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Missed telecoms appointments are now addressed by Ofcom, as it today announces the intention to put in place fines against telecoms suppliers for missed appointments. Something which has needed to be sorted for a long while.

In short, the proposal now is that those householders who receive poor service by way of missed telecoms appointments from their telecoms provider are from 2019 entitled to get entitlement to compensation. It is estimated by Ofcom that as many as 2.6 million people could well benefit from the new rules being put into place.

Householders will get £8 a day if a fault is not fixed, and which is to be paid as a refund through their bill.

However, this is less than the £10 which was originally proposed when Ofcom began its consultation earlier this year.

Telecoms providers are also to be instructed to pay householders £5 a day if their broadband or landline is not working on the day on which it was promised.

Also, if an engineer misses an appointment, suppliers will have to give £25 in compensation.

These new missed telecoms appointment agreements will initially cover those consumers who have contracts with BT, Sky, Talk Talk, Virgin Media and Zen Internet – and which make up around 90% of telecoms customers base in the UK.

Plusnet and EE are expected to join the scheme at a later date.

According to Ofcom’s estimates, customers in total can expect to get £142m in pay-outs every year.

Presently telecoms (household) customers can get compensation in theory, but only around 15% of those who complain will actually manage to get any form of a refund. Then most only get small amounts, said Ofcom.

Such compensation payments will not be automatic, as the customer will have to lodge a complaint in the first instance. However, the fear here is, that although customers may know that their experience of poor telecoms service is something which they need to sort out with the supplier. They may just ignore making the initial complaint in order to set things rolling, due to lack of time, or they see the amount on offer being considered too small.

In Summary

  • Missed telecoms appointments agreement only relates to householders and NOT businesses.
  • Consumers will have to phone up to complain initially.
  • Service not working, and not fixed after two days: £8 compensation a day.
  • Missed engineer appointment, or less than 24 hours notice of cancellation: £25 for each appointment.
  • Delayed starting date: £5 a day.