(thanks for that word Lyle)
A quick bit of background: We are with Telewest who also supply my our broadband connection and cable TV package. We’ve been with them since we moved in here, about 2 and a half years ago. I’ve paid every bill by direct debit.
So, Friday afternoon I realise our phone line is dead. I phone customer support and they arrange an engineer for Monday (today) between 11a.m. and 2p.m.
Doorbell goes at 1.02p.m. I’m not surprised by this having had Telewest engineers out 3 times since moving here and they’ve always appeared on time.
Come on in, I say. The engineer says that there isn’t any need as he’s been trying to fix my problem for the last two hours but hasn’t been able to get anywhere.
Confused I ask him what he’s talking about. He explains.
Basically, seemingly (ridiculously) Telewest have ‘lost’ the fact that I have a phone account with them. So they disabled the service. This is despite the fact that on Thursday last week, the monthly bill came through, and I checked it to see how many international calls we’ve made (to Spain to Louise’s Mum and Dad) to see if the International calling package I’d had added to our account the previous month was saving us money (which it is).
GRRRRRR – surely there is some step in their procedure that states: if the person has been paying for a phone line, and has made calls USING the phone line then they are entitled to have the phone line. I mean it’s not like I was trying to cheat them but using a phone service I hadn’t paid for…
So they are going to phone me (!) to clarify the issue. I’m not sure if they will contact me on my mobile (which should be fun as the reception in the house is lousy) or if they will re-enable the phone line to do so, either way the matter of three days of lost service will be discussed!