I'm starting to hate Virgin. Blueyonder was much better before, now they are changing everything. Capping on busy bandwidth users, charging £1 plus 10p connection fee?! What is this crap!? I'm not impressed.
25p/min to call Virgin Media helpline
From 1st July, Virgin Media’s broadband helpline number is changing to a premium 090 number. It will cost 25p per minute to call from a Virgin landline plus 10p to connect, meaning a 10-minute call will cost £2.60. Mobiles and other networks may vary.
Con or what? 25p/min to discuss something that might even be Virgin's fault. Is this fair? How long are customers typically spending sorting stuff out with Virgin?
Like this? Please share it!
Like Broadband Genie?
Fortnightly newsletter | 8367 subscribers
Comments
-
-
Just had the same email notice from them and I agree its appalling. The broadband service costs £25 per month which is far from the cheapest around and to pay 25p per minute to get problems, possibly due to their failures, sorted out is unacceptable.
Since the re-branding from Telewest (never had problems before) I have found it near impossible to get email responses from customer service so telephone may be the only way to get any customer service at all - but at what a price!!. -
I totally agree, since Virgin Media took over Telewest things have gone from bad to worse. Their telephone service is rubbish now, if you call them all the departments are mixed up.. e.g. (not exact wordage) "Hello welcome to Virgin Media, we now have three choices for you.. to discuss your bill press 1 if you have a fault blah blah press 2.. for any other crap (own addage) press 3.. (note this is nothing to do with making payments.. I press 3 and the usual if you wish to add..please press 1 or please hold to speak to an agent.. I hold then I get "thanks.. to make a payment press 1.. jesus what flipping payment I did not ask for the accounts department. Now they want to charge for help which in my mind should be absolutely free for customers.. I say get rid of Virgin Media and bring back Telewest to have control.
-
Disliking Virgin?....me too. They just cancelled my broadband a month ahead of time. Arranged disconnection for July 12 to move house. They disconnected on June 12! In a conversation with their "customer service" (yeah right!!) planks, that was akin to the Little Britain "computer says no" sketch, they say it will take 15-18 days to reconnect as it will be a new order! Er...hang on.....I don't think so! Your **** up I believe!!
Binning them and looking around for another deal at the new house.
By the way, get round the rip off call charges to Virgin, or anyone else, by using www.saynoto0870.com where you get alternate numbers to call including 0800 sometimes. -
It is clearly outrageous! Virgin comes in and unilaterally changes service contracts with users and when I queried at customer relations the answer I got was 'when you signed the contract you agreed for us to make any changes we like'. I don't think so! I did not sign up to Virgin and one attractive draw for me was the free telephone helpline. I too am looking for an alternative provider.
The way to really get them is to offer advice to people like me. Any better deals out there? Please post I am fed up and anxious to leave!!!! -
With Telewest I had excellent service.
What a shambles since the mergers.
The slowdown in the afternoon if you dare to download was bad enough, but expecting people to pay especially as you will be on hold for ever is the last straw. -
I can only agree that since virgin media took over telewest the overall service has gone belly up.i used to think that mr Branson was a man of the people, but now i thing he is getting like all the other greedy people just like SKY.i also they say they are offering free upgrades, but in fact you have to pay for it disguised as call charges, even if the problem is theres, how do we know that if they drop internet connections ,they are not doing it just to get millions of people to phone up just to generate more money.
-
Since Virgin Media took over ntl/Telewest, I've had nothing but slow and dropped connections (and looking on the internet I'm not the only one.) Now they want to charge for what was previously a free service (and no doubt I shall have to pay 25p/minute for them to tell me to "switch off my computer and modem ...", "phone the service status line" etc. etc.)
Branson and his team are doing for the original "Blueyonder" brand what he's done for his railway empire; hiked up prices and delivering a lower quality product in overall terms.
Despite all the inconvenience to myself and my contacts I am very seriously considering switching to another ISP.
Perhaps "Richard" would like to respond personally, but I won't be holding my breath ...
Chris Howell -
they are only charging for the call if its not virgins problem. say a pc or router issue.
they are going to refund the cost of the call and call the cmr back if it is virgins fault. stop bitching for god sake. no company is perfect and i kno for a fact virgin media is miles ahead of sky so give them a break! -
I won't be paying £29 a month for super fast (ha!) broadband, and 25p a min just to get them to sort out problems at there end!
Most PC problems I can fix myself at my end, but when you want to report a fault on your broadband that arises due to a fault at there end 25p per min! NO WAY!
It's bad enough they only supply half the advertised speed most of the time on there 20mb connection, but to use premium rate numbers for what? For someone in another country to look at a PC screen, tell you to switch off your modem, restart your PC, and then offer to book an appointment as they have ran out of options!
A disgrace, the first time there is a fault that I cant solve myself I wont be calling there premium rate number, i'll be phoning the cancellation number for free and switching provider! -
The Virgin customer service is terrible. In the past, my dealings with NTL were fine. Any problems or changes were dealt with quickly and efficiently.
Virgin's customer service is terrible - and they now want to charge for it!!!
