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Why won’t Orcon let us connect our phone?

We have moved into our new house and absolutely love it. This post however is going to be a rant about trying to connect a phone line.

I signed up with Slingshot as our phone and broadband provider last week asking to be connected on the 31st October. They came out on the day to connect us but couldn’t because the phone line was still connected to the previous occupier’s account and they are with a different company. I phoned the previous occupier and asked whether he’d cancelled his phone – yes, he had and he was irate to discover his line was still active. His phone provider is Orcon so I phoned Orcon to find out what was happening. They told me that because I’m not the account holder, they can’t discuss anything about the connection with me, despite the fact it’s our house and we want to connect our phone!

It is now Friday, 5 days since we moved in and there’s still an active Orcon connection on the phone line. Slingshot tried again yesterday to connect us but couldn’t. I have tried phoning Orcon but just get palmed off with the “Privacy Act” explanation. It’s our house but if a third party has an account on your phone line then you have absolutely no say over it at all. Not even an explanation as to why it is taking or so long or when the disconnection will occur so that your company can connect you. I am now expecting to be without the phone all weekend and without a decent internet connection. Consequently we are racking up huge fees on our mobile phone and mobile internet device.

There’s something seriously wrong with a situation where you buy a house, try to connect the phone but cannot because there’s an existing connection and you cannot cancel that existing connection because the account is not in your name and the company (Orcon) refuses to help you solve the problem because it’s not your account. Without any explanation from Orcon, we are forced to conclude that they’ve stuffed up and rather than admit it or apologise or even provide us with a timeframe, they give us the “Privacy Act” instead.

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Rachel M

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2 responses to “Why won’t Orcon let us connect our phone?”

  1. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    I can't understand that, Rachel. Why can't you just explain that you don't wish to discuss anything to do with the account holder, what you what to know why his account has any connection now with my(your) property, which he no longer occupies or has any connection with. The issue is your company's association with your property, not his account. Obviously, they don't want to move his connection to your property without your taking up their service so they are hiding behind the Privacy Act when the issue is that their company has no right to monopolise your property's phone line. Get them to contact THEIR account holder to cease HIS connection with your property.

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  2. Rachel Avatar
    Rachel

    I have said that I don't wish to know any of the account holder's details and requested that they ring the account holder themselves but they just repeat the "Privacy Act" excuse over and over. It's like talking to a brick wall. Our provider, SlingShot, have issued some sort of disconnection notice. I'm not sure how long this will take but the whole thing is just ridiculous. That it should be this hard to connect a phone is unbelievable.

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