Virgin Media: Haggle down your costs.

alison74

FemaleGamer wrote:

Our current package is:
Starter TV £5.50
Telephone Line Rental £10.50 (soon to be £11)
4Mb Cable BB £25

Well I read this thread, wrote down facts and figures, summoned up my courage and phoned Telewest to see if they would offer any type of deal (hoping for a price drop on the BB) but got a smarmy guy who kept saying to everything "I quite understand..." and then said that he couldn't do anything to reduce the amount we pay each month, apart from cutting our broadband from 4Mb to 2Mb so that we could pay less that way :huh: . Or he could charge us more by changing our phone to Talk Evenings and Weekends...this is after I said that we don't use the phone much anyway! (average bill £4)
If his motive was to confuse the hell out of me and make me go away with my brain hurting, it worked ! :wall:
I'm too intimidated to try again.

I do encourage you to try again - although they might have it on their system that you phoned earlier to try and reduce it as the woman I spoke to said 'it's the best I can do since you phone up quite a lot asking for discounts'. I went off on one saying that if she actually LOOKED at the last two times I phoned TW that it was to fix my broken broadband and to upgrade my phone to talk evenings.

She left it at that.

Are you trying the cancellation line or 150 ? Just go right to cancellations and say can I give my 30 days notice and if they mention you called earlier, just say that you have now made your mind up that it will be cheaper to move to TT.

Don't agree with anything they say (look at my previous entry on this thread when the woman told me if I bought a digi box it would break down ?!) They are clutching at straws.

You have to be confident, almost bordering on the cocky and threatening to leave every time and say things like 'well why should I stay ?'

That was the key line for me, and she said 'well what would make you stay' and I said - free services and we then negotiated our deal.

YOU CAN DO IT ! And you will feel so much better for doing so afterwards.

Good luck !

dipideee

Phoned NTL, was on the 3 for £30 deal, (basic tv, phone line,1mb broadband)now upgraded to talk unlimited evening and weekends, internet speed has quadrupled to 4mb and there is a slight reduction in price to £28.50. The offer is for 12 months.

Thanks Martin and everyone else.

PP

bergy2

Telewest Before
2MB Braodband £17-99
Basic TV - Free - 6 months cos I haggled and asked them to take it
Phone Rental £11
Total £29

I called up armed with all the info and having phoned BT offering a 3 month tie in to line rental - said I had phoned BT and wanted to go to TT purely on price - got a spiel about Bulldog and TTs broadband waiting and a load of nonsense that TT is 512KB speed - which I corrected and said we were unbundled and can get 6MB here in Bristol

Best offer 2MB with Talk w/e and evenings £31

I said I wanted something equivalent or I am off
Eventually agreed cancellation for 9.6.06 and my parting line was asked his name and said straight after I was calling BT and theres no going back so if anyone calls I will quote him and his rather sad offer as the reason I am not returning

Went downstairs and told my wife we may not have broadband fer a bit - she was ahm shall we say slightly saying 'wot you wot'

Then the guy phones back after 5 minutes and offers £20-99 for 2 MB and Evenings/ Weekends - I said I wanted Talk International free as well - haggled and got the lot fer 6 months - can see what TT is like at that point

So got

Talk Int £3
Talk w/e and evenings with line rental £16-50
TV £5-50
2MB BB £17-99
Total normally - £43 or so


All fer £20-99 fer 6 months

The 5 minutes of panic was worth it and I would have left by the way so wasn't deceiving anyone

jonder

One very quick phone call to NTL and they gave me 2mg BB ( upgraded on the 1st June to 4mg ) for £12.50 and talk unlimited 24 free for life. That's a saving of £27 per month, not including saving on phone calls, or £324 per year.

Quaff

Previous:
Phone: £10.50
1mb B/B: £17.99

Now:
Unlimited 24hr UK Phone: £11.00
10mb B/B: £12.50

That was easier than riding a bike. Phoned NTL said that I had been in The Carphone Warehouse and they had offered me Talk Talk with free 8mb broadband. I was immediately put through to Disconnections where they up graded my package to £23 per month for unlimited UK 24 hr calls and up graded unlimited 10mb broadband.

I also make a lot of international daytime calls and they also offered to monitor my account and credit me £25 a month on my international calls

I've been an NTL customer for 15 years, I'm ecstatic with the 10mb broadband

fabulous_sweetie

Thank you all so much for your advice. I'm with NTL, my current package is:
2 meg broadband - £24.99
Phone + talk unlimited £16.50
TV base pack - £11.00
Total each month £52.49

Spoke to a very polite man at NTL and mentioned the Talk talk deal. Although he tried to talk me out of going to them by mentioning all the disadvantages, I explained that I'm on a low income and that really it's the monthly cost that's important to me. He then offered me:
1 meg broadband for £9.99 - to be upgraded to 2 meg in June
TV + phone + talk unlimited for £16.50
Monthly total £26.49!!!

So I have the same package except that I lose 1 meg of broadband for a month only, and I'm saving nearly £30! Thank you thank you thank you - I would never have thought to ask for a discount if it hadn't been for all of you!

tranceaddict

Woo Woo Woo!!!

This is my first ever post, but I had to tell you all how easy this is.

I've been with NTL over 5 years with Broadband and Phone (no TV) , after reading this thread I decided to phone the number (I usually hate doing things like that I'm not very good on the phone and back down to easily) anyway got through straight away (no holding) to a very nice lady, all I said was I had read about Talk Talk and Bulldog etc and was there anything they could do for me. Instant 50% reduction in my 2Mb Broadband rental to £12.49 per month (which will go up to 4Mb on 1st June) plus free evening and weekend calls, all with immediate effect.

She did say it was for three months at present, but they would call me back in three months to discuss, I've made a note on the calendar to call them if not.

I advise all to do it straight away, easiest money I've ever made, thank you moneysavers

Moviestar

Just got not to bad a deal of NTL

They offerd me at first:
Matched Talk talk but at 2 meg going up to 4 meg broadband and TV package for £31.00
I said no
They then offered 10 meg broadband instead of 4 so I said ah ok then well happy with that.
Plus they have upgraded my 1 meg now to 2 untill an engineer can come around to install new 10meg modem.

Well happy

gelato_cat

Can I just ask what modem you currently have? I think I might need mine upgraded too if I increase my speed.

Do you have to pay for installation?

How long do you have to wait for it?

Suze

Moviestar wrote:

Just got not to bad a deal of NTL

They offerd me at first:
Matched Talk talk but at 2 meg going up to 4 meg broadband and TV package for £31.00
I said no
They then offered 10 meg broadband instead of 4 so I said ah ok then well happy with that.
Plus they have upgraded my 1 meg now to 2 untill an engineer can come around to install new 10meg modem.

Well happy

BigDonut

dipideee wrote:

Phoned NTL, was on the 3 for £30 deal, (basic tv, phone line,1mb broadband)now upgraded to talk unlimited evening and weekends, internet speed has quadrupled to 4mb and there is a slight reduction in price to £28.50. The offer is for 12 months.

Think I will need to phone up. Only been with ntl for 8 months but got through a flyer with my latest bill that says they are putting up the 3 for 30 quid offer to 31 pounds.