Exchange upgrade causing issues with internal wiri...

Question

Recently our exchange was upgraded to accommodate bt infinity and at the same time our broadband started playing up. we called bt and I spent 1.5 hours checking and re checking equipment with the call center. Tests were done with the hub at either end of the internal wiring. All the tests were still showing faults even with hub connected to the test socket. They asked me to leave connected for 24 hours while they monitor the line. They promised to call me back which they did not. I called them again the following day to be told I should have left the hub in the test socket which I was not told the previous day. I then had to wait 48 hours while they monitored the line this time in the test socket. All the tests still showed the fault was still there so an engineer called out.
The hub was still in the test socket when engineer arrived and the first thing he did was hook up his test equipment to the test socket and he stated there and then that there was nothing wrong with the line but it had been throttled down. 2 minute phone call and 10 minutes later broadband was back and working perfectly at the test socket. He checked the internal extention and the faults were being thrown up by an extension that has been in place for 10 years +. He stated to me that the new equipment installed in the exchange was more advanced and did more line checks so, although this equipment has been used for Internet with BT for 10 years it is no longer adequate.
All of this I find understandable but the whole way that BT handled this from day 1 of my first call has been appalling. BT openly admitted that the original engineer calls were handled badly and we were credited £9 for the lack of services we had for overly long time. However we are now, 2 months after this, faced with nearly £130 charge for the engineer visit which, looking back with the info I have now, was completely unnecessary. Had the engineers on the phone bothered to reset the line while hub was in the test socket when they were allegedly monitoring it for 48 hours they could have told me there were no faults on their equipment up to the socket and I would have sorted out the internal wiring myself. Even now I can find mention on the Internet of old wiring causing issues but no specific posts to do with exchange upgrades potentially meaning that you need to upgrade internal wiring or mention by the BT call center itself on any of the calls I made to them. All I was told was that everything up to the main box is BT and everything after that mine but since we have made no changes to the wiring we did not think it was applicable until the engineer arrived and told us what he told us then. Yesterday I called Bt again around 9am to dispute the charge. I was informed that because the fault was with our equipment the charge stands. I explained all of the above and I had my case put to the review team. I was told I would get a call back within 4 hours which I did but the phone rang 3 times and as I answered they hung up. I then got a text saying they had tried to call and asked for me to call back which I did to be told that his computer wasn't working. He took my details and said someone would call me back which no one did. I chased again to be told that someone would definitely call me that day. No one did. I chased again today to be told the decision still stands. He has put to final review and promised a call back within 5 days. Until this is resolved direct debit is cancelled. To the letter of the contract we have with BT this is our charge to pay I know that but this could have been avoided if the information was out there on the net, if the original checks done over the phone were done correctly or if I had been told this directly by Bt themselves prior to the engineer being called out which is why I am posting this here so hopefully no one else falls into this trap.

Answer 1

You're right I'm not connected to the BT infinity cabinet. But the BT Infinity cabinets all still route back through the exchange that I am connected to -
http://www.ichilton.co.uk/blog/phones/faster-broadband-bt-infinity-fibre-to-the-cabinet-coming-to-in...
Quote :
What this modem does is connects using VDSL from your home to the VDSL cabinet using the existing copper wires, on to the DSLAM, back to the exchange (over the fibre) and on to BT’s core network.
Your phone line is then still terminated in the original cabinet for telephony (using the cross connect between the old and new cabinets I mentioned above) and back to the exchange over the original multi pair copper cable as it always has done.
http://www.robertos.me.uk/html/fttx.html
Quote:
FTTC involves BT Openreach installing a new street cabinet near to the existing one and linking the two. They run optical fibre from the exchange to the new cabinet then link individual lines from the old cabinet to the new one and back to get VDSL2 onto the copper connection to the premises. The PSTN phone connection continues to operate over the pre-existing cable from the old cabinet to the exchange.  It does not get put onto the fibre connection.
In other words the linkage is Exchange >> Old >> DSLAM in New >> Old >> Premises. (Traffic in both directions of course!)
Presumably the equipment in the exchange cannot stay as it is and is upgraded in the process?