Slow service and dre4adful customer service

Question

I was enticed to the BT infinity service from an existing ADSL provider with the promise of additional speed. Not the full 20/10 but 17/2. I actually get 6.5/0.6 unfortunately after a catalogue of dreadful customer service and bad technical support I am faced with no other alternative than to open a case with the Ombudsman for communications.
My post is to warn others who get suckered into the promise of a faster connection from BT. The fact is that infinity is no better than ADSL unless you are next to the cabinet or exchange. Same scenario as ADSL. The bad thing is that although the 1st engineer correctly diagnosed the issue immediately after installation BT continued to send another 7 engineers to look into the issue. The tech buddies at the call centre have no idea on what to do other than send another engineer and assure me they are work hard to resolve my issues. The fact is that the call centre staff do not understand the complaint procedure nor can they escalate issues to get a resolution.
After nearly 2 months of being told to re-boot my router and many engineer visits the UK customer agent has finally conceded that the cable is too old to carry a reliable digital signal and that it is too costly for BT Open reach to replace it. Although I am paying for an infinity service I should accept that due to the inferior quality of the BT network I am getting as good as it gets.
I am sorry to say I do not accept that the old antiquated cables that provide the phone service are not up to the job and can be left in place as it is too expensive to replace. Surely every technology company expects to invest in delivering the service they offer their customers and asking me to accept an inferior service but still pay the full price is unacceptable. I do not live out in the sticks I live in a large town. My previous ADSL provider gave a better speed than infinity provides.
I was told by BT that it would not be recommended to take this case to the Ombudsman as it is unlikely I will get anywhere. My view is that if everyone took this stance then the Ombudsman would have no visibility of the poor service BT are providing and their inability to update their infrastructure to meet their obligations. Not only is the speed way too slow the customer service that BT provides is among the worst of any company I have dealt with. Given the size of BT I would have hoped for a better escalation system.  Sadly there is no alternative to BT unless Virgin runs by your door as all providers have to utilise the antiquated BT network. They may have spent loads on Century 21 but they missed the final section of cable.
BT has agreed that they are unable to resolve my problem. I have requested a ‘Deadlock’ letter but apparently only special authorised people can issue these and none are available for a few days!  So it appears that even when BT have admitted they are at the end of their trouble shooting they are still reluctant to issue the final letter to prove it and allow me to take the next step.
All of this is a sad state of affairs making me back away from BT for any services.

Answer 1

Absolutely accept they do not have to provide. However, once an offer has been made and accepted they should have an obligation to deliver on their commitment. If they had never offered me the service at the speed greater than the ADSL I would have stayed put. I do not see how BT can hide behind outdated infrastructure in the 21st century in a built up area and with consumers having NO choice as Virgin is the only competition.
Above this the biggest issue is the appalling customer service.  If fact NO customer service. All they have is a tech help line staffed by people trained to speak nicely and ask you to switch off the router or wait for 48 hours for the new profile to take effect. All this given it was never going to work and they knew it. They do constantly call back at the rate of 3 times a day to enquire if the problem is solved tasking no notice of the request to call my mobile phone and harassing my wife at home who has no idea what they are talking about! At one stage she threatened to report them as a nuisance caller!
The problem was diagnosed on the first visit and if they had any tech staff with any knowledge they should have said from the start don’t waste hours talking to our tech buddies ‘cos it’s as good as it gets.
I do not think any of this is unreasonable as I’m just asking for what I am paying for no more or less and an efficient way to get the issue resolved.
I would like to add that eventually after constant complaining and even filling in the complaint form on the web site, that never recvd a reply, I was called by a very helpful lady named Emma who did agree immediately the issue was the aluminium cable that was unable to carry a digital signal. She contacted Open Reach and they performed more tests to absolutely confirm the cable was at fault and they would not replace it. She said there was nothing else that could be done and as GBP28.00 PCM was what I would pay for ADSL I should agree to keep what I had and just accept it.
BT need to understand that a digital service is where we are and if they want to be in the game they need to invest in delivering it or just accept that Virgin have it nailed and leave it all to them and the rest who might not want Virgin will just stick with a slow service.