Really annoyed with NTL

j. corb

Hi - another newbie to the forum here...
As the subject says, I am really annoyed with NTL. A friend of mine who works in sound recording in Dublin told me last night that I have three new channels (really. That was news to me) - he has SKYdigital - anyways, my annoyance is to the following: a month and a half ago, a representative of NTL told me by phone that I was to be getting 5 new channels in 2 weeks time. They were to be among the following possibilites: ITV2, UK Gold or Living or both, one or two other documentary channels (which I see we got one of), another news channel of sorts (which I see we got), and (I must say I was really looking forward to this one) the satelite music channels like they have on SKY (all Jazz, all RnB, etc) which would be considered "one" additional channel. Well, 2 weeks went by, and nothing came of it. So I rang NTL - big surprise, no-one knew anything at all about any new channels which may be added - treated me like I was a leper over the phone. So this is my first point of annoyance: we were supposed to get 5 new channels, and we only got 3 (well, 2 really, as FTV is a load of unwatcheable tosh. Waste of space on the guide.)
My second point of annoyance with NTL is that their customer service (wow, this is such a BIG shock I'm sure to everyone) is non-existent. Since getting the digibox in January, I've always wondered if it's operating properly. It constantly does things like drop my favourites from the list, freezes the screen, blacks programmes in and out so that watching a programme is nearly torture as you miss half the dialouge, and my all time favourite: takes about half an eon to bring the guide up so I can program my favourites in advance. I can't even begin to count the times when I have only been able to see the current days guide of programmes or possibly the next day. Otherwise, 85% of the time, I can't get the guide to come up properly. I go to sleep at night counting "Gathering Datas" jumping over fences. It's pathetic. So, like any good consumer, I called NTL last week as I was fed up with all this cr*p. They made an appointment for a tech to come out to the house between 9am-1pm on Friday where they would most likely swap out the box. Surprise! No-one ever showed.
It really doesn't surprise me that the company as a whole is having troubles keeping it's head above water if this the way they conduct themselves around the world. In places where they are not nearly the only option, I'm sure people get fed up and move on. As for myself, I'm certainly fed up, but I just keep gobbling up their own unique brand of sh*te. What can I say, I'm a glutton for punishment.
Just thought I'd share my frustrations with ye.

mike65

I know exactly how you feel

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33277

Mike.

Originally posted by j. corb
Hi - another newbie to the forum here...
As the subject says, I am really annoyed with NTL. A friend of mine who works in sound recording in Dublin told me last night that I have three new channels (really. That was news to me) - he has SKYdigital - anyways, my annoyance is to the following: a month and a half ago, a representative of NTL told me by phone that I was to be getting 5 new channels in 2 weeks time. They were to be among the following possibilites: ITV2, UK Gold or Living or both, one or two other documentary channels (which I see we got one of), another news channel of sorts (which I see we got), and (I must say I was really looking forward to this one) the satelite music channels like they have on SKY (all Jazz, all RnB, etc) which would be considered "one" additional channel. Well, 2 weeks went by, and nothing came of it. So I rang NTL - big surprise, no-one knew anything at all about any new channels which may be added - treated me like I was a leper over the phone. So this is my first point of annoyance: we were supposed to get 5 new channels, and we only got 3 (well, 2 really, as FTV is a load of unwatcheable tosh. Waste of space on the guide.)
My second point of annoyance with NTL is that their customer service (wow, this is such a BIG shock I'm sure to everyone) is non-existent. Since getting the digibox in January, I've always wondered if it's operating properly. It constantly does things like drop my favourites from the list, freezes the screen, blacks programmes in and out so that watching a programme is nearly torture as you miss half the dialouge, and my all time favourite: takes about half an eon to bring the guide up so I can program my favourites in advance. I can't even begin to count the times when I have only been able to see the current days guide of programmes or possibly the next day. Otherwise, 85% of the time, I can't get the guide to come up properly. I go to sleep at night counting "Gathering Datas" jumping over fences. It's pathetic. So, like any good consumer, I called NTL last week as I was fed up with all this cr*p. They made an appointment for a tech to come out to the house between 9am-1pm on Friday where they would most likely swap out the box. Surprise! No-one ever showed.
It really doesn't surprise me that the company as a whole is having troubles keeping it's head above water if this the way they conduct themselves around the world. In places where they are not nearly the only option, I'm sure people get fed up and move on. As for myself, I'm certainly fed up, but I just keep gobbling up their own unique brand of sh*te. What can I say, I'm a glutton for punishment.
Just thought I'd share my frustrations with ye.

