Today I learned...

BT are evil. Or staffed by idiots. But I'm going with evil, as it's nicer to believe that they're doing it deliberately and not just hiring monkeys to write their systems.

I moved house again in May 2005. BT have conveniently provided a handy "moving home" form in their online account management which allows you to tell them when and where you're moving from and to and they're very nice and called me back within a couple of days to confirm everything before I moved.

BT Bloke: "Okay, your old number will be cancelled at midday on the 21st and the line at your new place will be activated at the same time"

Me: "Cool, thanks!"

21st May rolls around. I pick up the phone at my old place just after midday to check (in case it wasn't cancelled and I could still use my broadband for a few minutes longer. Weeks without broadband... noooooo!) Yep, phone line is dead. No dial tone, calling in doesn't ring.

Yesterday, I receive a red bill that my payment for my first three months line rental is overdue.
Me: "Shit." I pay the bill online (Yay for online banking)

Today, my brain wakes up.

Me: "Heeeeey.. wait a minute! I just paid 80 quid for my line rental and calls this quarter when I know that line rental is about £30 per quarter. Arse."

So I whip out my BT Online Billing account, sit down, work out how much I should have paid and how much I have paid and call up BT.

BT: "For BT products and services, including BT Broadband press 1. For billing enquiries..." And so on. You get the picture. I wend my way through menus and the sub menus until I reach a person. Well, a holding message ("Thank you for calling BT. Your call is in a queue. We value your money. Err... we mean custom. We value your custom. Please hold for an advisor"). Finally, I get an advisor

Me: "Hi, I have a problem" blah blah explanation.

Friendly BT customer service bloke: "Okay, checking your account details. Hmm... yes, okay, I see. Hold on please while I talk to someone in sales to find out what's happened"

Me: "Okay"

On hold listening to: A really awful muzak version of The Police's - Can't Stand Losing You rendered on cheap synthesized saxophone. I think it's that song. A looping 30-second clip of it anyway. Yeah, BT are definitely evil.

BT Customer Service: "Okay, I'll just put you onto Brian in Sales. He'll tell you what's happened with your line"

Me: (bored now) "Okay"

BT Customer Service: *click* *bzzzzzzzzzzz* *dial tone*

Fuckers.

Follow-up 45 minutes later:

They are also staffed by monkeys. After going through the entire ring, navigate menus and sit-on-hold-for-20-minutes process again I'm told that the original line was never stopped. Really? Then why was there no dial tone? And why do I get an unbroken hum when I try to dial it? On the bright (or at least less dimly-lit) side, he did manage to find my "stop" order, so I'm officially not liable for these charges (which I already knew) and should be getting a refund for the line rental. Will keep my eyes peeled for incoming money :)