I was with Pipex, they bought out homecall, and then made my broadband terrible, I had constant cut outs and broadband speed issues, it was slower that the old dial up alot of the time, when I tried to complain about it, I spent most of my time trying to get through to their customer service line which cost me a fortune, none of their staff could seem to help me, and the helpdesk is poor, and to top that they put my existing contract of £6.50 for broadband up to £15.99 without telling me, so I cancelled my contract, unfortunately, I had been paying the higher price for 12 months, they said they had sent letters out informing of the price raise, but, I never recieved one, and they wouldn't give me my money back either, not easy getting out of their contract, it will cost you about £30 in phone calls to their billing dept. Make sure you cancel your direct debt, as I have read other customers being charged for their services after contract should have ended! no customers service at all.

Unfortunately this is a copy of the letter of complaint I recently sent to Pipex. I have had no reply even though they say they will reply 48 hours.
To Pipex Homecall
- I initially called your company on 5th October to obtain a MAC code to transfer to Talk Talk. During this first call your customer agent advised me that 'Talk Talk offer very poor customer service and it will take you over 3 months to get connected'. I suspect this on the basis of recent press coverage on the company. However in sharing this type of information is libellous and could cause you company to be sued by Talk Talk.

- I then called your company on 23rd October as I had not received a MAC code that I was advised would be 5 working days. When calling I spoke with Mughta in customer care. I had to forcefully ask to speak with her manager several times and prior to eventually transferring she advised that her manager had to hang up on another customer in order to speak to me. I was then transferred to Zoe Garner who was aggressive and I had to ask her twice to stop shouting at me. Zoe advised that there was an issue with requesting these codes that was not going to be rectified in the near future. Zoe advised that she would send a letter or get a colleague to call to advise of the situation.

- I received no response by 30th October and called again. I then spoke to someone called Leena who advised that there was no point being put through to a manger this time Faheem Hussain as he had advised that due to me cancelling my direct debit they would not be able to issue a MAC code. Please see the passage below that I have copied from the Ofcom website. I was then transferred to a Lee Derby who advised that due to being on a certain type of account I would never be issued with a MAC code. So having waited so long and being told different stories none of which factual I have got no-where in nearly 4 weeks.

- I then called today1st November and asked for Alain Allison's email address to be told by Salkham that Pipex homecall a broadband provider don't communicate on email! After some questioning he provided me the email address that doesn't work.

- I find the whole situation insulting I have spent hours of my time dealing with this as well as money by way of phone calls.

- I am still waiting for someone to advise why my last bill is so much I have requested a call back several times to no avail.

Customers' rights and obligations
Under the terms of the code:

The existing service provider cannot unreasonably refuse to issue an authorisation code and may only withhold a code if:
the request is not made by the account holder or the account holder is deceased
the contract has already been terminated and the connection ceased
However, the existing service provider must explain the reasons and supply information on how to appeal against the decision;

The existing service provider cannot withhold an authorisation code to enforce debt collection or contractual rights. However, customers are not freed from contractual obligations they have entered in to with their existing service provider - i.e.: they will have to honour the remaining term of an existing contract or pay early cancellation fees, if applicable. An existing service provider will still be able to take reasonable action to enforce their contractual rights even after a customer has migrated to a new service provider.

I joined pipex many years ago and have had no problems with them till the start of this year, when i asked for the max service and was fobbed off with all the exccuses they could think of, so in July I managed to get the max service and I ask about the phone package but declined it as i have a better deal with another company for my calls, the about 10 days later I received a letter from BT saying they where sorry I was leaving them, Pipex had added the phone package to my account so I called and was told they would remove it (this was about the 2nd of August) around the end of August I noticed I still had the phone package so called again and this time was sent by email a link to cancel the package which I used , the 29 Sept I asked for a static IP address and was told it would take 7_10 day to setup, after 10 days I had heard nothing to called CS and was told that they could not set my static IP up because I had a phone packge and from then on I find i am going round in circles with CS each time a promise to remove the phone package,
so now all I am left with is the option to cancl my accounts with them and find another ISP

Hi Jim,

Sounds bad. I had a similar situation with an insurance company once, ringing up all the time while they kept losing all my forms etc.

I guess there are plenty of useless people in any call centre who really couldn't give a monkey's about customer support. I moan about them too but I think I'll try and be a bit more sympathetic now I've witnessed the other side of things.

Sometimes their system breaks down randomly and just cuts everyone off after they've been waiting for ages to get through, my bloke complains about this when he gets home from work and says he feels really bad when it happens and he has sympathy with the people waiting in the queues, but not much he can do about it. :o(

So there are good ones too....wouldn't like to guess what % though!