This is what happens when a company rushes through a digital platform without testing it properly, in order to comply with ODTR/BCI mandates-You should complain to Ethain doyle.
NTL obviously have decided to Rush things through,thinking that people will not complain.
Thats bad management chorus style:rolleyes:
Maybe they're talking to one another now and emmm... swapping ideas on how to collapse their service:rolleyes:
Music to Sky's ears anyhow and an own goal for NTL:(
mm

Jessica

oh j corb it sounds like you really are having problems with ntl at the moment.


firstly i would like to say one thing - never believe ntl sales. or in fact sales within any company, they will lead you up the garden path and you are still left in no mans land. If your sales agent told you that you were getting all these extra channels, my advice is go back and speak to them and ask them why the bloody hell he lied to you. it was the sales agents fault and not a fault of ntl as such other than employing the moron.


as for your ongoing problems with the digital service - i know cable guy would be your best bet on this one, but you got me so i hope in my own little way i will help.


Dropping the favourites - seems to be a problem with ntl digital box, but only if you are unplugging it everynight as far as i am aware, as you are resetting all your settings in the digital box. therefore losing all your favourites. as far as i know - well thats what happened me when i plugged the damn thing out.

gathering data on the epg and freezing and blanking out. Blanking out was a problem over last weekend - as i am reliably informed by an ntl representative during the week. so this really should not happen. I am assuming that you have unplugged the digital box and tried again, and checked all the connections at the back. If all this has been tried then i would agree with ntl the box needs to be changed out. or at the very least the signal needs to be looked at. Is it possible that you are in an area where there are old cables ? if then, well there is possibly nothing ntl can do for you only recommend sky.

cable guy would help you better than me on that one ?


as for ntl in trouble - we all know they are > but we would hate to see what would happen if they went - hands up who wants chorus as their provider.


my hand stays firmly down.

j. corb

Wow, I just read you NTL saga, and I feel blessed that they even installed the box on the day they said they would for me!
I didn't go with SKY because I wanted my irish channels + channel 4 and utv, now I'm starting to wonder why I ever made that decision. I know lots of people who use SKY, and I have to say, it seems like so much better of a service. Oh, and also, I like the fact that with NTL you still have all your analogue cable channels on a different video channle, so at least I can tape 1 of 13 channels while I watch something on digital. I think it's near impossible to wire up the vcr with SKY? I certainly don't know anyone who has, but maybe they're all just lazy gits It's a bit annoying that you would only be able to record what you're watching on SKY.
I'm just an annoying stickler!

p.s. like you, I was also hoping to get the cheaper cable modem service from NTL fairly soon, but my friend who works in the sound recording industry (and seems to have his finger on the pulse on all of this) says that in Dublin anyways, that is totally dead in the water - which also annoys me considerabley. I use the net alot and was hoping for much quicker and cheaper access.
Again, a few months ago when I made the appointment to get the digital installed, the person from NTL told me that they would have the internet (wondering if they meant the same cable modem service as I did?) services up and running by Sept. of this year. I'm not holding my breath.

j. corb

Actually, when do the problems with NTL ever stop? I don't think they do.

As for believing NTL sales staff, well, it sounded good. Probably too good.

Dropping the favourites: don't unplug the box at night. Sometimes don't even switch it off.

Picture freezing on and off: Easter weekend was the worst I had seen it, so your explanation makes sense. It hasn't happened too much since then. I'm still annoyed though - I don't un-annoy that easily!

