion (even though no one asked for my opinion).

Terry

twocvbloke

Quote from: gpo706 on April 14, 2012, 07:45:58 PMFunny that 2CV the cable was originally United Artists, then TeleWest, then we got rid of it and then Virgin devoured the cables...

Where we used to live, the cable used to be Nynex (something our friends across the pond may recognise!!), then it became Cable & Wireless, then NTL and finally Virgin... :D

Owain

Quote from: gpo706 on April 14, 2012, 07:02:28 PM
Naturally when he got up to the socket to my bedroom he nearly flipped, with all the phones and cabling strewn about, asking me if I had a circuit diagram or labelled my extensions from my Pana 616.

I'm surprised he even recognised a PBX.

The few times I've had BT round and they do a test call slightly startles them. I think they've forgotten what 700 series bells sound like.

twocvbloke

#9
When we had a BT guy here to reconnect our line, I had forgot I left my junker ivory 746 on the windowsill by the main terminal block, and he honestly picked that up to check for dial-tone, not realising it hadn't even got a line cable on it!!! :D

He was a tad red faced when I mentioned that it wasn't connected to anything... ;D

(not that it would have helped, another engineer snipped our line to steal the wires for another house on the street cos the overhead copper had failed on their line to the exchange!!!)

gpo706

Luckily he didn't hang about long enough to ask what a "Dictograph" is when he seen three wired to the Pana... :o
"now this should take five minutes, where's me screwdriver went now..?"