OK so he's fairly new to the job but he really tries to help people and feels frustrated that he can't sometimes. But from what he's said to me, some call centre tips I would to everyone offer are:
1) Once you are through, don't rant for ages about how long you have spent on hold because, as he has rightly pointed out, he just has to sit there and listen until they have calmed down and they have wasted even more of their phone bill ranting before he can help them.
2) Be aware that a lot of the time, when they say 'my supervisor will tell you the same thing'...they mean it.

Anyway, I will take a break from my crusade now before I annoy anyone! ;o) Just sticking up for the underdogs (the good ones not the naff ones).

Hi there,

It is now almost TWO MONTHS since I first reported my problems to Pipex. What have they done? Absolutely NOTHING. I still have the same problems I had when I first rang them. I have been promised again and again that I would hear from BT or Pipex themselves - I've had NOTHING, except for a few totally useless emails that were more insulting to my intelligence than anything else.

Yesterday, I got a call from Pipex - wanting to offer me more of their services!!!!!!!!!! I was almost speechless. When they want your money, they call you up, or answer their sales line immediately. When their service falls apart, you won't hear a peep from them, no matter how hard you try.

I do sympathise with people like your fiance - I have spoken to some helpful people on the phone, but the fact remains - every single time, NOTHING actually gets done. I'm not saying this is always the fault of the person I speak to - but you must understand the utter frustration in getting ZERO result, after waiting on hold for the umpteenth time, and spending a further half an hour explaining your whole story AGAIN. I have been through this process 7 or 8 times now, each time on my own phone bill.

This company is a joke - especially the customer service department. WHAT customer service? I do agree, though, it is NOT always the fault of the individual who deals with you on the phone - although I have spoken to some utterly useless people through this ridiculous mess. There must be some good people working there, who are capable of sorting out a problem - I just haven't spoken to them yet, in 2 months of trying.

If you want to give me your fiance's direct number, I would love to ask for his help, he sounds like one of the GOOD ones!!!

In the meantime, I am still at square one... the last thing was, we AGAIN emailed Pipex, to say how outraged we are that BT has CLOSED our case - when nothing has been done and our connection is as bad as ever.

Jim

I'm not going to comment on Pipex themselves as I don't know what they're up to and they are probably crap.

Just a plea not to take it out on the guys on the phone too much, eh? My fiance works in their call centre and was stuck on the phones after just a few days training. He was terrified, especially as he was told he'd get 6-8 weeks training when he signed up. Their training appears to be less than great and their systems are apparantly dodgy and keep breaking.

Btw he is something of a computer genius (only doing this job to get on the ladder since he has no qualifications) but it takes time to get used to Pipex's specific systems and with such flimsy training it's not surprising.

On several occasions he has finished his shift an hour late (unpaid overtime) when he has taken a long call and had to help someone out, he's a good guy.

As I said, not defending Pipex by any means, just trying to speak out a bit for the 'muppets' on the other end of the phone.

Hope it doesn't fall on deaf ears!

Good luck with Pipex guys, sorry you're having such a hard time! I'm with Wanadoo and they're not much better, lol. :o)

You're spot on Jim.

I've been doing a bit of research on this and think I know where its at. The sync speed of your router has a direct bearing on your download speed. What happens is the BT system monitoring your line averages this out over a period of time and bases your download speeds on it. So if you get consistently low sync speeds at your router, you'll get crap download speeds. Another problem with ADSL MAX is that if you suddenly get an improvement in sync speed, you won't see it reflected in your download speed for about 3 days. The system will need to see a stable improvement over the 3 days, otherwise it'll lower your speed.

I think I'm right here with my assumptions, but your sync speeds are low and your download speed will always be below your sync speed. If you're getting 2MB the most you're going to get is about 1.3MB. My sync speed is 6784kbps and that's not brilliant but when I connected my router directly to the BT connection behind the faceplate, I was getting 8MB so that proves that all my internal phone wiring is degrading the signal considerably. Trouble is I can't leave it connected there because I'd have no phones. I'm getting just over 4MB at the moment, but last night at around teatime, I was down to 1MB.

I know there's contention ratios to consider but this ADSL MAX seems to be a naturally fluctuating concept that way it works is a real pain.

I'm gonna keep an eye on things, but as I mentioned in a previous email, I've got a phone line in the house that I'm not using at the moment so I may use that as a dedicated broadband line with nothing else on it. Trouble is BT will want £11 a month line rental which I'm not sure I wanna pay.

One things for sure though ............ Pipex aren't causing this problem. This is good old BT.