Sorry for going into detail (below) but it is an amazingly poor service that needs highlighting.
I recently changed my package with Virgin. The next day our phone and broadband didn't work. I had to phone using my mobile. The first person appeared to have no idea who they worked for let alone what a problem was. I was cut off. I phoned again, eventually got through to someone who seemed to at least know who they worked for. Unfortunately, couldn't tell me what my problem was - but thought our account was suspended. Got cut off when they tried to transfer the call. Phoned again. This time said they it might be my phone that was causing it (broadband as well?) but they insisted they would send a technician round.
I decided to call again the next day, this time spoke to a fantastic bloke who sorted it all out in minutes.
As a result I cancelled the visit from the technician. You've guessed it. The technician called when I was out (amazed he found the house). Seems I'm getting a £10.00 fine for not being in.
Called to sort that out, but they can't do anything until I get the bill. I have to call up next month. What fun!!
Incidentally, I also contacted them on the above matters via their 'help(?)line' on the website. No response at all.
25p a minute - where else can you get such comedy at that price? Who needs Sky One for entertainment!!! -
Absolutley OUTRAGIOUS, Now we are being told we have the privilage of PAYING to be fobbed off with the usual runaround, whenever their service regularly goes belly up. I dont ever remeber signing a contract to be with Virgin, moreso I never once signed anything that siad I was willing to pay for their faults (in more ways than one).
According to Law, if we are to pay for the techless, it is illegal for them to put you on hold, and no call should BY LAW last longer than 20 mins.
I thought it was SKY who used the dirty tricks over virgin. How wrong I was, and I cant wait to get my new SKY package, good riddance to bad rubbish! -
Additional, how long does my 20meg BB have to be run at 1.2 meg, am I paying for this, or should I ring the new number and pay for someone else to tell me "....urgh,,,,technical difficulties"
-
had enough of virgin moving to Bt its the only way to stop them ripping me off help line lets make some more money from the customers, vote with your head move away from virgin
-
We also did not sign up with Virgin Media,in fact we were out of the UK for 2 months and returned to find NTL no longer existed-We never had a problem with them but Virgin- I'm never off the phone. Can any-one out there tell me how to install Anti Virus with our PC guard. We should be able to get it but can't.PC Gaurd has now been installed and uninstalled 17 times in two months.Its no good having a knowledge of computers, if you are employed to solve problems you should be an expert-sorry but Virgin Media dont employ experts,and to think next week itl'l cost us to be told the obvious (install and uninstall) and it still wont work.
-
Had Telewest Broadband for a couple of years no problem - actually quite good, no significant problems and fast. Now Virgin have taken over it's slow and not so reliable. Phoned customer support who basically quoted me a load of mumbo jumbo about UBRs and suchlike.
Question is: Who can I change to given that I only have cable to the house, (never had a BT line). Would I have to get a BT line installed to go with another provider?
Help much appreciated
John -
After Years of service through NTL and very minimal problems with my broadband and phone package, i was a happy customer, then bang along come virgin media. The first 2 weeks were ok, then my internet speeds dropped and my modem kept dropping out, called the usual suspects and received my good friend in India telling me that i had no problems and reboot my modem and router, so as usual i did all this rubbish that i have done a 1000 times just to make it easier than getting him to try and understand what i was saying. 30 minutes later he tells me their is a fault in my area, Great another fault in my area according to my friend in India. Two days later still the same problem, then i get another friend in india telling me no faults in my area and it must be my modem, this is after another 30 minutes going through the same old rubbish. WOW the engineer turned up 4 days later, he actually found the house. He then proceeded to tell me nothing is wrong with my modem, it is my cable from the house to the main box, the cable is not thick enough for the broadband and the box is too far away from the house and will book me a team to come out and pull a new cable. Two weeks later the team managed to find my house and proceeded to tell me that they didnt have the cable that was required on the van, and went away telling me there is nothing wrong with the cable i have. Now i am in a complete circle and back to square one, after hours and hours of calls to virgin, i now find myself no better off and they are now wanting to charge me for all their s***. I am so sick of their rubbish and excuses and believe virgin are as bad as sky if not a lot worse. Inbetween all this i get a letter telling me the price of my service is going up by 2 pounds but they are doubling my speed to a 20 meg connection and my area is due for upgrade in august but i have paid the extra money for 2 months now. 20 meg and i cannot even get the 10 meg speeds i should be getting.
Richard bransons virgin media absolutely sucks.....i will be moving to redten a.s.a.p. -
I have just given them 30 days notice to cancel.
The sevice they provide now is appalling. My broadband is constantly disconnecting and is very slow at times. There is no way I am paying 25p per minute to sort out faults on their network. They say the charge is to discourage unneccessary calls but I am sure it is to help off their massive debt. -
I've just managed to get through to virgin media, cost a fortune on the mobile. I have 2 phone lines here at home, 1 for work 1 for home. Neither phone is working, I've now just been told Thursday is when they can get a engineer out THURSDAY they are having a laugh. No business for 4 days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well not with me, I've been spending approx £80.00 a month for 2 lines broadband et al, nearly £1,000 a year. Not anymore, as soon as this is sorted I'm off to new provider!!
