"I will sit right down, waiting for the gift of sound and vision." -- David Bowie, 1977.

What follows is a cautionary tale (co-written with K), which is primarily for the benefit of anyone who might be thinking of installing a service called BT Vision.

(If you're not thinking of installing BT Vision, then please sit back and enjoy the schadenfreude.)

BT Vision is British Telecom’s rival to the Sky Plus service, which involves receiving your TV signal through your high-speed broadband connection, via a special set-top box and a wireless “home hub”. Once installed, you can receive all the Freeview channels, plus a wide range of digital radio stations, with the ability to pause and rewind live transmissions in the same manner as Sky Plus, Tivo etc. The box’s hard drive lets you store recorded programs, with a significantly larger memory than Sky Plus.

The interface is well designed and intuitive, with a more contemporary look and feel than Sky. There’s also – and this was one of the clinchers – an extensive “On Demand” service, which lets you download a truly vast range of movies, TV shows (including entire series), music videos and so on, either for free (most of the time), or for no more than £1.99.

Since we already use BT for our landline and broadband, the combined service works out dramatically cheaper than using Sky for the TV. Since we were already extremely happy broadband customers (rock solid, fast connection speeds, never goes wrong, wireless and “home hub” installations a painless doddle), we thought we’d be onto a winner. So long, evil billionaire tyrant Rupert Murdoch! Hello, lovely fluffy cuddly British Telecom!

How wrong can you be?

Brace yourselves, readers; it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

(What follows is, believe it or not, the edited, highlights-only version. Because we wouldn’t want to bore you.)

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August 6. A morning installation had been booked for this date. Nobody turned up. A phone call was made. “Oh, it’s been cancelled by the installations team.” No further explanation given.

August 10. Installation completed.

(Note: Over at the cottage, at around the same time, we also received 400 – yes, 400 – identical telephone bills through the post, in 400 separate envelopes. Perhaps this was some sort of omen for what was to follow...)

After a brief and blissful “honeymoon period” of a couple of weeks or so, problems started occurring, with the box regularly going down and requiring re-booting. This also affected the previously rock-solid wireless Internet connection, which also started dropping out (or “going out of synch”, as it was explained to us), requiring nothing short of a full PC re-boot each time.

TV recordings also had a habit of frequently ending a couple of minutes before the actual finish times for the programmes, which was particularly frustrating during the sort of drama series which habitually ends on a “cliff-hanger”. A phone call was made.

“Yes, we know about the problem. It will be fixed with the next automatic software upgrade. No, we don’t know when that will be.”

To the best of our knowledge, this problem has still not been fixed.

“On Demand” programmes also started freezing in the middle of playback, rendering them unwatchable.

We repeatedly rang Technical Service (0845 600 7030), on average twice a week. Calls usually lasted between 45 minutes and one hour each, due to a lack of staff at their end. Various suggestions were made, which were generally variations on the theme of “switching the system off and then on again”, and checking the line speed. One of the suggestions meant that we lost all of our stored recordings (but hey, the last couple of minutes were generally missing anyway).

Nevertheless, we were still able to “enjoy” some sort of regular, if intermittent and slowly deteriorating service, even if numerous “relaxing evenings in front of the telly” turned into marathon Call Waiting Hell sessions.

Now the fun really begins!

Monday October 8. The “On Demand” service fails entirely. The screen says “Call Technical Service – Fault Code V04”. We call Technical Service, and go through all the usual processes yet again: switching off, switching on, and checking the line speed.

“Sorry sir, this problem is beyond us. We will get the Resolutions Team to call you within 48 hours”

Thursday October 11. 72 hours later, there has still been no call from the Resolutions Team. We call Technical Service, as the Resolutions Team do not give out their number. (Well, why would they do a silly thing like that?)

“Oh yes sir, the Resolutions Team are scheduled to call you on Saturday October 13.”

“Why didn’t they let us know?”

“The person you spoke to shouldn’t have told you 48 hours.”

