When will engineers STOP changing router passwords

[MikeWilliams_UK]

Yesterday I was called a customer's premisis, as they could not connect a new device to their newly installed smart hub.

When I arrived they said that none of their devices could not find the SSID listed on the card at the back of the router. They said the old SSID was still showing, which it shoud not have done as the old router was taken away.

It turns out that the idiot who installed it had changed it's SSID and password to that of the previous hub (which was taken away). And did NOT inform my customer that they had done this, nor informing them what the SSID and password were set to.

I had no choice other than performing a factory reset using the button at the back of the router, this allowed me to get their new devices connected. Unfortunately this knocked out Digital Voice, which I have subsequently found out needs to be reset by someone from EE/BT remotely.

BOTTOM LINE

Any engineer changing settings of SSID and or password MUST write it down and let the customer know, otherwise the router becomes severly limited due to the custer not knowing the SSID or password.

Or better still not be lazy and set up all the customer's devices to use the new SSID/password.

PS: This trend is not only present in EE/BT engineers I have had a TalkTalk engineer give me the same grief.

[MikeWilliams_UK]

@MustrumI am pretty sure that the engineer did the minimum that was needed for them to be in and out in minutes.

i.e. changing the SSID / WiFi password to that of the old router, therefore everything was working at that point in time.

However the WiFi network was in an unfit state as NOBODY in the houshold knew what the SSID / password were, hence when they were trying to connect a new device they could not as the SSID listed on the card could not be seen by any device. When I attended them I verified this using my mobile.

I re-itterate the engineer is at fault because they did not supply written information that the card on the back of the router was now useless and supply the "new" values.

[MikeWilliams_UK]

@MustrumI am sure that the engineer demonstated that their wifi devices were connected. Thus unaware that there was an issue.

The customer did not know the implications of what the engineer had done.

[Chris_B]

@MikeWilliams_UK   Why was an EE customer asking you to sort this when they are the customer of EE.  Surely you go to the point of sale/service provider if you have an issue not a 3rd party expecting them to resolve an issue that to be honest has nothing to do with that 3rd party.    

Forgive me for  being blunt but this customer of yours is paying you to sort this even through they should go directly to EE themselves and your complaining about doing what this customer of yours is paying you to do  for no reason at all. 

Yes the password should have been given but all current devices that were linked to the old router would have paired to the new router.  You don’t have to keep the new router details when then is a switch over that is provided via the EE app or just by logging to the router and manually changing the information.  You then don’t need to repair everything back up,    Just to point out if any iPhone was paired to the router you can get the wifi password from that device. 

[MikeWilliams_UK]

@Chris_B  I got a call from my customer saying "I am trying to connect her daughter's laptop and printer to my WiFi but nothing in the house can see the WiFi listed on the card at the back of the router".

They urgently needed to print some vital documents. At this point they did not know that the engineer had played with the settings because their Ring doorbell was working fine. Her iPhone did not appear to have any problems because it was using 4G as it was not connected to any WiFi signal nor did it show any stored connections.

She then told me that they had an engineer visit to install a new router with Digital Voice.

Normally I would tell them to contact EE (as EE have messedup things they should fix it) but they needed to print the documents before the end of the day so I did what I could. i.e. factory reset which allowed me to connect up the "new" laptop and printer.

[JimM11]

@MikeWilliams_UK When you have some time you can read the third pinned post that XRaySpeX has at the top off this Forum page, and it holds true for many reason's, the pinned reset is unfortunate get out of jail and there are way better ways than this. You got them going and achieved what was required, so best left at that.

[Chris_B]

@MikeWilliams_UK   So the iPhone had the WiFi password on it if it was ever paired to the old router.   Settings>wifi>click the blue i and then select the hidden password and enter the iPhone password or faceID to reveal the password.    All that was needed was to join that WiFi connection from the iPhone for this to be available and seen.    

It’s one worth remembering for future use. 

[MikeWilliams_UK]

@Chris_B  Just to reitterate this, the iPhone was not connected therefore the i button is not available for unknown network nor for any previously connected networks which are not listed on iPhones.

[Chris_B]

@MikeWilliams_UK   Just to get that right are you saying the iPhone was never ever connected too the old router?  Ever ?      

[MikeWilliams_UK]

All I can say for certain is that the customers iPhone would not connect to the SSID of the old router set by the engineer. Therefore as the iPhone does not list previous connections it was impossible to obtain password.

With no working device with an ethernet connection I had no choice other than doing a factory reset via the button on the back of the router.