Virgin Media: Haggle down your costs.

niklang

I was paying £25 a month for my 4mb broadband plus around £20 a month for my phone (free evening and weekend calls and a reduced calls to mobile phones rate). I phoned up to see what could be done and by threatening to shift all my services over to Sky I got an instant reduction down to £19.95 a month! That also includes unlimited calls to landlines so I have ended up with a better package for less than half the price. I have to say it took all of 5 minutes to do and the guy couldn't have been more helpful. So it certainly pays to call Virgin media as they are making a lot of money off people who are willing to keep paying over the odds.

Lets just hope they get my bills right as I have had trouble there before :-)

lu_lu_2

I phoned Telewest and told them I couldn't afford them, was offered an increased broadband speed, said I didn't need that but needed to reduce my bills. As I had been with them for a number of years was told to talk to their loyalty dept. When I asked to be transferred was told I would have to phone in again - didn't bother. Phoned BT and arranged to transfer back to them. Some days later I rec'd a call from Telewest loyalty dept. who have done me a "lifetime" deal because I have been with them for a long time. Have got:

4mg BB going up to 10 shortly
Free national & local calls daytime/evening & W/e
line rental/cable TV

£20 per month. I was paying £37 pm + being charged for weekday phone calls

It would appear that starting the switch back to BT gets a better result - so go for it Moneysavers!

jax8008_2

Think I'm going to give it a go. Just telephoned BT to find out it will cost £125 to switch back, with £11 month line rental £132 and then with the cashback sky saving spotted on this great website, I think I will be much better off!! But, will see what VM have to offer first.

doire_2

OK im paying

£11 for phone plus £7.95 line rental
Broadband 2mb £18!!! :mad:

I rang up Virgin and said i want to cancel as i dont think my package is value for money and £18 for 2mb is a joke.

She offered phone and 20mb broadband for £37

I said i dont want 20mb broadband and £37 is more than i can afford. She said that the best deal i can get.

I asked to be put through to rententions and she put me through.

I hung up! :eek:

What can i say to get my broadband done? I quoted SKY'S 3 for £16 and it didnt help

doire_2

OK

Rang back twice

The second time they put me right through to someone in customer rententions.

He was very helpful. I quoted SKY and TalkTalk and their prices.
He waffled about SKYs line rental was not inlcuded in their price but i said TalkTalks line rental was

After a pause he gave me three options to choose.

So i picked Talk Unlimited, discounted international calls, 25% off mobile calls, TV and broadband for only £19.95 per month. With line rental included!

Im more than happy with this!
I was paying £18 for my broadband alone! :j

Thanks to this forum i have saved a nice little sum per month :T

Everyone should try it and if they offer you nothing then ring back!

Good luck

Equinox

£11 ... Line rental (+£1.50 for international)
£18 ... 2Mb broadband

---

£30.50

Phoned up just now and got it cut to £16.50. Practically half price. Although this isn't as good as everyone else's deal here ... I was nervous about it all :rolleyes:.

Phoned up to the disconnections department and asked for my MAC code to show I've been seriously thinking of leaving. They asked me why and if I was happy about their service so far, and what my internet usage was. Pretty friendly guy, and straightaway the guy offered me the present deal which I accepted.

He did offer me the 4Mb deal for £23.50 (which is going to go upto 10Mb), but I asked if I could upgrade later on, which he said I could.

Am stuck in a 12month deal with VM though. Could've done better with the TV (although we didn't really need it) and the phone usage (even though we're not heavy phone users).

All the same thanks MSE :j.

jodiej_2

We are VM customers and just moved house. Our tv and broadband is working but there is a problem with the phoneline. We have to wait 10 days before someone can come out to fix it!!! in the mean time they said we will not be paying for our interet and tv.

We asked if we get compensation for having to use mobiles in the mean time and they said yes £3.60. Rubbish or what? the call to them from a mobile probably cost about that much.

We asked how we can complain about this and were told we can't because she has told us how it is and that is that. We will see about that.....

Not very happy with their service but we are tied into a 12 month contract and don't wna to have to pay the megabucks of getting connected to BT in order to get talk talk

Tailslide

Been a happy NTL customer for 9 years and didn't pay a lot of attention to the Virgin bills as they came in... till now.

Currently paying:
Phone - £11pm
Broadband L - £25pm
TV XL - £20.50pm

Can't believe that I'm paying £25pm for Broadband! So after a little research I rang them and complained and after ringing round a bit got hold of a lady who offered me £47.00pm for the same package plus evening & weekend calls. Went away to think a bit and did a bit more research - still not happy.

Rang their "disconnections" dept and spoke to a nice chap - told him he'd have to match Sky/Talk Talk or I'm off and he came down to £35 for Phone M, Broadband L and TV XL plus evening and weekend calls.

Much happier now!

belfastmoneysaver_2

belfastmoneysaver wrote: »

Just wanted to share my VM experience so far. We moved in to our house just before Christmas and got set up with phone size L and broadband M for £18.95 per month.

Our TV receiption is rubbish so I phoned up to add the basic TV package as the signal would be better through cable than through the outside aerial (i hope). I was told it would be an extra £4.50, in spite of the fact that it's advertised as "free with virgin phone". I was told the TV was free but that they couldn't give me as good a discount on my phone and broadband package as well and the extra £4.50 wasn't for the TV but for the talk evening and weekends phone package. This sounded like rubbish to me but i reluctantly agreed because the TV is hardly watchable at times.

The more i thought about it afterwards, the more annoyed I was so I phoned up to insist on the TV being added for free and they agreed right away. So I now have TV size M, broadband size M and phone size L for £18.95 per month for the next 12 months.

Clearly the first guy I spoke to was chancing his arm. It just goes to prove that what a lot of you are saying is right - keep ringing back until someone helps you.

Just to update you, the bill arrived yesterday. As I suspected, the monthly charge had gone up to £23.45 so I rang to complain. I was told that I had been getting a monthly discount of £4.50 on my old package and that I now wasn't entitled to it as I've gone for the free TV. I was really annoyed and made the point that the TV is not free if my bill goes up by £4.50 after adding it.

They again gave me this nonsense about how the TV is free but I'm no longer entitled to my extra discount on the phone. I told them I didn't care where they applied the extra charge, the fact was that I added a service that was supposed to be free and my monthly bill went up and that wasn't acceptable. The girl put me on hold and came back 10 minutes later to say that the extra £4.50 discount had been deleted from my account in error and it will be re-applied from next month, along with a £4.50 credit for the overpayment this month. We'll wait and see what the next bill says!

It's very improtant that you check your bills carefully with VM and keep on at them until you get what you're entitled to.

muttlock

I recently saw my bills going up as i had an applied discount on the account. My package is XL TV, Unlimited 24/7 calls and 2MB broadband. The TV and calls came to £33.94 a month and the broadband charged seperate £18 a month.

Speaking to first customer service could not offer any discount but tried to get me to upgrade broadband and pay extra! Now thats not the moneysaving way so asked to speak to the disconnections.

Here's where the haggling began, ALWAYS REFUSE THE FIRST 2 OFFER's. 1st offer a measly £2 a month saving. Asked for better offered £5 a month saving. I said not good enough. After putting me hold for a minute came back with the same TV and phone package for £16.95 a month and broadband the same £18 a month.

SAVING ME £16.99 a month.:j