No telewest phone services for two months

[johncoogan]

My landline service ( phone ) went out of service in the first week of November, now two days after Christmas it still isn't repaired. Despite numerous calls to TeleWest, and various visits from engineers, nothing has been done. Engineers visit, say they can't fix it as they need to dig up the road. The final call I made to them just before Christmas informed me of the fact that they have had to apply for permission to dig up the road from the local council. The call centre manager who I insisted on speaking to made many apologies, but like the agent I spoke to initially, was in India and I had tremendous problems making myself understood. I have spent upwards of £10 each week on my and my wife's mobile ( £10 per mobile ) just so that I can have a phone service. As of today, 27th December, I still haven't been given a date for when my phone is going to be fixed. I'm going to take my custom elsewhere but need to have a BT line installed before I do that. Can anyone advise me, am I entitled to sue TeleWest for the loss of my service, or what is my legal position, if anyone been in a similar position? Thanks,

[Nikesh]

Sorry to hear about your problem with Telewest. I don't know what legal position you're in but I would remove your email address from your post so spammers don't attack you.

[Paul K]

Doubt if you can sue them as they are probably waiting on your local council giving them permission to dig up the cable to repair it. I've seen the same while working at BT so it's not just a NTL problem. All you can do is push TW for compensation but you will then only be offered the number of days that you are without your line multiplied by the daily line rental charge which is the same as BT.

[johncoogan]

Cheers guys, feel as if I've been banging my head off a brick wall for the last 2 months, think I'll go to Sky which is much cheaper anyway, Happy New Year

[Paul K]

Do you have a BT line installed already? If not then the cost of install went up this year to around £100 :(

[johncoogan]

Do you have a BT line installed already? If not then the cost of install went up this year to around £100 :(
There was a BT line installed, but the assh**e who lived in my property previously disconnected it, as he was a TeleWest engineer, and set it up as he wanted it ( the house is only 3 years old ). Where I live is a new build housing development at the bottom of a dip, literally everyone else in the development has Sky, we're the only ones with TeleWest.. that's probably why they're so slow to fix it, how economically viable is it for them to fix it? The BT line is still there though, though I think it would be chargeable to get it reconnected.