I think Brason is getting far to smug.
They must be losing lots of customers, and the news is they may be taken over, service will be worst then ever!! -
The charges are still cheaper than most places, yeah BT can provide the internet. BUT ooo its ADSL. ill stick with DSL any day.
I have never had any problems with telewest or virgin, never needed to call. as i dont have stupid problems like...
oo i cant connect to the internet coz the modem is in standby,or oh my pc is not turned on.try and fix it yourself.use a friends connection and itll be free....
and its only 25ppm, thats gonna ruin my pention that is LOL -
I was a Telewest customer for years, and only now really appreciating how good they were. Ever since Virgin have taken over I've had nothing but problems and the price is going up while the service go's down. I play poker online and have lost plenty of money due to the connection being lost. The free service line tells you there are no issues and if you call tech support you spend ages speaking to someone who doesn't seem to know anyting, you'll be asked to reboot (like you haven't already tried that!) and really handy during a game of poker, they will get you to change all your settings and eventually concede (40 mins later) that there is a fault (and now its gonna cost 25p/min)
Perhaps Virgin should spend less on fees for a-list celebs to advertise their crap service and more on engineers to maintain it. I intend to cancel my service immediately. STEER WELL CLEAR. -
ITS JUST PURE GREED FROM "VIRGIN RUBBISH-IA!" THEY ARE SIMPLY OVERLOADED AND JUST DON'T HAVE THE CAPACITY TO DEAL WITH THESE KNOWN ISSUES! THE HELP-LINES ARE FULL OF IMBECILES WHO REALLY ARE SO CONDESCENDING AND QUITE IDIOTIC!
NOW IF WE ALL JUST SAID "SOD THIS" AND WENT AWAY FROM
"VIRGIN CRAPPY-IA!" - THEN ALL THEIR DRIBBLE OF EXCUSES WOULD
PERHAPS ONLY MAKE SENSE TO THEM! - LET'S ALL DO IT, REALLY!!! -
I've been with ntl for some years and the only problems I've had have been when the engineer installing someone's else phone managed to disconnect mine - twice. But it was always sorted within 48 hours. It happened for the third time TEN days ago but trying to get Virgin Mediocre to fix it has proved impossible. They've failed to even acknowledge that there is a problem despite having phoned them twice and emailed them on a daily basis. The response to my first email was faster than I expected as the automated response had said it could take up to eight days. When I phoned I got the usual drivel, as reported above, and fed the call box in excess of £2.00 for nothing. On returning home there was the first email response requesting the account number and a password (?). We've never had a password other than for email (and why would you need a password to fix the phone? It's hardly a financial transaction). My son pays the account and was out of the country so there was nothing they could do. I rarely use the phone but this week needed it more than I've ever done as my son is getting married and needed to contact me - and I him - to make various arrangements. When he returned he called VM using his mobile and was kept on hold for half an hour. When he complained they read from the usual script telling him that calls from a VM phone were free. Hello? They asked us to check the phones like I hadn't already done that and refused to accept that the fault could possibly be theirs. The call lasted an hour and was a complete waste of time - they've done nothing. Several emails later and a week of frustration trying to arrange things without a phone (washing machine broke, cat needed to go to vet, deliveries needed to be rescheduled, etc. etc.) I've managed to contact BT on line to arrange a connection next week. All their numbers are free and the friendly banter was refreshing to say the least. Does VM care that someone might need the emergency services, could be disabled, sick, have a sick child, is dependent on a phone for work and so? Do they hell! Needless to say, we've now given their appalling service notice. Both my sons had planned switching to Virgin Mobile and I'd planned getting a VM mobile phone. And we were making several calls overseas. It's beyond belief that they can treat customers with such contempt. What a bunch of f***wits and ripoff merchants. Branson should be ashamed.
-
I totally agree with Angry Person.
All the network was down a day and half, couple of days later down again, four day's later no internet all evening....!
D'ya know they actually offered me £2.00 compensation of my next bill which never was deducted..... I told them to put it where monky's put's peanuts.
They give me 3 incorrect 09 numbers to dial... I played hell cos I had to use the mobile and the neighbours phone (BT) which I told was free and isn't, along with other numbers I was told to dial, on all occassions.
Well Messers Virgin the bill ain't gonna get paid til I get some answers and reimbursement I made it known verbally and in writing - I am awaiting thier response on this matter.
"Sod em".
