HomeChoice www.homechoice.co.uk
Customer Service
Reliability
Speed Consistency
HomeChoice www.homechoice.co.uk
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User Reviews
Reliability
Customer Service
Speed Consistency
Value For Money
Used To Be Good, But Now, Well We Have Been Receiv
Used to be good, but now, well we have been receiving no service for the last 2 months apparently their are no boxes available? Do not recommend HomeChoice Broadband.
Reliability
Customer Service
Speed Consistency
Value For Money
Don't Understand Other Negative Comments. I Have U
Don't understand other negative comments. I have used HomeChoice since it began over 5 years ago and it is excellent - very occasionally it goes down for a few hours but otherwise fast and reliable and excellent technical help.
Reliability
Customer Service
Speed Consistency
Value For Money
Reliable Service, I Would Say My Internet Was Down
Reliable service, I would say my internet was down once a year. Had issues with email accounts on the Homechoice domain, rang customer service, logged a fault call but 6 months later still awaiting a response, lol. Just deleted those accounts and started new ones. UK based call centres.....which helps.
Reliability
Customer Service
Speed Consistency
Value For Money
The Internet Has Gotten A Bit Better Since Tiscali
The internet has gotten a bit better since Tiscali has taken over, it used to just randomly stop working for no reason and I'd have to wait hours or days and it would suddenly turn back on again.
The Great News Is That My 1 Year Of Hell With Home
The great news is that my 1 year of hell with Homechoice/Tiscali is almost up and I am looking at BETTER service providers for broadband.
Currently I cannot use the service, as they do not support Windows Vista. This was brought to my attention by their technical department. What they advised me? - I should go and buy Windows XP - I can't believe it! I must downgrade my Operating system! Why must I pay my subscription for the interim until my contract is up for a service they can not provide? This is grossly unfair.
I have had about 10 problems with the service in a year; not to mention an incident where I took the advise of a fellow member of their staff, only to find later that they refuted everything, despite it being recorded on their system.
HomeChoice offer the worst broadband service!
Had A Homechoice Service For About 6 Months And Th
Had a Homechoice service for about 6 months and then moved house. Several weeks before moving I called Homechoice to ask what should I do if I'll be moving home. They told me, then I'll know my new BT number, call them again. So..., I moved home (19 of February in 2007), called BT so that they would transfer my line to a new address and guess what? I have called them on Saturday evening, and Monday at 9am I've got a text, that my line is already working. Now that's what I call a good customer care. So with my line trasfered I called to Homechoice, told them my new address and asked to transfer my service (phone number remained the same). Some girl told me, that an engineer will call me in 24 to 48 hours to confirm his visit. Next morning, just to make sure that everything is fine called them again. And guess what? I had to tell them my new address again, because they still had an old one. How is that posible, huh? To make things worse, the new girl told me that engineer will call me in 7 to 10 days time. From 24 to 48 hours it became 7 to 10 days. All they could say about this is only SORRY.
Day 9
Not to mention about all the other calls trying to find out, why does it take so long to transfer my service, I have found out nothing. They just kept assuring me, that someone will call me in that given period of time.
Day 10
As you can guess, noone has called me yet. So I was calling them again and they told me, SORRY, someone will call me in 24 to 8 hours.
Day 12
Period of 7 to 10 days has finished 2 days ago. The next period from 24 to 48 hours was going to end, but I was still waiting for their call. So I decided to call them by myself. Lots of SORRY again. They told me, that Engineer will come to me on the 7th of March. So thats 17 days of waiting. And no one could explain to me why it takes so long.
Day 15
I called them again (I was calling them every day), and to my biggest suprise, they told me, that engineer will come on the 13th of March (22 days of waiting). Where has the 7th of March gone? They dont know it, me neither.
Day 16
Im still waiting, there's no point of calling them again, cause all they can say is SORRY. But how that sorry will help me to watch TV? How that sorry will help me to read my Emails? How that SORRY will help me to browse pages I like? Providing the service would help, but SORRY doesn't.
During all these days I don't count how many times they assured me that their manager will call me back in 24 to 48 hours to explain me the situation.
The worst thing is I give about 90% chance, then I will call them on 12th of March, my engineer visit will be postponed to etc 20th of March. The only hope I have is that 20th of March will be during year 2007, not 2008...
My advice: keep away from this company (Homechoice - TISCALI) as far as you can. They are cheap, but my experience of the service is very poor. So it's better to pay bigger money and get service, than pay small amount of money for no service at all.
Keep away from them and tell your friends to do so.
P.S. I have read the agreement, and it states (8.3a), that I can cancel my contract, if they do not provide me a service and do not restore it in a reasonable timescale. So I'll call them to find out how do they understand that reasonable timescale.
As I said, I called them to ask about that reasonable timescale and they said they don't know what does it mean :)
After 22 Days of waiting they finally came... Everything is working now, but... They said me, that I have to sign up a new contract for 12 months because of my new address. How come that? I asked to show me, which term or condition states this fact on the terms and conditions of previous contract I have signed and they said that they don't know those terms and conditions... They only know, that if I want their service I have to sign up a new contract for 12 months. I refused to do so obviously and they told me, that this means I am canceling the contract and have to pay for the rest of 12 months periods of previous contract... I said no, I'm not canceling the contract, you are... I already have a contract, but you don't provide me a service for it as our contract states and offering me a new one. But as on my terms and conditions do not state the fact, that I have to do so, so I'm not doing it, I'm not signing a new one.
And one more thing to mention... they have reduced my packed without my knowledge, I just noticed, that my bandwidth is a bit slower than 4 megs... A bit means only 1.5 megs. So I called them again, and they said that they don't know why my package has been reduced...
