Broadband and phone line help

[Barry Scott]

I'm having a cunt of a time lately with my landline and broadband and need some advice.

My broadband is up and down like fuck. It drops several times a day and often i have shit as fuck speeds, like sometimes as low as 500kbps and not very often above 1mb. If i plug my phone in, it gets worse, so have to remain completely phoneless. I have tried numerous microfilters and several routers. Nothing changes.

My main issue now is that TalkTalk have spent a lot of time trying to help, but have now said i need an engineer. They have gone on to say that if it's the internal wiring in my property i get charged a minimum of £120. If it's tested and found faultless, the same applies. The only way i don't get charged is if the problem is beyond the boundaries of my property.

Now, if o2 fuck up the mobile network i don't pay to repair it, so why do i if it's a phone line? I wonder whether it's a TalkTalk thing because they have to get BT in to fix it, as from what i understand BT OWN all wiring and even the boxes in my house. It's in fact against the law for anyone who's not a BT engineer to touch them aparently. Well if that's the case, why do i pay? They fucking own it?

If i move providers will it change anything? I imagine it wouldn't. Or perhaps moving to the ripoff that is BT would solve it? It seems logical that any provider is going to be using everything the same, therefore nothing changes. Is this right?

So, can i tell them to fuck off if they charge me? Should i move providers? Should i make do and not risk the charges?

I want to smash something because i'm properly frustrated.

[Simon Pieman]

I thought if it was your own equipment fault you have to pay, but this means the router etc.

I've had connection issues in 2 houses and both times the fault was on the outside and one was an old house. BT are the ones who impose the charge, so Talk Talk will recharge it to you.

Just make sure you've tried the master socket first.

[Simon Pieman]

Forgot to say, I never paid as it was outside issues.

[Samdy Gray]

I had similar problems a few years ago. Using the phone would cause the ADSL to disconnect. I tried everything. New router, new filters, changed the internal wiring. Mine turned out to be a problem in one of the junction boxes down the street.

The £120 charge is standard BT charge for any fault caused by your own wiring that they fix. BT's liability ends at the master socket. Anything after that is yours, everything before it (including the master socket itself) is BT's property.

As for troubleshooting, have you tried the quiet line test? Make sure your phone is plugged into the master socket (or preferably the test socket if you have a NT5 faceplate). Dial 17070 and select option 2. Should be completely silent. If there's any kind of hiss/crackle/pops/buzz/anything then it's more than likely there's a fault on the line.

This site is useful: http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/connectionprobs.htm

[flammableBen]

It think that the £120 charge if there's nothing wrong is pretty much the same wherever you go, although might be different on BT themselves.

We're with tesco (both internet and phones) and when our phone line went down at the weekend they said exactly the same thing. I'd already tried two different phones in the test socket so figured we were pretty safe. Our phones actually ended up fixing themselves by monday, I guess it was something to do with the bad weather and it had been fixed through another complaint, they didn't mind us cancelling the engineer.

I really do need to change my internet from Tesco though, I think it's still the same 512kbp shit that I set my mum up with when I was at uni. I'm not really much of a speed freak, pretty patient with downloads and stuff, but it would be nice to be able to reliably stream iPlayer and 4OD.

Sorry I would have posted that straight away but the TEF Spazzed. Sort it out barry.

[sonicyouth]

i had problems with o2, massive latency and slow speeds during peak times. they insisted i need to get an engineer to investigate the line.

i changed ISP and have had no problems since.

[Barry Scott]

Thanks everyone, that clarifies everything. I did manage a small amount of research and discovered what you lot said about the charges thing. I think i may just find an Open Reach engineer on the street and offer him £50 to check it out.

@Sam, the master socket thing has always been an issue for me because i can't tell where the line comes in and all my sockets are identical. (He says about to contradict himself.) I did achieve a slightly higher connection speed on one and it has a strange coaxial looking plate below it, so will try the silent test on that. I presume i need my router disconnected when i try that?

The Tef spazzed out Ben because i'm now hosting it from my laptop, so you can blame TalkTalk.

[Simon Pieman]

http://www.wppltd.demon.co.uk/WPP/Wiring/UK_telephone/uk_telephone.html

[Barry Scott]

http://www.wppltd.demon.co.uk/WPP/Wiring/UK_telephone/uk_telephone.html

I'm such a fucking spanner. I remember looking at a picture like that a while back (with the capacitor thing on the inside) but remembered it looking like an NT5 socket thing, so somehow completely overlooked the actual master socket. Obviously i do have one and it was/is the one i'm using.

[Batch]

And you've tried removing the front plate and sticking the router straight into the socket behind it (if there is one)?

Also what is call quality like on phone calls. Crackly or normal/good (may not be indicative of fault ))

--

Generally if the master NT5 socket behind the faceplate still gives poor results it is likely to be a BT problem as their line terminates here. But it can be a bit of a  grey area when a third party gets involved (like talk talk) as to what is chargeable these days.

That said BT openreach fixed my fault and replaced my very old master socket FOC, as they should.

[Samdy Gray]

That said BT openreach fixed my fault and replaced my very old master socket FOC, as they should.

Same with me. I didn't have an NT5 faceplate and they installed a new one FOC. I wonder if they'd give you one of the new filtered NT5 faceplates now?

[Barry Scott]

And you've tried removing the front plate and sticking the router straight into the socket behind it (if there is one)?

Also what is call quality like on phone calls. Crackly or normal/good (may not be indicative of fault ))

--

Generally if the master NT5 socket behind the faceplate still gives poor results it is likely to be a BT problem as their line terminates here. But it can be a bit of a  grey area when a third party gets involved (like talk talk) as to what is chargeable these days.

That said BT openreach fixed my fault and replaced my very old master socket FOC, as they should.

I don't have an NT5, just somehow presumed that's what a master socket looked like, as i completely forgot about the capacitor thing.  So no, no other socket in the thing.

I haven't plugged my phone in for months because it either kills the connection or ruins it to less than 100kbps. I remember the quality being crackly at best and full of quiet white noise at worst.

I'm gonna disconnect the router and try the silent test Sam says and see how it goes.

[Barry Scott]

the quiet line test thing doesn't work anymore. It gets answered and all it says is, "This circuit is designed as 01793xxxxxx" twice and then hangs up. There is no options or anything.

[Batch]

Same with me. I didn't have an NT5 faceplate and they installed a new one FOC. I wonder if they'd give you one of the new filtered NT5 faceplates now?

yup

[Barry Scott]

Strange one. I had to unplug my router to make a phone call, so did and when i reconnected my router it jumped to 3503kbps, when it was only 700kbps before. I wonder if an engineer has been in that moment? Although saying that it's done that once before so i expect <1000kbps within the next couple of hours.