David
Nr Manchester UK -
Hi
Im on 4Mb with Virgin who state that they have no download limit , but lately i have notice that after i have downloaded 1Gb a day my speed drops to 2Mb
Anyone else finding this
Bill.... -
why are you guys going on about branson and it's his fault? for the record NTL brought virgin mobile and were given the rights to use the virgin media brand name an RB gets his share of profits at whatever percent. I don't agree with the 25p per minute charge but then other providers can and do charge more for basically the same level of service although this is a hit and miss affair on who answers your call. No service is perfect, i have had many issues with virgin media but eventually i do get issues resolved mainly by bashing head on my table during the call lol. People need to realise the more people that go online at the same time the download speed will drop, just think a 3 lane motorway with 200 cars in each lane, then there becomes only one lane 400 cars have to move over somehow into the remaining one lane, this causes people to slow down and those who have a caravan cause havoc in internet term heavy users lol. oh well if you want 100 meg connections move to sweden :)
-
i have payed for 2mbs internet with virgin media.
i acctualy get 0.80mbs.
i rang the number that costs 25p a min and they kept me on ages and repeating i must have a program conflicting issue or a very bad virus.
well i ran my norton 2007 and found nothing on that then i ran my spyware terminator and found nothing on that so i ran my system mechanic and that only found a bit of clutter and removed it automatically.
i took my p/c into a shop near me at a cost to myself off 20.00 only to be told i have done everything correctly and i shouldnt have bothered taking my p/c as there 8mbs service was giving 8.2mbs output on my p/c.
i now believe that virgin media are full of crap and dont care about there customers and continually lie to keep you holding on and get more money from us,
because the guy who looked at my p/c says there at fault on there end as it seems perfect at there end.
i didnt want to pay 20.00 to him as he hadnt really done a single thing in my eyes,but i needed my p/c back asap,and he said i will keep it here if you cant pay today and you can pick it up when you have the money if you dont have enough on you.
see the problems they cause people like us.
im a newcommer on the p/c but getting to grips with it very fast now.
TALK ABOUT BEING CONNED BY VIRGIN MEDIA,SHURLY THATS PROOF ENOUGH FOR YOU GUYS OUT THERE.
THANKS FOR READING THIS HOPE YOU ALL GET JUSTICE AND ARE NOT BEING TAKEN IN BY THESE PRATTS LIKE I WAS.
WAYNE. -
been with virgin media since it was telewest.
2 yrs ago my wall was knocked down by the council and the council lorry ripped the wire from the ground at both ends.
two years on i have slow crap internet crackling phone line that has a terific echo when i speak to my sister on virgin who is having bt installed,and a loss of tv services mostly at night when i want to settle down with my family.
they have cut the cable at the wall and joined it twice but its even worse now,and i have 2 newer joins to add to my first join since the lorry did the damage.
i have been waiting in for bloody ages as they promise me on 5 times i would get a repull of the cable each time the cable guys turn up and say we need a heavy crew to remove the blokage.
WHAT BLOCKAGE ITS ALL READY INSTALLED AND JUST NEEDS A CABLE PULLED TO IT AGAIN TO REPLACE TO DAMAGED ONE.
THEY NEED A HEAVY CREW TO DID 5 INCHES DOWN IN TO LOOSE SOIL AND PUSH A CABLE THROUGH A HOLE BIGGER THAN THE ONE THEY NEED TO PUT IN.
they used to be good and fast at there jobs before in the old days but they are really a joke now as they become the worst cable supplier in the uk ever.
shurly if they left me the tools i could have done it myself 2yrs ago.
another thing they say they need to pull the old cable out altogether and start again by drilling a new hole for the wire to go through.
why not use the hole already there its 5 inches down why make my wall a mess,are you all tecnically stupid virgin.
you dont need a construction crew to go down 5 inches and through a hole bigger than the cable your installing.
i cant believe they are now leaving it another month and a half again.
this is the 6th instal they have promised now.
i threatend then with leagal action and getting in touch with bbc watchdog and they offered me 103.50 compensation and half price phone and internet for ever,and i said i have sky now i dont want there crappy tv package anymore.
then i realised if there doing the cable maybe i can keep the tv and use it as a freeview box for my bedroom when the instals done at last.
it will be done this time im assured.anfd it will be because if they dont i am taking the keys from the drivers van or werever that he pputs them and holding the van to ransome.
THIS I SWEAR TO YOU OUT THERE WHO ARE BEING TREATED UNJUSTLY BY VIRGIN MEDIA,AND ARE BEING HELD HOSTAGE BY YOUR CONTRACTS.
ILL HOLD THEM UNTILL A CREW DO MY JOB IN FULL.
AND RING THE LOCAL EXPRESS AND STAR TO ALERT THEM OF MY SITUATION.
TO GET THIS NOTICED.
watch this space like i say they better get it done this time or ill carry out my threat in full.
mideon. -
BY THE WAY DID I TELL YOU I HAD HAD 6 SET-TOP BOXES AS THEY ALL WENT INSIDE DUE TO FAULTY PARTS AND THEY WERE ALL RECONDITIONED BOXES.
IM ON MY 7TH TO DATE. -
I keep getting charged for a Tv box i dont have,told them five times now that i dont have one and they keep telling me that its sorted.This month i got two bills totalling £30 when i only pay £10 for internet and charges for my phone (the line rental is meant to be free),its a joke.
-
ok its not as bad as eveyone is making out if its virgins fault you get your money back, you only get your speed reduced if you download more than 3Gb during peek times, and you dont get put on hold when your call the premium rate line as thats against the law! Switch to bt all you like as its an ADSL service which is rubbish as anyone any computer knowledge will tell you!