Saturday October 13. No call from the Resolutions Team.

Monday October 15. A full seven days after we were promised a call from the Resolutions Team, there has still been no call. We call Technical Service.

“Oh yes sir, the Resolutions Team are scheduled to call you tomorrow – but in the meantime, their may be a fault on your line. Have you tried unwiring your main BT socket and wiring your Home Hub into the back of this?”

Eventually, K grudgingly finds a screwdriver and complies. It doesn’t work.

Okay, so they are being inundated with calls, due to launching a product before it is actually ready. We will give them the benefit of the doubt this time. However, we also try to register a complaint with the BT Vision Complaints Line (0800 545458).

We try this number repeatedly throughout the course of the week, and never get an answer.

A week after the failure of the “On Demand” service, the entire BT Vision box fails, meaning that our only remaining TV service is terrestrial, via the old aerial.

Tuesday October 16. Still no call from the Resolutions Team. We call Technical Service, and demand to talk to a supervisor. The supervisor comes on the line.

“Sir, I can see you have had an embarrassing number of problems with BT Vision. We are a large organisation and sometimes things do go wrong – but I can see in your case that just about every wheel has fallen off the wagon. I will take care of this personally myself, and will call you back tomorrow.”

Wednesday October 17. No call from the supervisor. In the evening, we call Technical Service.

“Oh yes sir, he is looking into it and is currently booking you a service engineer visit. You will get a call tomorrow.”

Thursday October 18. After ten days with no On Demand service and three days with no BT Vision service whatsoever, K finally gets a call! This is a major breakthrough!

“The service engineer will be with you tomorrow morning, between 8:30 am and 1:00 pm.”

“Fine, thank you, but I am not waiting at home. As I work only five minutes from home, he can call me on my mobile when he arrives, and I will be there straight away.”

Friday October 19, 3:00 pm. K has heard nothing from the service engineer, and so calls Technical Service.

“Yes sir, we can see that he has been to your house, and that he has not called your mobile as it states on the job sheet. Sorry, we don’t know why not.”

The next available re-scheduled date is the morning of Tuesday October 23.

Tuesday October 23, 9:00 am. K calls Technical Service.

“Can you please confirm that the service engineer has my mobile number to call when he arrives?”

“Yes sir, that is on the job sheet.”

Tuesday October 23, 2:00 pm. See Friday October 19! Once again, the engineer has been and gone, without calling K’s mobile. K demands to talk to the supervisor.

“Sorry sir, I can see that you rang this morning to confirm - and also that my colleague, the supervisor that you spoke to on Friday, also called to confirm that you should be contacted on your mobile. Can we reschedule for tomorrow? Would you prefer am or pm?”

“We’d better have am please, since we will need the afternoon to repeat this process.”

“(thin laugh)”

While this call is taking place on the land line (it lasts well over 45 minutes, due to being placed in various queues and “on-hold” situations), K passes the time by placing a simultaneous call to BT Corporate Headquarters (0207 356 5000) on his mobile.

“Oh dear, you have had a very difficult time with BT Vision, sir. I will register you for a call from the Chairman’s Office.”

The Chairman’s Office does not reply.

Wednesday October 24, 11:00 am. The service engineer successfully calls K’s mobile! This is a major breakthrough!

K returns from work, lets the service engineer inside the house, and begins to explain the problem.

“I’m sorry sir, but I’m going to have to stop you there. I’m afraid that you’re not going to like this. You see, I’m a service engineer for the broadband service, not for the BT Vision service.”

“But the broadband service is fine!”

“Shall I check the line speed anyway? Yes, it’s 5.5 mb. No problem there, then!”

K rings the supervisor. By now they are old friends, and on first name terms.

“I’m sorry K, but we’ve had you down as the wrong kind of fault all along.”

“But I have told you on numerous occasions, spread out over several weeks, that the broadband service is fine, and that the BT Vision box is at fault!”

