Having a problem with the Fab, brakes and brake lights stuck on, EPC and engine management light on and won't clear.

Couldn't resolve it last night, so disconncted the battery . Before I went to try and fix it this morning, went to phone-in to work using the landline to say I wouldn't be in and discovered that Bangalore Telecom had disconnected my outgoing telephone service - Internet OK.

Eventually got through to them. Turns out that they disconnected me for an unpaid bill.

I can find no record of ever receiving the bill either electronically or in paper form.

I have to say that early this year I swapped from BT Classic Broadband (2 meg service) to the current standard offering (5mb service). Not because I wanted to but because I kept on losing the service on Broadband Classic in the period before Xmas i.e. they wanted me to migrate to the better specified service.

Up until that point I'd been receiving paper bills. The Customer Service bloke told me today that my account has now been set-up for electronic billing only. No one told me. Further, I haven't received an electronic bill or hastener for the outstanding bill (Jan to Feb 2011) which I now learned was due from mid February.

They won't send me an electronic copy of the bill by E-Mail and I have to wait 14 days for a paper one. And the web site is so slow that its virtually impossible to access my account.

And what's more they seem to have missed a period in the billing between Nov 2010 and Jan this year.

Anyway, after confirming the amount due paid the bill and I'm told that telephone service should be restored within 24 hours of receipt of payment.

I hate to harp-on about levels of service, but I remeber when the likes of BT were in public ownership and things like bill payment and talking to an enquiry point were so much easier.

I'm seriously thinking now of swapping the service out. Trouble is, I suspect that Virgin,who keep on petitioning me to change (And no doubt will do, until Infinity is in place round here at the end of the year), aren't much better.

Anyway, I just going out to see if I can fix the car - couldn't use VCDS to diagnose the problem, cause the laptops battery is flat and I discovered that the clover leaf mains cable on the mains adapter is busted.

Great.

At this rate, I have to resign my job, in the words of MPs "To spend more time fixing all the broken things".

See you at the soup kitchen.

Postscript 1

Go outside the house - overnight someone or thing has ripped the brass letter box flap off of the letterbox in the door.

Postscript 2

Because there's an Engine Management Light I took fuse No 7 (5 Amps) out - brake lights remained on - took out fuse from stop lights No 2 (10 amps,) so looks like either its the electronic control unit or the stop light switch. Looks like, for the time being I'll have to disconnect the battery each time I park-up.

Nick

Nick

Edited 23 March, 201115 yr by Clunkclick

If it was an octy it would be a faulty brake light switch causing all the problems you listed, not sure about a fab

So I learned from the dealer, who did it for me a short notice this afternoon - how about that for service !

Part is about £9 with labour and VAT, totalling £52.

Looking at the fusepanel on the drivers side of the dashboard, the 5A Engine Management fuse is right next door to the 10A Brake light fuse, so I presume it shares a common positive feed, If the brake switch starts to short out (As it must be doing if the brake lights are on without the pedal being depressed) then presumably it draws more current/reflects greater resistance back up the positive feed side of the circuit and affects the input to the EMU, causing ghost errors.

You'd think that something as sensitive as the EMU would have had, as a matter of design, its own dedicated positive feed. There you go, value analysis at work and another days annual leave gone. Not to worry.

I think I saved myself a bit of aggro by pulling the 10 A fuse whenever I parked up. Dealer said, that because of the current draw of the stop lamps (Over an amp each, approx 3 AH in total) that the first most people know about it is when they get a flat battery.

Nick

Edited 23 March, 201115 yr by Clunkclick

Lucky white heather. :no:

If only I had the time ! Too busy puting male part a into female part b and securing with cyanacrylic ester to worry about that !

Nick