No internet, flashing PON light

[Clem-Fandango]

I’ve had no problems with my connection for about 10 months. The connection dropped this morning with a red light on my eero router. PON light was flashing. I powered both off for a good few minutes before powering them back on. Still nothing. 

I spoke at length to webchat. After trying a different cable and powering down, the chap said that they’d send a new router. I explained that I was not convinced that the router was the problem because a flashing PON is often an authentication failure. He explained that the diagnostics were certain of the problem, and he assured me that a new router would solve the issue.

I work from home, so 3 days without a connection is a nightmare for me.
I have an identical eero as an extender, so I factory reset that and went through the eero app to replace the old gateway with this “new” eero. Going through the process was fine until it tried to connect to the internet – same problem as the other one. While it’s possible that both routers failed with the same error on the same day, it’s unlikely. This suggests that it’s not the router at fault, but occurs somewhere between the ONT and the network, with authentication being a likely candidate. 

Some googling suggests a serial number mismatch, which would be weird given the 10 months of normal service. Any tips on getting support to double check the serial number authentication with OpenReach?

[Chris-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

I'm glad to hear that the issue has been resolved but really sorry about how long it has taken. If you do experience any further problems just let us know

Chris

[Clem-Fandango]

Hi Chris

I eventually resorted to persisting on the phone and talked to someone in the call centre. She was  able to book an appointment for this morning on my behalf.

Needless to say, no engineer turned up this morning and I have received no communications from either OpenReach or TalkTalk. 

There is some good news, however. It seems that my Internet connection was restored at around 3AM this morning. 

I will be making a complaint about the length of time this has taken, and the complete lack of urgency and poor communication that I’ve received. I’m sure it won’t make a blind bit of difference. 

While I’m very grateful for the replies by you, your colleagues and the community here, this whole ordeal has been exhausting, frustrating and expensive for me. I am a very dissatisfied customer. 

James

[Chris-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

Have you still been unable to book the engineer?

Chris

[Clem-Fandango]

I feel like I’m losing my mind. I started with Web Chat looking for an update on the Openreach fix. 

After about an hour of getting nowhere, I received an SMS letting me know I need to book an at home appointment. Clicked the link, got an error message. Then got a message asking me to contact a bot via WhatsApp. An operator then sent me a phone number to call. 

Phoned the number, but was told wait times were very busy and was encouraged to press 1 for a link, which sends me back to webchat. 

I feel like I’m being gaslighted. 

if your website won’t let me book an appointment, and your overseas call centre can’t book them, what am I to do? I’ve been without an internet connection for 8 days. I’ve need this sorted. I need TalkTalk to take this seriously. Please can someone contact me immediately?

 Thanks 

James   

[Michelle-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

No problem. Hopefully it won't take too long for Openreach to resolve.

Thanks

Michelle

[Clem-Fandango]

Hi @Michelle-TalkTalk, I have just received a call from the service team. It’s being escalated to OpenReach, so hopefully will be resolved soon. 

Thank you very much for your persistence with this, I really appreciate it. 

James

[Michelle-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

I've contacted them now.

Michelle

[Clem-Fandango]

Hi @Michelle-TalkTalk no contact yet. 

James 

[Michelle-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

If you don't hear by 10am then let me know please.

Michelle

[Clem-Fandango]

Thank you, @Michelle-TalkTalk, this is great news. I look forward to hearing from them. 

thanks again,

James

[Michelle-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

I've contacted the manager of the team and he advised me that he has escalated this and asked that this is picked up ASAP so you should hear from the team this morning.

Thanks

Michelle

[Clem-Fandango]

Thanks @ferguson, I hope so, too. 

I’m concerned that nothing can be done over the weekend, so I really need this to be resolved today.

 @Michelle-TalkTalk , is there someone more senior this can be escalated to? It doesn’t appear that the Fault Escalation Team are doing anything about this?

 Thank you

 James

[ferguson]

Sorry to see this still ongoing, the support team here I am sure will pick this up again as soon as they are back online tomorrow. 

[Clem-Fandango]

4 days without an internet connection. Hours wasted in support chat only be told the support systems are down. Nobody has contacted me and absolutely no sign when this problem will be fixed, or if anyone is actually doing anything about it.

Is this typical for Talk Talk customer service? This is one of the worst customer experiences I’ve ever had (and I was a BT customer for years before this). 

I’m very grateful to the Talk Talk staff and community members who’ve replied to me here and given me some hope, but it needs to be backed up by actions. 

I am politely requesting that someone with the ability to actually solve this problem contact me immediately. I don’t think I’m being unreasonable here. 

Thank you,

James

[Clem-Fandango]

Hello again. Still no contact and I really need this to be sorted. The PON light is still flashing even without the router plugged in, so it’s definitely a connection or auth problem. Please could this be escalated further and expedited? 

thanks

James 

[Clem-Fandango]

Thanks Michelle, I really appreciate it. 

[Michelle-TalkTalk]

Morning,

I'm really sorry. I've chased the team now and have asked them to provide an update ASAP. I'll post back here as soon as they reply.

Thanks

Michelle

[Clem-Fandango]

Hi @Chris-TalkTalk. Nobody has been in contact and the issue persists. I’ve just power cycled the router and ONT and it’s the same as it’s been since Monday. 

I suspect the automated text message was in relation to a new router being dispatched. I’m fairly certain this won’t solve the problem, so I guess I’ll have to start from scratch tomorrow?

This is really disappointing. 

[Clem-Fandango]

Hi @Chris-TalkTalk. No, although I did receive a text saying “Good news! We’ve applied a solution”. 

I can’t verify this as I’m not at home (although I can’t reach the router via the eero app like I usually can). I’ll reboot the router when I get home later. 

James. 

[Chris-TalkTalk]

Hi James,

Just checking in with you, has anyone been in contact yet?

Chris