Bestest, YC

Hi Yellowcake,

Thanks for the reply - I also have a Netgear router, how do I check the download sync speeds? I'm really not that technically minded, but I think it's this:

Modem Status Connected
DownStream Connection Speed 2144 kbps
UpStream Connection Speed 448 kbps

Does that mean it's currently registering a download sync speed of just over 2MB?

Thanks for your ongoing help!

Jim

Jim

I wasn't charged anything for the callout, but all the guy did was check the sync speed of the connection into the house, ie. on BT owned equipment. All this confirmed was that it is working OK which I suppose in itself is useful as it was something that needed to be eliminated from the equation.

I don't know what gear you guys are using in terms of routers, but my Netgear router enables me to check download sync speeds and these were pretty stable at between 6 and 7MB so I new that something was working right. The bit that enabled me to get up to the 4.5 - 5MB speeds that I'm currently getting was nothing to do with Pipex but involved a BT tweak that was enabled while I was actually speaking to the BT guy. I literally went from 512K to 4.5MB instantaneously.

I think you need to get the basics sorted out first. You need to establish if you're actually getting the required speeds into your house. You've probably already done this already so excuse my ignorance. If you are getting the correct speeds in then at least you can eliminate this.

With Pipex technical support it really is pot luck, but this 'call back later' thing that they're doing now is totally crap. When you do get someone half decent, it can really make the difference between success and failure.

Best, Yellowcake

Wow, Jimmibo that is unbelievable!!!!

Think I'm gonna cancel when I call today. There may be a problem with my line also, but dont want to go to Pipex to help sort it out I dont think.

Try and get an upgrade maybe to convince me to stay? (upgrade to what ? 512k!)

Any1 recommend another provider?

Cheers Guys!!!

Hello fellow Pipex victims!

Thanks for the updates - Yellowcake, when the BT guy came to your house, tested and found 7MB then buggered off - did he charge you the £60 call-out fee? It sounds like my problem is identical to yours, but I don't want some BT guy testing the line and charging me for their damn problem!! I'm glad yours seems to be sorted now, please let us know how stable it is.

Imprezauk, your experience is mine exactly - you upgrade to a "better" service, and get one FAR worse... then find there's almost sod-all you can do about it.

My latest - for the last 4 days, Pipex's "Technical Support" (cough, splutter) line has been stuck with an automated message: "Due to unusually large volumes of calls, we are unable to connect you. Please try again later." This is the same for the 3 phone numbers I have for them. Are they so deluged with complaintes they're simply not answering any more?!

So I called sales instead - lo and behold, I was INSTANTLY put through! This really makes me sick - they answer the phone immediately when they want your money, then once they have it, they no longer want to talk to you. I told the woman who answered as much. So, she put me on hold for Technical Support - amazingly, I only had to wait about 10 minutes this time (ridiculous that I now regard a 10 minute wait as being "good").

I got a semi-helpful techie (definitely an impovement on some I've spoken to). I went through the whole story AGAIN, and long story short - he said BT had "looked at" the line, and had asked us to test our connection again (we only found this out by sending a scathing complaint email to Pipex, I doubt they would have even contacted us). So yes we tested the connection, and it was as bad as ever. Apparently, BT then CLOSED THE CASE!!! What?!! They closed the case before even hearing if their "work" had helped at all? Unbelievable. So once again, if I hadn't called this guy, NOTHING would have been done, and the "case was closed."

While I had this guy on the line, I did a speed test and couldn't believe it - 167 kbps. A new all-time low! So naturally I vented my utter frustration and disgust with the whole affair, and he put another "case" in to BT, saying our problem was still the same. So AGAIN I'm waiting for ANYBODY to contact me to sort this mess out. I'm sure in a week's time I'll be sat on hold AGAIN then explaining my problem AGAIN etc etc.

I've never known customer service like it. I thought I'd had a bad experience with NTL a few years back, but this is a whole new world.

So, if you're trying to get through to these imcompetents, call sales, and ask them to put you through. If I lived anywhere near their call centre, I'd be round there with a baseball bat by now.

Jim

Hi

I think you've got to get the 10 day stabilisation period out of the way before you start firing rockets! During this period my speed fluctuated from 500K to 4.5MB but if you ring them they'll say that this is normal and BT are just finding your optimal speed. In my case this turned out to be complete rubbish. After the period I got 500K and the rest is history.

For their customer service levels alone, If I was looking for a new ISP now, I would avoid Pipex. A 45 minute wait to speak to someone is unacceptable and now what they're doing is saying that all their operators are busy, please call back later. Now that is bad and also unacceptable.

