The opera singer, the broadband delay and why customers aren’t divas if they expect a good service

Denise Leigh, who appeared in a production of Rigoletto with Alan Opie, was left without an essential service

Denise Leigh, who appeared in a production of Rigoletto with Alan Opie, was left without an essential service (Channel 4)

How’s this for shocking customer service: a blind couple with a young child were left facing three weeks without their essential broadband connection on Thursday after EE messed up what should have been a simple switchover.

Denise and Stefan Andrusyschyn of Cheshire had decided to switch from Sky to EE because their mobile phone provider had offered a better deal. But what should have been a simple operation turned into a nightmare on Thursday when the engineer dispatched to make the changes was sent to the wrong address.

It was only two doors down, but by the time the couple discovered the mistake, he had left the area. Unbelievably, they were then told by the mobile phone giant that it would be at least 15 working days – three weeks – before it could arrange for a new engineer to come.

Denise, a professional opera singer, naturally panicked. “We do all our grocery shopping online and internet banking and even the Christmas shopping,” she told me. “The thought of finding ourselves without internet access is totally disabling.”

That’s why EE’s response was so poor. “The operator we spoke to was sympathetic – he even said ‘that’s a shame’ – but he seemed to be keeping to a script and refused to expedite our case,” says Denise. “I had to call back several times before I spoke to a helpful person.”

Leaving people without what has become a crucial service is unacceptable. Given that the company made a mistake, you would expect it would want to put things right as quickly as possible and not leave its customers with such worries.

After The Independent contacted EE, it responded: “There is a standard 13-day period between switching providers, which has been set by Sky and BT.” It has agreed to make the switch on 31 October.

But seeing as the company had already set a date and it was only through its own error up that it didn’t happen, it should have put things right for its customer immediately, I believe.

The company continued: “We have apologised to the customer after the router was delivered to the wrong address. We have refunded the installation charge as a gesture of goodwill.”

I don’t know whether my intervention helped achieved that small concession, but I suspect so. And that’s not good enough. It shouldn’t take fear of bad publicity to force big companies to treat customers fairly.

Top-class customer service should be there in the first place. It’s an issue that’s going to become increasingly important – firms that consistently fail will lose customers by the boatload. And they will get no tears from me.

s.read@independent.co.uk

Twitter: @simonnread