How long can it take for BT to repair a BT line?

Question

I am concerned that I am going for some sort of record!
I have been having problems with my telephone line, there is no dial-tone and the DSL is all over the place.  After checking that it was not an equipment failure on my side I logged a fault on the 9th February.  Literally within hours (I was impressed) I had not one but two BT vans outside to trace the fault.  They very efficiently diagnosed the problem to be a connection fault with the wire that was replaced about a year ago (the grass has only just grown back in my front garden).  That was it.  A week later I still had the fault, the fault web site says the ticket was closed and so I called in to 151 and was told “an engineer would be with me by 5pm that day”, they were not.  So the next day I called again and was told “an engineer would be with me by 5pm that day”; fearing a bad case of deja vu at this point I asked to speak with a supervisor who was very understanding.  However, basically I was told that the line is waiting for contractors to dig up the wire again and would have to wait until “next month”.  How long should this take?
I am at the point where I am waiting for some undefined point in time for someone to dig a hole so that someone else can come along and fix the wire.  I have been a BT customer basically since I left home, quite some years ago, this line alone I have had ADSL on since early 2001.  At this point I am considering dropping everything I have with BT and switching to another provider entirely.  I try to do my bit for the environment and work from home when I can, currently I either hit the environment and drive into work or it cost me on my cell phone.  The only reason I have not already as I know that they would end up providing the connection over the same wire – perhaps their customer service will be better…  If there was virgin cable in my street I would have switched already!

Answer 1

Hi AGeezer,
If the road has to be dug up then there needs to be permission granted from owner/council and of course the road must be closed etc so sometimes it can take a while to get all this arranged.
I'll be happy to keep you up to speed and let you know what's happening as the updates come through.
Could you drop me in an email please with your BT account and telephone number along with a link back to this thread.
Just send to the email address in my profile and mark FAO Craig please.
Thx
Craig
BTCare Community Mod
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