-
I'll be cancelling my subscription to Virgin Media's broadband service tomorrow. Since the changes to their service to cap speeds for high usage users, every night my supposedly 10 mb connection drops to under 4mb. It wouldn't be so bad if I was still able to browse/play games online as you'd presume you'd be able to do with a 3 or 4mb connection, but that simply isnt the case. Web pages take forever to load or simply time out and playing games is as frustrating as my phonecall to the morons who staff their phone lines tomorrow will be.
Oddly, when I take the PC over my folks and network it with their non Virgin Media broadband PCs...no issues. Weird.
Despite having only slightly less inept customer services, when everything was running smoothly with NTL atleast you got the speed you were paying for and I'm a little confused how things can have changed so much....
Oh and their speed cap thing is ******** aswell. My PC hasn't been turned on for the past 2 days, thus I've downloaded nothing, yet as soon as I turned it on today - 4mb connection again. It truly bothers me that I'm such a nerd I notice things like crappy broadband performance but there must be countless people across the country paying to get bent over by Virgin Media and just presuming that's the way it's meant to be.... -
Won't be 25p - just go to saynotto870.com and they will probably have the local number you can dial... for free f you have a free landline deal :)
-
Wish I'd read all this before signing to virgin. We had been ntl customers for nearly 10 years and only had 1 real problem in that time which ended up with them crediting us a lot of money spent on calls to their help line. Our broadband with ntl was stable and fast enough at 1mb. however i thought it was time we "upgraded"our connection so as the new provider anyway, opted for the 8mb bundle. We have had nothing but trouble with this since we signed up. Our connection disconnects at least a dozen times a day. their customer services peeps are a bunch of dumb retards, at 1 point telling us it was a bt problem cause there was already broadband on the line. WTF????? VERY irate phone call back to the dummies. The best connection i have had so far when using this sites test is 3mb at 6am. My usual connection seems to be less than 1mb, and the other night it was
-
I personally dont think Virgin Media is that bad
my broadband will occasionally run slow - all you have to do is switch off the router for 10-20 seconds and it will run fast
in all fairness Virgin Media cant help how fast your broadband runs i find that late night/early morning it is much faster because barely nobody is on if youre on during peak times then obviously its going to be slow think how many people in your area are on the internet downloading.
The call price is ridiculous but from experience if you pay and its their fault they deduct the price off the call off your next phone bill so maybe you should turn off your PC. switch off the router, reboot the internet before you phone them and they tell you to do all those things so you can say ive done this and ive done that, this isnt my problem its yours they its free
some people are so over reactive
youre not the only ones using this service everyones runs slow sometimes -
Absolute classic! We have been without a phone connection for over three weeks now and today received a letter from VM that, in one sentence, stated that they were sorry we had no connection and that they'd tried to phone us but without any success!
-
"Kyle Jul 2nd, 2007 at 7:24 pm
The charges are still cheaper than most places, yeah BT can provide the internet. BUT ooo its ADSL. ill stick with DSL any day.
I have never had any problems with telewest or virgin, never needed to call. as i dont have stupid problems like…
oo i cant connect to the internet coz the modem is in standby,or oh my pc is not turned on.try and fix it yourself.use a friends connection and itll be free….
and its only 25ppm, thats gonna ruin my pention that is LOL"
MUPPET - what are you on about "I'll stick with DSL any day"? aDSL *IS* a type of DSL! Cable networks are something else entirely. But with your advanced knowledge you still slag off people for having problems, when they probably know a LOT more about PCs than you! "my PC isn't turned on", as if! You probably pay for the helpline and internet with your mum's credit card. I assume this, as you haven't learnt to spell yet, either.
Me - I have an advanced network in my house, but there's still problems caused by virgin. Like the modem not synching properly. Poor peak time speeds, which is what the damn speed capping is supposed to protect us from, right? If Virgin aren't causing the problems and it's my setup, then why the hell does the speed always come at full at 2am, but at peak times it's always poor? -
Oh, and saynoto0870.com's a great site, but those slippery sods at virgin have blocked all the 0800 numbers, and the best you can do is 0845. Plus you ring, go through the menus, and then they say 'Customer Service is open 8am - 10pm', then certain sections aren't anyway, so why be misleading?
-
jakinaboks, I don't know whether to laugh or cry.
They're rubbish. I'm having problems similar to some of the posts above. In my case, I haven't had an internet connection for over a month. I've been through the awful tech support lines (I'm paying to be patronised? please change the script.) I've had engineers round to diagnose the problem, and a stealth crew to fix the problem (they didn't say hello or leave a calling card : I took the morning off work and was told later this wasn't necessary -- cheers). I think this is a failure on their part to provide the service. Am I within my rights to cancel without penalty? I'm afraid that such a course of action would end with them sending debt collectors; perhaps, in good old VM style, by mistake. I don't want to give them any excuse. But I'm loathe to pay off the contract! -
It is now six weeks since Virgin Mediocre inadvertently disconnected our phone and still we've heard nothing - other than five standard letters promising to resolve the situation within 15 days (I suppose that each letter means an additional 15 days so 5 x 15??? It wouldn't surprise me). A letter was sent to:
Steve Burch
CEO Virgin Media Ltd
Media House
Bartley Wood Business Park
Hook
Hampshire
RG27 9UP
but we've not received the courtesy of a reply. We even send it as an attachment to his email address: Steve.burch@ntl.com but judging by the response (from one of his minions) he or they don't know how to open an attachment. Despite a detailed account of everything that had happened, or should I say 'hadn't', and the inclusion of all our details, the response simply said 'We can't do anything without your account number, name and address and the nature of the complaint'. It was in the thread so I can only assume that they are taking the piss. I await the bill knowing full well that they will have charged us for a non-existent phone. As for the speed of the broadband connection, it is getting slower by the day...
