So this is a bit of a long standing problem and I'll try and keep it brief.
I signed up to o2 on the 8th of July for a pay monthly contract. I didn't port my number at the time of signing up since I wanted to ensure I could get a reasonable signal at two locations. After receiving the handset and testing it out, the signal strength was great so I used their online number porting form to submit my pac. I left it for a few days then contacted them to ask how it's progressing. Nothing had been done so they did it and a couple of days later the number was ported...sort of.
As has been reported on these forums a fair number of times, I was unable to receive calls or text messages. I could phone out with my ported number, but anyone contacting me was just given an automated reply stating "Press 1 to let the person you are calling know that you tried to contact them". This then led me to over a month of calling and using their online chat sessions.
I very quickly diagnosed that it wasn't an issue with the phone as swapping the sim out with several other phones resulted in exactly the same issues, regardless of handset. Of course o2 won't accept this and made it very clear that they won’t do anything until I go into a store and speak to a guru. I told them I would be unable to make into a store for a couple of weeks dues to working commitments and if there was anything else I could do. They just rudely kept ignoring my questions and telling me to go into a store (I have the chat logs if anyone wants a laugh). I have no choice but to agree. To keep up this endless dance of evasive answering and rude responses was just getting tedious.
So two weeks pass and I'm finally able to get into a store. I explain everything (once again), to one of their staff. Who passes me onto someone else who I have to explain everything again. They test the sim in one of their handsets and have the same issue. They try a few hash commands (as I had done during many of the previous sessions), and still no resolving the issue. They confirmed that it wasn't the handset (hallelujah). They contact someone on the phone who tells them that they've had a lot of issues with number ports from a couple of networks, they'll fix it and I will have service within 24 hours. I thank the young lad that was assisting me and left, faintly reassured that this would finally sort the problem out… Nope.
I leave it a few days to give it a chance then once again contact o2. They try to get me to start messing with the handset again, which I refuse. They now have to listen to me since one of their own confirmed what I’d been stating all along. They have no choice but to accept that there is something wrong with the account itself. The work involved in getting to this stage is quite astonishing, frankly. But at least I can now get them to do what I asked them to do a few weeks earlier. They raised the issue with some support team that deals with porting issues and they would be in touch within a couple of working days. Since this was close to the weekend, they said they would contact me by Wednesday the following week. This of course never happened, so I phoned up again on the Thursday and after once again explaining everything, they said they would personally raise the issue and contact me back. This was another lie and heard nothing for a couple of days so once again contacted o2 (online). Explained everything again and got the same answers again. They would personally look into it and contact me. I told them I wasn’t happy with this answer due to past history and they would then only reply telling me to phone o2. I was passed onto a floor supervisor, who I hoped would be able to answer a question for me regarding the legality of me ending my contract with them due to them failing to fulfil their side of the contract. This just put me into that position again of the endless dance of evasive and fairly rude answers. FYI ‘floor supervisors’ are just someone that you’re fobbed off onto so tech support can get back to work. They are pretty dumb and rude, will ignore what you ask them and give very short and irrelevant answers.
So it’s been over a month that I’ve been without the ability to make use of my phone. My number is used for business purposes, and as a result I’ve lost out on quite a bit of work. This has equated to a fairly sizable loss of income. I’ve spent countless hours dealing with all this and I’m no further forward to fixing it than I was a month ago. My advice to anyone still reading this is to avoid o2 altogether. Ignore any tempting offers you see, it’s really not worth it. For those that are currently with them, really consider leaving them for a better provider. Look for independent reviews and make an informed decision. If anything goes wrong, you will be forced into an agonising system of being passed from ‘pillar to post’, and lots of lies and false promises. It's just not worth it.