“I understand that, K. We’re going to supply you with a replacement box. Someone will contact you soon, in order to arrange a visit…”

All of a sudden, Grand Tragedy has converted to High Farce, as we have finally reached the stage which K and I habitually refer to as “Beyond The F**k It”.

Well, you have to laugh, don’t you?

Update (1): Tuesday October 30, 14:00 pm. An engineer arrives to replace the BT Vision box. Naively, K assumes that before signing off on the job and leaving the house, the engineer will have tested the service.

Tuesday October 30, 16:00 pm. K's parents have arrived for an overnight visit. As they are potentially interested in subscribing to BT Vision themselves, K switches on the TV for a demo session... only to find that none of the "on demand" programmes will play. (This is a recurrence of our old friend, the V04 error code.)

Tuesday October 30, 21:00 pm. By this time, the entire BT Vision service has become inoperable once again. K spends about an hour on the phone with his old friend the supervisor; you know, the one he's on first name terms with. (The supervisor, it has to be said, is as friendly and as willing to help as any supervisor could possibly be.) Between them, they try everything that they can think of, but to no avail.

K: "I'm going to be requesting a goodwill gesture of a full year's worth of free On Demand programmes."

Supervisor: "And I'm going to copy your full history to the team who looks after compensation."

K: "In which case, you might want to take a look at troubled-diva.com - all the details are there."

K posits the new theory that maybe the "home hub" box is at fault, rather than the BT Vision box.

Supervisor: "We'll get another home hub delivered to you, K."

K: "Oh, that's OK; you accidentally sent us two home hubs in the first place, so we've got a spare!"

Update (2): Wednesday October 31. K swaps our home hub unit with the accidentally delivered spare unit. Amazingly, everything now works - and has continued to do so ever since.

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Summary.

1. Both the BT Vision box and the separate home hub box were faulty, with problems exacerbated by fluctuations in line speed.

2. BT Vision support failed to diagnose the source of the problem correctly, logging it as a broadband fault despite repeated instructions to the contrary. In the end, it was down to us to suggest that the home hub might be faulty.

3. Time was wasted by BT Vision support's inability to get the engineers to ring the mobile number, again despite repeated confirmations - and also by their sending the wrong type of engineer out to visit us.

4. Telephone response times for BT Vision support were abysmally slow throughout, with many, many hours spent in call waiting. Their internal structure appeared to be cumbersome and overly complex, even causing confusion for BT's own staff. Much time was wasted on being passed between various departments.

5. The so-called "Complaints Line" deserves a special mention, for never once answering or returning our calls. Ditto the so-called "Resolutions Team".

6. The BT Vision service simply isn't mature enough yet. It's too new and too bug-ridden, and was released too early. It compares well with Sky on cost and look-and-feel, but Sky is already responding to the competition on price.

7. To their credit, BT Vision staff were unfailingly courteous and helpful in their attitude. They seemed to be as frustrated by organisational problems as we were. Special credit must be paid to "Steve" the supervisor, who latterly went out of his way to help us. Steve is still ringing us most nights, on his own initiative, to trace what's happening with our request for compensation - and we'll certainly keep you posted as to what form of compensation we eventually receive.

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Estimated number of phone calls to date: 45 calls.
Average length of phone call (at a conservative estimate): 25 minutes.
Longest phone call to date: 90 minutes.
Number of conversations with the Resolutions Team (as promised): zero.
Number of conversations with the BT Vision Complaints Line (as advertised): zero.
Number of calls from the Chairman's Office (as promised): zero.
Total estimated telephone time to date: 19 hours
Total time without any “On Demand” service: 23 days.
Total time without any form of BT Vision service: 16 days.
State of K’s nerves: shot to pieces recovering.
Likelihood of ditching the entire BT Vision service and returning to Sky: high dependent on a stable service in the future.
Moral of the tale: DON’T TOUCH BT VISION WITH A BARGEPOLE!

Labels: broadband, bt vision, consumer, television