Apparently, getting fault fixed within the agreed time is only for "critical" customers.

We have issues with people in BT understanding the basic agreement that BT plc have made from time to time. One of the key areas is that BT have agreed to fix faults within 40 clock hours. There is, of course, compensation (peanuts) agreed for when they fail, but for their contract not to be a total sham and fraud, they have to at least try and do what they have agreed.

So, a fault report today, has a contractually agreed service level guarantee of 40 clock hours from reporting, though engineers are only appointed on working days, which limits them to somewhat less than 40 hours when we get near weekends and bank holidays.

Offering a first available engineer visit of 5th Jan is quite clearly way outside the 40 clock hours target by a huge margin. It looks like 200 clock hours before they start looking at fixing this fault. So, as per the agreed process, we are escalating the issue within BT.

What is odd is that I have got the response from BT:-

"Having said that if the customer is so critical I advised you to contact your CRM and who will in turn contact the DSO to get the issue resolved."

So, it seems that expecting BT to meet is :-

1. Only for "critical customers"
2. Something that has to be raised to director level in BT to get actioned.

You would think that it is somewhat inefficient to involve people at that level for a simple customer fault. Obviously all customers are, in a way, critical to us, and some even pay extra for 20 or 7 hour fix targets in BT. This customer is not critical enough that they pay for this extra fast repair target, so they only expect the normal 40 hour target. Seems BT do not care about what they contractually agreed.

What can I say. I think we may have to go ahead with the plan to get all staff a 5p share so that we can all go to their AGM and ask if this is considered acceptable by BT's director.