Virgin Media Retention thread

grayme-m

I used to be getting a discount on our bill as I'd pointed out that to get phone and BB with alternatives was cheaper, but I noticed a while back that now I am just paying the going rate (£12.50 for L 10mb BB, £11.99 for the phone with free evening calls, total £23.49 after the £1 online billing discount); I'm not sure how that happened.

We've got Freesat (Humax Foxsat HDR) and don't watch much premium TV, so Sky Sports, Movies, etc are of no interest.

I've noticed that with O2 I could get 20mb (11mb in reality) BB and unlimited evening and weekend calls for £10 plus £9.50 (wife uses O2 for mobile).

Given VM are going to to take away the £1 discount, seems interesting that we could save £5 per month by moving to O2.

What I need to work out is if I will have to pay to get the BT line switched back on if I chose to go that route, if VM don't play nicely (either upping my BB speed or dropping my price).


ETA: O2 can't switch on the BT line till a week today and there would probably be a cost to that (plus I'd have to do some rewiring), VM have reduced my M phone and L BB to £20.94pm. :beer:

shelley_crow

After 6 years with Virgin/Telewest, have finally had enough.

I was on a retention deal from least year of L Phone, XL TV and L BB for £35 a month. I opened the email bill and this months charge was almost £60, eek! Rang through to CS, who couldn't tell me why the price had jumped up so much, my actual phone bill was about £1 on top of the monthly charge.

Turns out that they have apparantly wirtten to me to inform me of price increases, I haven't received any letter of any sort from them since I went paperless last year, they didn't email me this information either. They did this to me last year, so I got through to retentions and got a really good deal.

The CS man I spoke to said i was lying about not receiving notification of the change in prices. Can't say I'm too impressed by that.

I wasn't offered any deals to retain my custom, I was put through to disconnections which is unusual.

Does anyone know if I need a MAC code for broadband if i switch to BT from Virgin?

kwikbreaks

MAC is for swap between BT based ISPs and not applicable to cable.

I'd suggest that you research ADSL ISPs as BT is close to the worst one you could choose. LLU is usually the best - check what you can get at http://www.samknows.com/broadband/search.php if O2 or Sky are available then that is the way to go. Checkout the cashback offers at Quidco/TopCashBack and sign up through them when you've got the BT phone line installed.

sblore

Virgin have hiked my price from £47.45 a month to £53.10

Apparently I called them and requested my broadband was upgraded to L (I had the M package)
The best bit was, I was not in the country at the time they say I called - they can't provide a recording of the call either.
To cut a long story short, after threatening legal action, they put a credit on my account to counter the increase.

However, my contract us up on the 24th September and I'm after a better deal.

Currently have....

XL TV
L Broadband
XL Phone
Line rental
Multi Room

Totalled at £53.10

I don't use the home phone really, so if I dropped the phone to M, it would make the costs £47.49 as a new customer.

I'm ignoring the loyalty discount showing on the bill as it's a fictional figure anyway - I'm saving about £4 compared to a new customer (before they get 2 months free)

What sort of price do you think I could get?

With a bit of haggling with Sky, I've been offered free line rental on top of the current offer, making TV, Broadband, multiroom, Phone and line rental £43.00, but Virgin say this isn't like for like as doesn't include ESPN (that I don't use) or HD TV - which I'm not fussed about either.

Any ideas on how to tackle this?

Thanks.

As a footnote - I've tried getting Virgin to match prices on here before, but they will only do it with an account number or telephone number to confirm the deal.

Madison

I'm with Sky for the TV - £21.00 a month (old Sky box so no HD) and it's about to increase to £22.00 a month. They've just offered me enhanced TV package, broadband and phone for £44.50 per month. However, I'd need to pay for a HD box (29.00) and line installation (39.00). Sky's phone allows me to phone abroad anytime for free but mobiles cost.

I'm with Virgin for the phone: £11.99 line rental plus £29.00 talk anywhere (useful as I phone abroad a lot) and it's also free to mobiles and non-geographical numbers.

They offered me XL plus TV and 10 meg broadband for £76.50 per month with free installation but I'd have to pay £49.00 for the box.

Sky would seem the better deal given that I get free mobile calls on my 02 contract but I'm put off by the 5meg of broadband through my phone line. I could go with their free broadband option for £37.50 per month and get my broadband from Virgin for £12.50 per month. I'll see what Virgin come up with when I call them.

Anyone coping with 5meg of broadband - seems pretty low to me.

mobile48

Has anyone tried to cancel with Virgin Media and been refused as it is not possible until they first pay off the balance.

Happen to someone I know this week Virgin wanted money first and just refused to allow them to cancel without it.

isotonic_uk

Does anyone know what the operating hours are for the Retentions department?

grayme-m

isotonic_uk wrote: »

Does anyone know what the operating hours are for the Retentions department?

I believe they are up to 8pm weekdays, but if you call them on 150 they have a recorded message.

Ann-Dolphin

Hi all,

Been with VM for over 3 years now but moved house a year ago and retentions told me they set up a brand new account if you move home, so they cannot see the history. But they claim to transfer the loyalty discounts when you move, which is good, but when you come to renegotiate the contract a year later it may be a bit of a problem.

Anyway, I paid £56 last month with calls so I thought it was too steep. Called retentions and they got me TV M, Broadband L and Phone M for £25.99 a month. I got V+ box already but they gave me 3 months free on that, the package will go up to £31.99 after 3 months. And there's no contract, which is great. And they will send me a free N wireless router for free, I just have to pay for postage.

Sounds like an all right deal, I'm sure it can be beaten though if you haggle for long enough

qxt123

Been with virgin for 2 years now, but they weren't able to offer me any deals this time round so I think I'll switch to O2. Been a good service nonetheless.