Laugh Matt iratewithVM. You have to or else they will drive you insane. -
I miss Telewest. Never once did I have any problems with their customer service. Since Virgin told us what would be better for our Broadband, Telephone and Cable TV needs I suppose we wont have to phone their expensive customer service number since in their eyes they are so perfect and can do no wrong.
This is shocking considering that you can get free Broadband via Sky and the Carphone Warehouse etc. That fiasco with Sky One and Sky News was bad enough (when Branson renamed the EPG Sky Snooze and told us what was best for our viewing needs) and then had the cheek to tell us about 'Fair Play'. Why do we now pay 25 minutes to get help. Supposing we get connected to a Customer Service Advisor who is just out of training and has to run to their team leader to ask questions every two calls, should we pay for that!
No, precisely the reason why I'm getting a BT and Sky combo installed. Good riddens to Virgin.
R.I.P Telewest/NTL Customer Service - You will be missed........... -
Help, I to am an old ntl customer, then suddenly seeing my bank statement, I noticed I had become a Virgin customer. No contract no message nothing, and no
address to write to to cancel my broadband connection with Virgin.
Who and where do I write to please. Do I just cancel my direct debit and wait
to be sent to prison lol. -
I have had problems with Virgin Broadband 3 times after it went down. I haven't got a land line so it cost me a fortune to call on a mobile to try and get them to help.
Each time I spoke to someone, they would ask different questions and nobody ever had a clue. Each time it would take 4 or 5 days for an engineer to turn yet my broadband would work again after 2 or 3 days.
The engineers would never find a problem. One day I went mad and fiddled about with my connection outside in the street and it started working. I only simply moved a wire which seemed fine. I am not am expert yet I had no problems since. Seems even these engineers didn't have a clue. Mind you, my broadband light would alway work anyway.
I think they were just having a laugh.
As soon as my contract ends, I am most definitely moving to another provider. Virgin is shockingly bad especially after the expensive 0906 number plus when it takes an age to understand what anyone can say. -
I reduced my package because it was getting too expensive, how does getting a crappier internet connection and tv package make it cost more than it was before!
(i am currently investigating my phone charges since they cost over 25 pound now and cost 15 before (i hardly use the phone))
My Tv package has been out for 3 weeks now, they said they would send someone they didn't come!
I phoned again but they said there computers where down and they would get back to me, THEY DIDN'T!!!!
I phoned again and they said they would deduct from the bill the time the tv was down and that will be starting from that day to the week it will take for someone to come round, "But it been out for 3 weeks" i say, "but that isn't down on our computers" they say!
arrhhhhhg your computers where down you said you would phone and you didn't HOW IS THAT ANYTHING TO DO WITH ME!!!!
on top of that IF you dont pay with direct debit they charge you an extra 5 pounds, if you pay the bill late they will charge you a 10 pound late payment charge.
Hey Virgin WHEN DO I GET TO CHARGE YOU 10 POUNDS FOR NOT TURNING UP, YOU WONT EVEN TAKE OFF THE MONEY FOR SERVICES YOU HAVEN'T PROVIDED!!!
I always loved Telewest they where a great provider, i feel like someone has take my perfect child and replaced it with a a retarded baby hippo. -
can anyone tell me how to get a virgin media email address so i can install pc guard as is wont install without one. is it something to do with the broadband disc not installing even though virgin say its not a problem, its been a problem since they took over
-
Does anyone know any good broadband phone provider. Virgin is completely rubbish. I was supposed to pay £18 a month for broadband, they have just taken £90.............. What is the problem with these people? And the customer service guy I just rang hung up on me because he couldn't deal with my query!!!!!
If you haven't joined them yet, please don't. Don't be fooled by the 2 for £20 or 3 for £30 rubbish they do. U don't really get the service, and they not there to help. -
I just got off the phone with Virgin media and after speaking to various people of various degrees of uselessness they put me through to customer services (I started off in 'general enquiries' which was the height of uselessness) and eventually reduced the charge of my 4mb connection to the price of a 2mb connection....
Which is kind of ironic, because they are 'traffic shaping' my connection so that it is only 2mb anyway...So really, now I am getting what I pay for...
The girl told me that it was 'unlimited' in the sense that I could use the service as much as I wanted...I told her to stop playing games with semantics, I was paying for an unlimited 4mb connection and getting a 2mb connection most of the time.
