Sky changed our landline phone number without prior warning and no phone connection

[Topsey1]

We live on the border of our county and our phone number was allocated to us by Sky when we moved further down the village 5 years ago.  We are elderly, have medical problems and we rely on our landline and recently had a problem and had to ring NHS111 but our phone number did not match the county we live in.  The call went through to our neighbouring county who could not deal with our problem and it took several phone calls over a few hours and we received a call back the following morning from our County.  We contacted Sky to enquire if we could change our number to the ones used in our village.  I had to ring them back a few days later to find out if this was possible.  I rang back and told them a choice of 2 number starting with the first 3 digits allocated to our village.  The next thing I knew the line went dead and we have not been able to use the phone since as there is no dialling tone just an engaged tone.  Later we had an email stating they had allocated a new number which again was not for our county and was not what we required.  We were given no choice and no warning of this.  Also Sky have not checked our line as they would know it is unusable.  It is now 48 hours since we had our phone working and despite sending in 4 complaints we have only received automated replies giving us a reference number to use in future if we have problems or telling us to use What's App (whatever that is), message us (which doesn't seem to work) or phone them.

We do not have these smart phones and are cut off from our family who live a few hundred miles away.

This is causing us a lot of anxiety and stress plus we have now had 2 sleepless nights.  We just want our line working and our original number back but our emails are being ignored.  We have had 48 hour of distress over this so far and not once has anyone from Sky checked our phone line as they would have found they have put it out of action.    We have now been without our phone for 48 hours and not once has a human replied to us. We just need our old number back and our line to work.

[Mark39]

Sky don't use email as a general means of contact, which is likely to be why you've not had a meaningful response from them.

I don't know what has happened with regard to your change of number, but I know that numbers are occasionally allocated by Openreach with a non local national code (dialling code).

With regard to your non-working line, you'll need to report it to Sky for the line to be tested and the fault fixed.

If you wish we can ask Sky's messaging team to contact you via,the forum, here so that you can do that? Let us know if you want to go ahead.

It's not an oline chat service and replies from Sky are unlikely to be instant.

[Topsey1]

Thanks for your help.  Anything you can do that will get our line working and Sky to put our old number back.  Yesterday I had a hospital letter to ring them but can't.  We are completely lost without our landline.  I will only be able to receive help on here or by email.  I have no other form of communication.  Sorry but we are elderly and urgently need our phone line and old number back.  Thanks again for your help

[GD1]

@Topsey1  To get you some help I've escalated your post via the community chat. This link explains how it works https://helpforum.sky.com/t5/Did-you-know/Escalating-a-post-to-a-Sky-expert/ba-p/3711147#M1014

Keep an eye out for an invite or blue chat bubble.

When the blue bubble does appear you have 48 hours to respond or it will be automatically closed.

Be reassured the email & message is from Sky and your details are safe and secure.
If you are using Safari please make sure that Hide IP Address is not checked in order to see the blue bubble. If you are having trouble finding this to check the settings, use another browser such as Firefox, Chrome etc.

I would also recommend that if not already on, that you turn email/private message notifications on to avoid missing any alerts

[Topsey1]

Thanks for your help.  We are elderly and only into basic emails and landline calls.   We aren't into mobile phones etc.  I did log into our account but the messaging service will not scroll up so can't even send a message in there.  I have filled in 4 complaint forms within our account but only get automated emails back giving reference number in case we get problems in the future.  We desperately need our landline as our family are miles away and can't ring them.  Thanks again for your help.  

[Mark39]

@Topsey1 Sky haven't invited you to the messaging service yet - it may be later today.When they do, you'll see a blue/red chat 'bubble' towards the bottom ofmthe page right here.

Just a thought - were you sent a replacement broadband Hub when you orig8nally requested the change of number? If not, don't worry - just wait for the 'bubble' to appear.

[Topsey1]

We lived at the top of the village and 5 years this week moved down the road and we were not allowed to keep the number from our previous home.  We were given a very different number from what all the villagers have.  We just couldn't do anything about it, not sure why.  The last Monday we had to ring NHS 111 and that is when all the problems started as we went through to the county were our 1st 3 digits represent (I'm not on about the area code just the 1st 3 digits of our number) and they Couldn't deal with us.  It took us hours to before we managed to get someone who would contact our County and they rang us back next day.  We explained all this to Sky and they were going to get us a number starting with the same as our village but then put us on another number outside our County again and not even informing us of it.  1 minutes we were on our old number and the next we had a new number but not being able to use our phone through it.  The first we knew we had an email later that day saying they had given us a new number but by then we couldn't use our phone to contact them.  Our 3rd email to them out of 4 asked, which we have sent so far, was asking for our complaint to be escalated but just got this automated reply giving us a reference number if we have problems in the future.   We seem to be going round in circles but thanks for your help.  We are now at the end of our tether with this.  Much appreciated.

[Topsey1]

No we haven't been sent a new hub as we didn't even know the number had been changed but I am still able to  get on the inter net and do email and open other things up.  I have learnt something this morning and that is this Community thing and so far it looks like I have done it correctly as I am getting help from followers.

[Mr+Flibbles+86]

Thanks for escalating this. We’ve sent an invite to chat.

[Topsey1]

Thank you so much for your help as we have had a chat but unfortunately nothing can be done until Monday when someone will look into it the problem and then call me so hopefully we will have a phone again then.  In the meantime hopefully we don't need it for an emergency.  Thanks again as your help as helped us.  Take care.

[Topsey1]

Thank you so much for all your help.  You and the other person replying have helped to at least get a chat person.  Unfortunately they can't do anything but hopefully it can be looked at on Monday when someone will call me.  That is as long as they can get the line working again.  At least it is now all logged and I have got a copy of the chat.   Hope we don't need to make an emergency phone call this weekend. Thanks again for your help because without it we were going round in circles.  Take care thanks