If you do get problems, you need an ISP that you can work with to get things resolved. Pipex's levels of customer service are virtually zero. If I were you now, I'd be looking at someone like Zen as an ISP, but at the end of the day it's your choice. Just remember that the longer you leave it the harder it will be to get out. You may have already left it too late.

All the best

Yellowcake

Thers a pattern here!

Signed up to our beloved Pipex last week.

1, No Email confirmation that the transaction actually went through.

2. Modem turned up out of the blue, so thought that was quick.

3. My "8 meg" connection is actually 240kbps. Rung them yesterday and gave me the 10 day trail quote. So that gives it till Sunday to rocket up to 8 meg. To be honest 1meg would be nice!!!!

Mr yellowcake or any1? im stuck! Do i jump ship a week in and cancel, or wait till sunday for a doubtfull change and wasted time and phone calls?

So here's an update guys.

BT engineer turned up this morning, plugged his box into the BT owned connection behind the consumer faceplate. Guess what? Getting 7MB connection speeds. Said it was something to do with my internal wiring and then buggered off. I disconnected my router and set it all up connected to my laptop on the main incoming phone line, rather than the one in my office that I'm currently using.

By using my Netgear router set up page I was able to monitor the sync speeds which were also around 7MB. So I knew by now that the line was OK, my router was picking up the required speeds, yet I was still getting 496k download speeds.

Got onto Pipex. After speaking to a really unhelpful 'techie' there I was about to give up. I then remembered that I have another phone line in the house that wasn't being used. I had it installed in days of old when I was on dial up and the wife used to get really pissed off about me hogging the phone line so I had another line installed. Then broadband came along and I had it disabled. I was that desparate by now that I was considering joining up with another ISP on this new line. The downside was that it would cost me another £11 a month. Fortunately it didn't come to that.

I phoned Pipex again but this time got through to a helpful techie. He took a look at my sync speeds and said there's a real mismatch here .... I was connecting at 7MB but not able to download faster than 500K. He said he'd refer the problem straight back to BT suggesting that a line reset was required.

Great I thought, I'm now going to get back into another frustrating Pipex loop, but true to his word, he did get onto BT and a rep from BT wholesale rang me this afternoon. He did a bit of remote tweaking and now I'm getting 4.5MB which is a vast improvement. Despite trying to get to the bottom of the cause of the problem, the guy was a bit vague. He said that the difference between an ADSL MAX connnection is that monitoring equipment is constantly monitoring the line looking for stability. For some reason in my case it was levelling the speed out at 500K. I stil don't really understand why and the BT guy didn't explain it that well, but the problem seems to be cured. He said he'd implemented an immediate fix plus one that would take effect in the next hour or two. Watch this space!

He did mention that my sync speed was prone to fluctuation and reckoned this was why the monitoring couldn't decide on my optimum speed, so it opted for something completely riduculous and very slow. Things seem to be OK now but I'll be keeping a close eye on things.

I'm still bewildered as to why it's taken this long to implement this. It seems to me that the whole thing has been done *** about face and the only reason I've got anywhere is because I've hassled Pipex like mad. Also although the company is complete pants, there are one or two indiviiduals there who do actually get things done, but it's real pot luck.

I'll need to make sure that this is a permanent fix. I'm certainly not counting my chickens yet.

Best, YC

I Jim i mirror everything that has been said about PIPEX THERE SERVICE HAS GONE TO THE SEWER and that is putting it miledly, word of caution Jim you say you are having a BT engineer comeing out to see you i went throu the same problem it cost me
£140 the guy said it was a bad connection in a junkshion box that was place there some months befor by one of there BT
engieers i said that the falt was theres then but it made no difference. Do yourself a faver take the face off your BT main
socket and plug your Modem or Router in still useing your filter but before you do this plug your phone in first if your phone dose
not work or is noisy then it is BT's problem if this is okay then check any extenstion socket you have starting with the nearest
one to the master socket and so on eliminating all the box's in your house if every thing is ok then the falt is outside of your
house. BT use in there outside green boxs aluminium wire which breaks very easly and can couse you problems with your phone
line if the falt is inside your house then i sujest you cheque all the wires in your extenshion box's if you have any,becouse if the
engineer starts work inside of your house then expect a high charge also a lot of these engineers are contractors, last word
Pipex are charging me for upto 8meg max and pipex talk £27 50p and i am not reciveing talk at all and BT are charging me
for all my call's the young git who owns Pipex or is the MD proberly has bought himself a big yaht by now.

We all should complain to Offcom or Wachdog.Hope i have been of some help.

Hal

PS. excuse my spelling only i am in a rush