Most of the people I spoke with claimed they had no knowledge of 'traffic shaping' going on and I had to get quite angry before they forwarded me to the people who did know and could do something...They made me wait about half an hour (no joking) on hold to finally get through to the right people...Their 'on hold' music could be used as a torture device and I think it is specifically designed to make you hang up before you actually get through to anyone of any use to you...
I also phoned Ofcom 020 7981 3000 and registered a complaint with them about the 09 number and the limited, 'unlimited' broadband...
Everyone should complain and force them to change, this is not an ethical way to do business. -
When we moved to this house, we decided to go with virgin broadband since BT wanted to charge us 150 pounds for the installation, (although the monthly payments would be a little cheaper than virgin) and virgin was a 20 Mbit connection.
It was all lies. First, we waited 2 weeks for their installation engineers to come at the scheduled day, and then they called us saying they can't come and we had to sign up for another time period. WTF? Then we had to wait 2 more weeks for them to show up. They could not find a box outside our house so they had to pull the cables from a box that is miles away, and they were not finished until around 10-11 pm. Our neighbours were upset.
Later we found out that because of this crap long distance wiring our effective connection speed dropped to 6Mbits.
But this was not the only problem we had. During peak times which covers a pretty broad time period from 6 pm to 12 pm, their internet service becomes a joke. My housemate ran various benchmarks checking broadband speed, and our packet loss was above 80% day after day during this time. It was so terrible, it was not even possible to connect to a simple messenger utility such as msn during this time. Download speeds were one digit numbers. Apparently, this congestion problem was not something that can be fixed, it was something everyone complains about.
We have had constant problems with their service, and had to call their support every few weeks during our three months we spent using them. Of course, the 25p per minute they charge to let us talk to their "support" staff at india doesn't help. They repeatedly sent engineers over. Their first engineer never showed up. Their second engineer rang our door at 8 am waking up everyone in the house, only to say they do not deal with connection problems. What a bunch of jerks! Their third engineer finally admitted that our connection speed was lower than normal, and arranged for the installation engineers to come over again, in THREE WEEKS.
Guess what? They never showed up. We spent three months paying for their apalling connection, and were sick of the service we receive, so the next day we called virgin and cancelled our conract. Yes, you heart it right! We told them how terrible the connection was, and that we refused to pay them any more money, and they agreed to cancel our contract even though it was for 12 months and we've only used them for 3. They said our service would be disconnected in 24 hours, but it's been days, and we can still use it fine.
I repeat, It IS possible to cancel your contract, so you too should stop paying them for their joke of a service, and switch to another provider! Everyone suggests Zen broadband, so we are switching over to them. Plusnet is also reputed to be a good choice.
Spread the word, for a virgin-free world. -
I've only been with them since September because of nightmare service with AOL, but I bloody hate them already. Their email service is complete and total crap and I'm really cheesed off at the thought of increasing my phone bill because they can't seem to provide even a basic service. Emails cut off halfway through, save themselves to draft, and lose half the text. Cut and paste seems to be really hit and miss and that's no good at all when you're part of a research team who all communicate by email. I'm having to forward the entire ruddy texts including headers and other crap because it's absolutely refusing to just cut and paste the parts I want. I got one of their helplines assistants online and all he'd say to me was that they had a mail outage, couldn't help me, and then he disappeared! I wish Richard Branson and the entire Virgin set up would disappear in one of his balloons tonight:(
-
Watch out for virgin media e-mails regarding free broadband speed upgrade to
8 mbps. You change to a "bundle" which includes changing from your current telephone company. When you cancel free weekend and evening calls you get hit with a £170.39 cancellation charge. So you call them up on an 0845 number, get past from pillar to post. 20 minutes later they have procrastenated so much it becomes infuriating. Just to tell you that you shouldn't have been charged a cancellation fee because you cancelled before anything was set up. Meanwhile they've got money in the bank from your call. "Dick Turpin wore a mask" is all I can say. I'm going to have to change to another ISP because their network is always temporarily down and they defraud money from me. -
You used to be able to contact Virgin via a messenger style utility on their web site.
It was Idea'l for getting problems resolved quickly.
The sneaky basts have even took that feature away now. -
I think 0870 013 0070 was the old number
-
Folks, I have read a few of the previous responses. I sorry if I’m sounding like I teaching you to such eggs, but, folks, you do realise you are phoning a call centre. In a lot of places, the people there are just bums on seats. They don’t give 2 about your problem. tis just get you off the phone ASAP and get onto the next. It is called cust service but I ask you, what call centre is customer service?!?
Word of advice from someone who has worked and managed these type of people that you call:
1. don’t get angry during the call – if you call and show your pissedoffness during the call, then the chances are no one will be willing to help you. This also and more importantly, goes for sarcastic responses. More than likely, you will get a even more sarcastic answer.
2. try to deal with the problem with the techie / repair people as much as possible. Most of those people have got IT experience. What I’m saying is try to sort it out without bringing the manager in. from my experience, it is timing. If I was dealing with something that didn’t take too much time, I was very willing to take a call, but if I was under pressure to get stuff sorted out for the next day, then I was very unwilling to take a call, I asked the advisor to sort it out themselves. I’ll ask you ….. “the manager is not avail at this time�…… sound familiar?? Yes you are nodding. But in my defence, so you don’t all hate me, I always asked my advisor, if the customer still wanted to speak to me, then I wanted them to get a name and number for me to call them back with a suitable time frame. Try that, ask to give name, number and suitable time for call back.
