Steer well clear of Bulldog

This is my recent letter to OFCOM regarding my shockingly poor treatment by Bulldog Broadband.

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing to inform you of my shockingly bad treatment by the company Bulldog Broadband. Having arrived back in the UK after a 6 year hiatus I was eager to take advantage of the great deals available to new customers and the marketing of Bulldog lured me in with their promise of 16meg broadband. I signed up on the 23rd May 2006 when I moved into my new flat and the waiting began. The first thing to arrive after a week was the modem. Fine. A few days later an engineer arrived to transfer the line from NTL to Bulldog. I was then able to plug in the phone. The phone line worked exactly one day before it simply stopped working. My modem did not work at all.

I phoned Bulldog and had the frustratingly bad time trying to get through to their various departments. They were obviously inundated with calls at that time as the wait times were painful and I was often on the phone for an hour or more on hold. In the end they agreed to send out another modem. This did not arrive. By this point I had been waiting for service for two months. We were well into July. I was stranded in a new country with no phone and no internet which was very frustrating for me trying to keep in touch with family and friends and impossible for my partner who was trying to find work in London. I phoned Bulldog eight times in this period speaking to different people and departments. I was extremely upset.

On July 27th I got through to their complaint department where the person there listened to my story and agreed that Bulldog had failed at every step to provide me with service. They could not tell me what was wrong with my phone line, how long it would take to issue me a new modem or when I would get service. The woman I spoke to apologised profusely for my poor treatment and agreed that they had broken the contract and would cease the agreement. I asked if I owed any monies and she said no. I took that at face value but did ask for it to be put in writing. I did not hear anything back from them.

Two months later I started to receive online bills. The bills showed that I now owed money for each of the months I had signed up with them for. This happened in September and October. Both times I phoned and was put through to their various departments after excessively long wait times. Each time I was reassured that this was an administration error. That my account had been closed and cancelled and that I would receive an email confirming the closure of my account. Nothing arrived.

A few days ago I received a final bill from Bulldog for £450 which was the bill for the twelve month term of my contract. After speaking to various people they decided that I now owed them for the full contract. I am disgusted by this.

This new company which has gone through a huge change of service provider from C&W to Pipex in the time I was a customer there, cannot even provide enough communication between it’s departments to sort this matter out. Their initial teething problems have not allowed for the fact that they could not cope with their initial demand for their service and could not release the customers they failed.

I have not had a single day of internet or phone service in my time with Bulldog. They had two months to provide me with service and they failed. I was told by them that they had broken the contract and that I would be released with nothing to pay. Had they told me otherwise I would have stayed with them because frankly I cannot afford to pay this sum to them.

I am absolutely disgusted by their treatment of me. As an IT professional and someone who works in the internet industry I will be strongly recommending to everyone I know that they should not go with Bulldog Broadband. I would really appreciate some advise from OFCOM as to my next move. I will be seeking legal council however I fear that this will be more costly than the overall bill I have received.