Talk account cancelled without notification

Question

Dear Sir/Madam  Can you please arrange for someone to respond to the email I sent to Olivia on 16th July 2012
Dear Olivia
I am contacting you in the hope that you will be able to succeed in resolving my unhappy status with British Telecom.
Services
BT Phone
BT Talk
BT Vision
BT Broadband
Some 3-4 weeks ago we experienced an issue with our BT Service.  Our BT Talk and Internet were not working.
After several hours and phone calls I was advised by BT that we needed a new hub.  I was also advised that to receive this new hub we needed to update our contract.
At the time I asked if all our current services would be resolved and continue including our internet phone, if I agreed.  I was assured this would be the case and I also asked that a note be issued onto my account details as I felt pressured into agreeing a new contract to receive a service which I already paid for.
Several days, phone calls and hours (hanging on the phone)  later, including delivery of two new Hub 3's, I have been told that my talk account was terminated that you no longer support this service, the new hub 3 has no port to support VOIP and that there is nothing that can be done to establish the service I had.
I have also been told that customers who do have an existing talk account will be supported until they no longer require it.
At no time have I asked for my talk account to stop.  At no time was I advised that my talk account would stop when being re-contracted to obtain a hub which I was advised I needed.
To date I have been sent two new hubs which I do not need because in fact the original hub is working and it turns out that the issue was a major area fault.  So I have been advised wrongly too.
My main issue is that the number we used on VOIP has been used to establish a new small business. (Which if successful we would transfer to a full time business service). In the meantime, due to my redundancy (twice in the past 18 months)  you can imagine that funding has been quite tight. Along with the stress and time taken to establish advertising opportunities this has not been an easy time.
We have spent what marketing budget we have using the VOIP number as a contact point (The VOIP number was used  purely to establish a trusted and professional rapport with potential customers and to distinguish from family calls on our main land line. )
Two years of establishing an advertising hard copy and internet presence using this number has just been wiped out.
To say that I am near to tears is an understatement.
I have been in touch finally with your customers in distress team.  I had to hold on the phone two hours  and speak to several people before this happened. They are very polite and would seem to do the best that they can given the tools they have.  Unfortunately having a sympathetic ear is not enough.  I have copied the last email received below for your information.
I have not replied to it yet.  I am not happy that this complaint be closed.  I agreed with Susan that she had told me she had done everything she said she would.  
I have as advised contacted the business team who have told me they cannot retrieve the 01522 774296 number.  If it had been a business VOIP number they would be able to.  Why is the same technology not available to residential VOIP numbers?
What I need, is to retrieve the number in order that the goodwill and our investment of time and money in advertising is not lost.
I understand that if retrieved we will need to put this to a business account which will of course then cost us more money.
All in all after being a BT customer for over 30 years I am more than disappointed but I am taking measured steps to try and retrieve the situation and I would appreciate your support in doing the utmost possible to just help us get this number back.
Otherwise I am looking at a cost to re establish the advertising which we cannot afford and will probably force the issue of considering if our business can afford to continue.
This is not said lightly to gain sympathy but to assure you that this is a very important issue for us as a small family business trying to survive in the current climate.
I have not yet completed the customer surveys which have regularly been sent to me as I have felt too angry to do so.  But I can say that the experience of speaking to a BT person has been a main source of anxiety rather than a service over the years and one of the many reasons I will be considering changing our suppliers if I can establish who actually has a service based in our own country with authority to actually resolve an issue rather than make it worse.
I do hope to hear from you soon as I wish to ensure that I have made the most effort possible to retrieve this awful situation before taking any final decisions regarding our business and tv/telecom suppliers.
Kind regards.
Gillian
Gillian

Answer 1

If you have received a home hub 3, then this does not support Broadband Talk, and the number is automatically cancelled.
However it can sometimes be re-instated.
If you would like to contact one of the UK based BT Care Team who moderate this forum, they may be able to help you.
They can be contacted using this link BT Care Team
They normally respond by phone or e-mail, within three working days, however you should get an immediate confirmation, with a tracking number.
Sorry, I misread your initial post, and thought you were already a business customer, as you were using the line for commercial use.
There is no need to post in the business forums unless you want to ask their advice.
Broadband talk is no longer available to now customers, and is being phased out.
There are some useful help pages here, for BT Broadband customers only, on my personal website.
BT Broadband customers - help with broadband, WiFi, networking, e-mail and phones.