Author: admin

With still no telephone connection in sight for some half of Ardentinny’s residents and businesses, BT today declared an MBORC (Matters Beyond our Reasonable Control) notice. In what way this will assist those affected remains to be seen.

In a strongly worded email (*see below) today to Ian Shanks, Head of Scottish Affairs at BT and Brendan Dick, Director BT Scotland, Michael Russell MSP expressed his surprise at BT’s response to the unacceptable situation and requested a clear timeframe to rectify the faults.

BT has reported that there had been considerable damage to the network in the area and that Scotland has had over 6,500 faults caused by the adverse weather.  We understand that extra engineers have been drafted in from other parts of the country. However, @BTCARE said this evening that they could not commit to a (completion) date.

*Dear Ian

I am a bit surprised that my office is having such difficulty getting a response from you about the above that we have now had to initiate direct communication with the office of the Chairman of BT in London, which are turning out to be much more responsive.

However, using all the channels available to me, I am writing to you as well to express my concern that today BT escalated the difficulty by declaring the situation one which was MBORC , an acronym with which I was not familiar but which apparently means that it is beyond your reasonable control.

Whatever that signifies, the fact is that Ardentinny has been without phones since the 3rd January. That is simply not acceptable and must be rectified. I look forward to an urgent response that tells me you and BT agree and gives a clear time frame and method for that happening.

I am also copying this to Brendan Dick who I hope might also express concern and act on it.

Regards

Michael

Some 30+ Ardentinny residents and businesses on Wednesday enter their 15th day without fixed line telephone or internet access. BT engineers are continuing to replace telephone poles along the shorefront and move lines from existing poles.

@BTCARE have been in almost daily contact with us re the situation, however they appear pretty much in the dark as to when the work will be completed. Householders on the shore did offer BT the option of temporarily suspending the lines from their trees, but the offer was not taken up.

Looking at current progress, hopefully they could reconnect on Wednesday or Thursday.

BT crews were today installing the first of several new telephone poles along the Ardentinny shoreline. On Friday a BT engineer surveyed the area where the main shore cable was cut during the storms on January 3 and concluded that several of the Loch-side telephone poles should be condemned and replaced. @BTCare confirmed today that they hope to have the homes and businesses affected by the outage reconnected by Monday evening.

Scottish Hydro has issued information related to compensation during the recent power cuts. Is an ex-gratia payment of £75 sufficient to cover the losses you incurred during the blackout? You can read the full text here.

In exceptional events such as these, industry regulator Ofgem specifies the level of compensation which is available to customers. However, we have decided to make a payment well in excess of what these regulations specify and will provide customers who were without power for more than 48 hours with an ex-gratia payment of £75. Customers can claim this by writing to The Claims Department, Scottish Hydro Electric Power Distribution, Inveralmond House, 200 Dunkeld Road, Perth, PH1 3AQ or by emailing feedback@sse.com.

Some 30+ Ardentinny households and businesses remain without telephone or internet access tonight. Despite assurances from BT to customers over the past days that the company is doing everything possible to rectify the situation, only a couple of properties on the shore were reconnected on Wednesday and no BT engineers were seen in the village today.

Argyll & Bute MSP Michael Russell has taken up the case of the villagers and has expressed to BT his dissatisfaction at the level of service his constituents are receiving.  He will be in contact with BT again on Friday.