We live in a brand new area with all new cabling.

As for if NTL went under and we lost service, well, I would miss certain programmes, but I would certainly have more time to do other things. I have a love-hate relationship with television.

Thanks for your comments though!

David C

First it was 1998, then 1999... 2001... here we are 2002, not a sign of Cable Internet... Every time I ring they seem to add on 6 months to its launch date in my area...

No sign of ntl digital either here... brutal line up anyway, no UK Gold, Play etc. It's a shame debt ridden ntl bought Cablelink and not a fresh new company. ntl are useless!

j. corb

Hi, Thanks for responding

The area we live in is Mountainview in West Tallaght (quite near Saggart.)
I had a feeling we had a faulty box, now if I could just get those feckers out here to change it!

The blanking of programmes hasn't happened since Easter weekend funnily enough. That was the worst I'd ever seen it.

It's been holding it's favourites for the past few days as well. Usually it only drops some of them, not the whole list.

I haven't tried the guide to get the whole week to show up lately - well, should I say, since Sunday. On Sunday morning I was able to program my favourites up until the following Saturday. I couldn't get the following Sunday to come up - got tired of waiting, and just shut it off.
So, I haven't actually had too many troubles with that the past few days either (that I know of).

Interesting enough, (and completely off topic I may add) a month and a half ago, I flicked the tv on during the day about mid-week, and a bunch of my channels had previews for the Hallmark Channel! This went on for at least 30 minutes, and I was quite delighted as I thought they were instituting the new channels the rep had told me about, and that the Hallmark Channel was one of them! It didn't last long though as everything went back to "normal" afterwards. I just thought that was really weird! The Hallmark preview was on about 7 or 8 channels. Some just had the static screen with the Hallmark logo saying that "Service will return as normal shortly" etc.

Of course the people at NTL when I called them about it thought I was a space alien. Who knows... maybe I am

suppafly

wow thats sounds exactly like chorus. The people that I stay in digs with have chorus and it does all the same crap that you are saying about NTL. Takes forever for the guide to come up(and sometimes it doesn't come up at all) and cuz all fuzzy and leaves out bits of dialogue. Its ****e and for the sound of it NTL sounds like its sh**e to!! Maybe you should just get Sky Digital. haven't had any problems with it yet. Its a really good service IMO!

David C

J. Corb.. the problems you talked about with getting Hallmark sound very like what happened on the day Sky Digital hq in the UK had a power failure and lost/mixed up channels all over the place one afternoon in February for a couple of hours:

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/displayarticle.php?id=6403

http://forum.digitalspy.co.uk/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18776
"Hallmark is now broadcasting on Q,Magic is on the Box,Kiss has gone god knows where but its not on 450,Sky News is now broadcasting on Kiss!!!Whats up???"

It was probably nothing to do with ntl...

colm L

NTL has a policy where if they send someone out, it automatically becomes declared as "Called but there was no answer".
You have to ring them up shortly after the time the engineer was supossed to be there at and be a d*ck to whoever answers, get their name, then they say they'll tell the engineer to call out to you next.
Then the engineer tells you that he never called out and that the no answer was put on the form the day the call was logged.
But NTLs engineers aren't NTL, they're mostly contracters methinks.

medja

I know this is a while ago but I used to work for a company that answered the phones for cablelink. (we were to let on that we were there but in fact we were 3 miles up the road and never had set foot on Cablelink property)

We took bookings for various products, mostly SKY Sports and an engineer would have to go out with a box. 2 or 3 engineers who would be behind on appointments would drop a card in the doors of houses that they were supposed to visit saying they had called, would then ring the bell and run as fast as they could from the house. If you were Carl Lewis you could'nt have reached the door in time,

thus when a customer rang up to complain to us, the answer from headquaters was "someone did call and waited but no one answered the door." they were then put on a list of stand-by installs in other words the bin.

Not too much may have chaged.