Rated: 100% (5 votes)
Loading ...Why Orange can ’something rude’ off
Ben Hardwidge
It’s not everyday that I want to disembowel everyone at Orange with a rusty fish hook, but today is certainly one of those days. I’ve just had the joy of trying to get my phone line and broadband connection installed in my new house, which apparently involves spending hundreds of pounds on absolutely nothing.
There’s an NTL box and a BT box at the back of my new lounge, so I thought I’d start with BT. I called the number, sat through several distorted Mozart pieces on hold, and then got through to the poor girl who answers calls from people like me everyday. I understand their pain, because I used to work in a call centre many years ago, and I used to have a big sign that said ‘something rude off!,’ which I held up whenever I had an angry caller out for my blood on the line.
I told her my situation, and she explained that it would cost me £124.99 for an engineer to connect up the line. I was then told than an engineer wouldn’t even be available for another week and a half to do the job, and wouldn’t be able to come round at a time when either my fiancé or I could take any time off.
I thought about it, and I thought ‘hmm, this is rubbish. I’ll just get the NTL box connected instead.’ This wasn’t an easy decision, as a fair few of my friends have told me horror stories about NTL’s customer service. Nevertheless, these worries were all based on hearsay, so I decided to give Virgin (which has now taken over NTL) the benefit of the doubt, and got the box hooked up.
The only problem now was that my broadband connection (currently with Orange) wouldn’t work with the cable line. ‘I’ll just call them up and close my account,’ I thought. After all, I’d been with that ISP since 1998 in its various guises, from Freeserve, through Wanadoo to Orange. They were bound to be reasonable about it, weren’t they?
Well, the guy at the Orange call centre (who we’ll call Matt, as I don’t want to give out his real name) was reasonable enough. I explained the situation, and he said that there was still some of my broadband contract outstanding, but that he would explain the situation to his supervisor. Unfortunately, though, his supervisor appeared to have learned their people skills from the Robert Mugabe school of negotiation. Basically, I still have to pay for 9 months of Orange broadband, whether I can use it or not.
Now, before I get started on this rant, I’d like to make it clear that I know how a contract works. I’m obliged to pay for 12 months of service from each renewal, and Orange will provide a service in return. I’m quite aware that Orange doesn’t have to do anything to help me out here.
However, it seems a bit silly to demand payment for a broadband service to a non-existent phone line, whether you’re under contract or not. After all, it’s not as if they can threaten to cut off your service, and it’s not as if it costs them anything to close the account either. I expected Orange to offer some kind of reasonable compromise; perhaps a cancellation fee of, say £20, or maybe two months’ payment upfront. But no, apparently I have to pay the whole £166 for nine months of broadband service that I can’t even use in my new house.
I expressed my annoyance at Matt, who was probably holding up his ‘something rude off!’ sign throughout the phone call. It was one of those circular conversations where I explained that I couldn’t use the service, so why do I have to pay £166 for it, and he then explained that I was under contract and Orange wasn’t to know that I’d move house to somewhere without a BT line. It went on and on, until I just gave up.
What am I going to do now? I don’t know, but I do know that I’m going to try everything possible to avoid paying £166 for a broadband service that I can’t use. Is it reasonable for me to be extremely irked by this? Should broadband companies be more reasonable with these kinds of contracts? I’d be interested to know what everyone else thinks.
I’d be on to a legal chap about this.
Although, the only company I’ve had broadband with where e7even (which imploded) and tiscali. Tiscali just ask for £50. Then your out the contract. Costs allot but then your free.
Anyway, get on the phone to some legal people or trading standards. One of the two will freak them into action.
I think I’m right in saying that my broadband contract was for 12 months, but it just continued on a month by month basis after that. ie I only have to give one months notice to have my broad band turned off without being charged.
Also, it’s a bit stupid of BT to charge £125 to connect a house. How do they ever expect to attract new customers that way?
You should feel privelidged that you get a guy on the end of the phone telling you to “something rude off!” I am a developer and oddly enough one of the names mentioned above is customer of ours for which we have an ongoing contract with.
To have a discussion about their requirements for their own web site is a long winded matter.
Just to get in contact with them means forwarding an email to the persons PA advising that you will call then you have to wait to get a response back confirming it is ok for you to call.
When you do get round to making that call you get to listen to everything mozart ever wrote and because its down the phone its not even in stereo … law suit coming on their about a dmaged ear drum i’m sure !!!
Then you finally get through and realise that guy your actually talking to is just some manager of a department and actually he has 400 forms to fill in before you can talk to him but he will let you off just this once because he’s a nice guy en all.
But then he wants to put you through to the guy who knows about the problem so you have to stand by through everything beethoven ever wrote whilst he learns how to use a switchboard because he clearly has never seen the phone that lives next to his playstation controller on his desk.
if your lucky enough not to be cut off you can then ask your question but you have to be quick because this guy is important and really doesn’t have time to spend working on their unimportant web site that will help out those customer things he’s heard about.
So you ask your question and he spends the next hour asking other people whilst your hanging on the phone you hear all about the guys life for the last year which all things considered is pretty dull so no wonder he sounds like he’s been on something class A since birth.
Funnily enough though getting their attention was rather easy when i pulled their web site down due to “required maintenance” cheeky “something rude” can now begin going through everything i did me thinks so i stuck him on hold to listen to some music i’ve never heard whilst i “ask my colleague for the forms he needs to sign so i can allot some development time to his concerns”.
By now the guy is already throwing a fit and I aint even got through a single day of my life story yet.
So yeh … ISP’s and telecomms companies in general can all “something rude off !!!” and if they really wanna play games I dare them to try it with me because i have all he time in the world to play games whilst they fill in those forms 
Hope this helps you guys, it won’t solve your problems but at least the guys doing it to you are getting some back !!!!
If all else fails move the Orange payments to a credit card and claim them back every few months under the Consumer Credit Act. That’s what I’m doing with none other than…Virgin Media! The connection’s rock solid, but when it doesn’t want to give good service, any ISP can be as bad as Orange…
I used to work for Orange in their call centres.
Thing is, a contract is a contract, regardless of your situation. To quote a metaphor we used a lot, we are providing the water, its not our fault if your bucket is broken.
Oh and in reference to “Anyway, get on the phone to some legal people or trading standards. One of the two will freak them into action.”, bollocks will it.
Read the terms and conditions on the Orange website first, and then you’ll find that they are doing nothing against what they have set out in them. Plus, the people that work in Orange call centres do not work for Orange, they are outsourced, so at the end of the day, if Orange go down, they are just redeployed to another unit in the call centre, so you really expect them to care about legal threats?
It is a horrible situation, and one I wouldn’t like to be in, but one thing I’ve learned in life, never assume a thing.
Or just never go with Orange broadband, I cant wait till my contract is up with them……
As an update to this, I’m pleased to say that this issue has been resolved and Orange have now apologised and cancelled my contract without charging me £166.
There’s an important lesson here, though, which is to read the smallprint in your contract and listen to the spiel that the salesman tells you really quickly when you first take out your contract with Orange!