3. A lot of companies have a complaints process. Go with it. It will take longer but the people in the complaints dept can offer you a hell of a lot more than your average ….. “Hello you are through to….�. but in saying that, there are companies that have the policy that if you speak to the manager before the complaint dept then they cannot help you as they have to go by what the manager said. Cannot go back down the grapevine. I would say speak to the advisor, speak to complaints, then speak to manger then speak to performance manager (the manager’s manager) then ask for the address / email for the company’s general / formal complaints dept. when it gets to that stage, there is no point asking for a phone number. There is never one, or one that is open to the public.
4. if making a complaint. If the company has annoyed you, before calling them, get a pen and paper. Note down the time and date you started the call. The time you got answered. Who you are speaking with. The time you are transferred, and the time to get answered again. What the prob is. What they asked you to do to solve it. Did it work? I say this because if you need to call back the next day and the same person is working there, if you ask for ie “is chris avail?� then chris might remember you and have more knowledge about the prob you are having and you don’t have to repeat yourself which is most annoying. If you do have to repeat yourself, don’t say the lines of “ I’m tired of explaining this….� Most of the time you have be passed to someone who knows nothing about your situation.
5. The first few seconds are very important. If you are sounding angry, then the advisor wont want to know. If you make them sound the smallest bit important, then they will be very helpful.
Folk, I hope this makes sense and helps you out. This is just from my experience. Experience of call centres from the other side. But one thing I will say….. Good Luck! -
i signed upto telewest broadband 4 yrs ago and it was a good service i had no problems what so ever then virgin media took over i started on 2mb broadband then they upgraded it to the 4mb then 10mb then last but not least there super fast 20mb which i dont even get half the time im constantley on the phone complaining to them all i get is swictch off your modem at the wall blah blah and it still runs crap what do i pay £37 a month alone for there internet service which runs like a 56k modem and im also sick of there premium rate service just to ring them and the 35 admin charge and the £10 late payment charge where does all this money go to because its not to us customers thats for sure on making sure that there customers are satisfied they also like to swicth your internet service of for the fun of it then you have to ring the status line just to find out whats wrong then when you complian to them they say our techicians are dealing with the problem but they still want you to pay there bill every month even when they have made the mistake in the first place and dont say sorry for the inconvience that they might have caused you its pay your bill or well cut you off i wish there was another company out there that would buy that arrogant money minded pig out and give us all a break and give us what we pay for. hes just greedy like microsoft they want your money but dont want to help you when something goes wrong. I hope you read this because its true yours a very dissapionted virgin media customer.
-
A Fast internet connection... last time i had that was with NTL 600KB.
A connection faster than my current 2MB Virgin connection.... last time I had that (excluding the 600KB BB) was 7 years ago on dial-up 56K when it was possible to play graphical games on Dial-up against Players in ths US!
Maybe less, really is more!?
Currently internet banking would be quicker if I walked to the bank at 8:30 at night, getting there for 9am in the morning.
It would be quicker to paint with Oil than Downloading Pictures
And as for the Email.. Many a time I have watched my NTLworld account download 4 emails in 2 minutes for the grand size of 21KB in total!
Occassionally the internet will run quicker, some downloads and updates will be quick (averaging about 70Kbps), some 30MB downloads (like last night) will take 27 minutes.
I am currently owed £4.25 10p for 17 minutes of international chat, to be told it is my PC... Funny how it is also slow with alternative PCs on the exact same connection that are brought into my house to test if it really might be my PC (I fell for their joke), .. Maybe it is just all of our PCs to blame! -
i was with Telewest who were ok, but the service has really deteriorated since they were taken over by Virgin Media -- tho i did manage just once to get my premium line support costs repayed -- it took 20 minutes of stubborm arguement before the customer support guy finally gave in and admitted the fault was at their end -- but what does he care? he's getting paid, while i'm wasting my time -- so now, when internet access goes down, i just wait for another 'customer' to report it, and i do something else for the rest of the night -- the only reason they're still able to compete in the broadband market is because lots of their customers live too far from BT exchanges to be able to get fast access internet over a BT line
Add your comment now
Broadband news & views
* Past couple of days
Bored with your smartphone? Then get wood!- T-Mobile raises the stakes: Full Monty smartphone deal offers unlimited everything
- Virgin Media 100MB rollout is ahead of schedule
- Virgin Media leads the way as average UK home broadband speed rises above 7Mb
- Sky 2012: More smartphone and internet TV, plus Wi-Fi and fibre broadband
Have your say
News & views
Editor's blog
Expert help and advice
Money-saving deals- Latest broadband news
Press releases
Meet the Broadband Genie editorial team
Top 5 Broadband Genie Guides
Broadband Beginners Guide
Mobile Broadband Beginners Guide
How to Switch Broadband Provider
Using Mobile Broadband Abroad
Mobile Broadband Awards
