Eircom telephone installation - am i being ripped off?

kiazoe

Hi, think this is in the right place.

I recently moved to dublin and am renting an appartment. I saw that there were 2 telephone lines (just the boxes on the wall) and the landlord had mentioned that the telephone had just been disconnected from the previous tenant, he said all i would have to do is phone up and get it reconnected and name changed over.

So i contacted Eircom and they said they would enable the line and so on however it didn't work and they said there must have been a fault in the line, they they decided to send someone out to fix the problem - at no point did they mention the charge of this - i assumed it would be free as all I had asked for was reconnection of the line.

When the eircom guy finally arrived he said there was no problem with the line, he did something outside the house but didn't take very long and our phone was then connected.

I then recieved the bill for €129.99 euro for telephone line installation charge! -not reconnection charge of €24.99

From the eircom website under 'First Home line'
"If your home previously had an eircom phone line full connection charge of €24.99 (inc. VAT) apply."

The €105 markup is quite annoying.

Any advice would be great (I wouldn't mind paying the €130 if they installed a new broadband capable line, but that hasn't happened.)

Thanks,
eoin

kiazoe

Update, managed to miss this in my first post:

"From now until 30th September you can connect your eircom phone line for FREE
If your home has never had an eircom phone service you can connect your eircom home phone for FREE."

So either we should be charged NOTHING for a new phone line, or €24.99 for reconnection.

Please Advise

Thanks,
Eoin

decbuck

Ring comreg consumer division and report them.
1890 22 9668

Hagar

Isn't there a certain irony in Eircom making even a tiny profit on each phone call to ComReg reporting them for overcharging? :mad:

Sponge Bob

new installation is free at the moment, reconnect is €25 .

cost shoulda been €25 or €0

ring em and give out

kiazoe

hi, thanks for the help and support guys

After a stern chat with one of their support team they have decided that I will have to pay the reconnection fee of €25 euro.

They advised that the original bill of €130 for line installation was a 'legal requirement' for them to send - I'm still unsure why they didn't let me know beforehand.

Anyway, I don't have to pay it so i'm happy.

Thanks again,
Eoin

BrianD

Hi

Some advice from my experience with Eircom on exactly the same matter.

Eircom don't cut off lines anymore. The best thing to do is when you go to a new home and it has what appears to be a phone line, is to get a handset and plug it in. You should hear what they call a "soft tone" and within a minute or so you will be connected to Eircom sales. You can also make 999 calls when a soft tone is present.

If you hear a soft tone you should only be paying for a reconnection.

With competition in the marketplace you should even have enough leverage to negotiate even the €24.99 that they ask for.

It's hard to believe that in a modern European capital in the 21st century that Eircom would ask for 130 for a basic phone connection.

robo

I had the same issue last January, I moved into a new apt that had a phone connection so I checked with the landlord and he told me that the phone line hadn't been used in a few years. So I rang Eircom and I got some mature woman who tested the line and told me that there was a fault and they would have to send someone out to fix it - €129.99 so I said no way...
Contacted Smart Telecom about them enabling my line for broadband and they said that they could contact Eircom or I could do it myself...so a few weeks later I rang Eircom again and someone else was delaing with me and the next day my line was connected for no extra charge and no one had to call out. I never kicked up a fuss to get the line, just happened to have someone who could actually help me...employee of the year with Eircom imo

Chipboard

This thing is a compete shakedown. I was at home one night about 12 mths ago and an Eircom technician (had an Eirocom van and all) called to the door and offered to connect my phone. I asked him what he was on about (it being a bit strange for him to just call unsolicited and offer to connect my line) and he said he was in the area anyway and could do it (there seemed to be a strong inference that it would be free ie I'm in the area anyway). I declined, largely cos I was suspicious of his approach but a friend of mine a couple of doors up got the connection done and what do you know he was billed €127 a few days later.

Bill Finnerty

I left Eircom about two years ago and it was the best thing I ever did!. I moved to Cinergi Telecom which guaranteed to be always cheaper than Eircom and they lived up to thier promise. THREE TIMES people called to my door trying to encourage me to go back to Eircom. I later found out that these were temp staff employed by Eircom to get old customers back. They would have got 25 Euro commission if I signed up to return. I can only describe one of them as a total bully, trying a very hard sell. I wrote a complaint to Eircom about him.

Last month I even changed over my line rental to Cinergi (You can do so now, you do not have to have anything to do with eircom). I enjoy lower bills and an excellent service and I am very happy to not be contributing money to a company like Eircom who do not treat customers properly.

dudara

@jetski - please don't drag up old threads. Closed

dudara