So i still have their service without any contract at all at the time (as they say the old contract is over already), I haven't signed a new one, because I don't need another one, I still have my old one, so they can disconnect me at any time and god knows what will be next. All their customer care team could say to me, is to ask about that new contract by writing to a head office. SO WHY DO THEY NEED A CUSTOMER CARE, IF THEY CAN"T HELP PEOPLE?
What To Expect From Homechoice: 1. Orde
What to expect from HomeChoice:
1. Ordered HomeChoice and made an appointment for the installation, in two weeks time.
2. Shortly before the appointment I received an email telling me there was a "cabling problem" and that HomeChoice couldn't provide me any service.
3. Tried to get connect with another provider but couldn't because of an "incompatible service" (HomeChoice of course) connected to my BT line.
4. Spent two weeks trying to get HomeChoice to disconnect their service from my line so I could use another provider.
5. I was eventually told that the "cabling problem" was a mistake and they could provide me service after all.
6. After more than a month of hassle and just wanting internet at home, I took the path of least resistance and let HomeChoice install the service.
7. After waiting two more weeks for the engineer I was finally connected.
8. The internet connection was OK, but seemed slow at times.
9. The system often needed to be rebooted before working.
10. TV was TV, but changing channels was agonizing slow, and often involved clicking through several screens of "up-grade your service NOW" ads from HomeChoice.
11. After a couple of months I was unexpectedly forced to move (landlord wanted to move back into the flat). HomeChoice said they could provide service at the new number and address.
12. Waited two weeks for the engineer to install the service at the new address.
13. He didn't show.
14. Rescheduled the installation and waited two more weeks.
15. Engineer finally shows. He dawdles around for an hour before finally concluding that the signal isn't strong enough and says he won't install the service.
16. Two weeks later I receive a £150 bill for an "early cancellation fee".
17. Called their "customer care team" and was referred to a sleazy little provision in the contract that says if you move and HomeChoice cannot, FOR WHATEVER REASON, connect the service then you will be assessed an early cancellation fee equal to subscription for the remainder of the fixed term.
18. I've now paid HomeChoice more than £200 for only 2 1/2 months of actual service, and more than three months with no service while waiting for connections, disconnections, engineer visits etc. (btw, my current provider got my service connected and working in 7 days!)
19. Bottom line: if you want to pay high end prices for low end service, and don't mind sending your money to a company that seems to be more interested in making profits from grift than by providing customer with a quality product, then HomeChoice is the ISP for you.
Value For Money
By Far Homechoice Are The Worst Provider Out In Th
By far Homechoice are the worst provider out in the market.....
I may be the "odd" unhappy customer...but it still doesn't excuse the mistakes and sloppy service rendered to me.
Now fighting with about the penalty clause of 700£ if I close my account!
NO SERVICE FOR A WEEK.....and I have to pay them a penalty charge!
What is the world coming too?
Just a follow-up on my initial problems with homechoice..
When I logged this review it was about 2 weeks without service. That carried on for 39 days!!!! After 3 homechoice engineers and a BT engineer visiting my home ..the problem was still not resolved!!! My account @ homechoice was closed yesterday and I will be forced to go back to BT again.
The whole experience has left me with a bad taste and all i can say about homechoice is....
They did themselves no favours with their "comic, depressing" support service....
BOTH Thumbs down for support and overall experience...
Totally agree. Homechoice have let me down badly. I had Homechoice TV and brroadband for 18 months, with a few niggles initially but no major ones after that, then I went away for two weeks and came back to find my set top box flashing. It seems my ADSL line had disappeared into thin air and they can't do anything about it. They say only BT can sort the problem and BT say they won't do anything as long as there's a phone line. So I have had to disconnect from Homechoice, which takes 5 days, and you have to be disconnected before you can even apply for another ISP. Apparently, Homechoice don't give migration/MAC codes because they install equipment at the exchange which has to be removed by BT and, guess what, that timetable is managed by BT. Then of course, once you're disconnected, it takes another two weeks to get set up with a new ISP (BT in my case because with any other ISP I'll be in the same powerless position). So I'll be without broadband for a month at least and there's no guarantee I'll get it back. My business depends on it but there's absolutely nothing I can do apart from de-camp to the internet cafe. It's unbelievable that Homechoice were happy to let a loyal customer go so easily. It's also crazy that the whole broadband market relies so heavily on BT, who can manipulate the market anyway they want. No wonder so many people are going back to BT. They have no real alternative. OFTEL should do something about it, and do it soon.
I Would Not Recommend Homechoice Broadband For The
I would not recommend Homechoice broadband for the above reasons.
They are easily the worst corporation I've dealt with in UK completely incompetent. Their service is appauling, so bad that I asked to be disconnected, 9 months later I received a bill of nearly £600 suggesting my account was kept active even though past bills showed reversed charges since the service was decommisioned. Please do yourself a favour and avoid at all costs there're are much better providers elsewhere
Oh Where To Start... Nothing Has Gone Right Since
Oh where to start... Nothing has gone right since we signed up to Homechoice broadband! The guy who installed it obviously didn't know what he was doing, so even before we were connected we were on the phone to their 0845 "help line"... rather, disaster line, if you ask me. They are seriously understaffed, and when you finally get through you can get someone helpful on the line, but if your problem is more complicated than "check if your modem is on madam", you are often in for a bumpy and stressful ride.
We were promised call backs from second line engineers on an almost daily basis, but we never heard from them. We have started to wonder if these people exist, or if they are just an urban myth!
In the end they completely wrecked our computer with their "advise", only to claim then that them "repairing XP wasn't their expertise". Giving us a heart attack certainly was, and we have now terminated our contract with them.
Homechoice's customer service is absolutely appalling, so save yourself a lot of heartache.
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