The previous occupier (a BT customer) of a property I recently took over, had, on leaving the property had his BT line disconnected.  I decided to use Talk Talk as the new line provider. Talk Talk provides Internet + Line rental + Free UK and 36 international destination, all for £20.50 per month.  Talk Talk would not provide this service unless I had an active line, this could only be done by BT. Only when active, would Talk Talk take over the line.

BT would only make the line active on the condition that 1 years line rental was the minimum charge.  

I contacted BT to reactivate the line. Two days later I contacted Talk Talk to take over the line. BT’s bill was £143.26 - not bad for two days service.

kk wrote on Aug 3^rd, 2007 at 9:27am:

Talk Talk could not provide this service unless I had an active line, this could only be done by BT. Only when active, could Talk Talk take over the line.

One word wrong there - replace could with would in each case highlighted.  It'd be slightly more accurate too if you replaced BT at the end of the first sentence with Openreach (but that's by the by).

Talk Talk's 'procedure' is to pretend they cannot activate a line.  They can (see HERE) - any LLU or WLR provider can - but , like BT and all the others, they'd have to pay Openreach to do so.  It's easier and far cheaper for Talk Talk to insist on the potential subscriber having an active BT line. That way, BT becomes the bad guy if the subscriber has to breach their contract and/or incurs costs in order to switch to Talk Talk (your example is not untypical) and Talk Talk remain the good guys.  It's quite clever really.

Personally, I think you got off lightly.  BT say they charge £124.99 for activating a line plus the remaining months rental or £70 (whichever is least) in addition.

In reality, of course, Ofcom is to blame.  In the interests of the free market (so that the 'engineering' side of BT did not continue to provide a better service to BT that it did to other 'providers'), BT had to set up Openreach and, now, all line provides/reconnects have to go through Openreach.  Even BT Retail has to pay Openreach the Ofcom-specified fees.

I hope you enjoy a better service from Talk Talk then these recent posters.

See: http://www.broadband-guide.org.uk/providers/talk-talk-broadband.html

TalkTalk has its ups and downs. When it works, it is great - when it doesn't work, you just want to slam your head against a brick wall several times. Customer service is a laugh - "we'll ring you back ... the week after the apocalypse :)". Their traffic shaping means that anything remotely peer-to-peer is blocked (except for between 12 midnight and around 7am - apparently that is "evening" to TalkTalk).

Atleast the geographic numbers on here work which shaves a few pence off the phone bill (plus it means I can ring them on my mobile, which seems to be the only way I can hear anything they are saying!!)

So far Talk Talk has been fine.  It took BT about 45 minutes to answer the phone, it takes Talk Talk about 5 minutes, depending on the time of day. Once they answered immediately.

LOL! You sure we are talking about the same TalkTalk? ::)

kk wrote on Aug 5^th, 2007 at 8:34am:

So far Talk Talk has been fine.  It took BT about 45 minutes to answer the phone, it takes Talk Talk about 5 minutes, depending on the time of day. Once they answered immediately.

But would you have had to pay this reconnection charge if you had remained  as a BT customer for the one year minimum?

If not surely it would have been cheaper for you to stay with BT and take your broadband from a company that provides a decent broadband service via BT Wholesale such as www.newnet.co.uk, www.idnet.co.uk or www.adsl24.co.uk

The fact that Ofcom does not force WLR providers to also offer fresh connection makes the whole WLR concept a complete farce and leaves BT as the default phone line installing incumbent monopoly.

Much though I hate BT I hate TalkTalk very considerably more.   A case out of the frying pan and in to the fire on this one kk I fear.  Or the old business of cutting one's nose to spite one's face also rather springs to mind......................