NTL Virgin Harassment

Florrie_Fimble

(this was originally on debt-free wannabe but I've reposted here as advised)

I'm hoping someone may have some useful advice as we're at our wits end with Virgin Media and previously NTL.

Seven years ago hubby moved into this house that had cable as standard. After they were unable to improve the picture quality he cancelled the service and had Sky installed. Despite this they continued to bill him until a very stern conversation with them made it stop. Apart from the last £9. Which we received bills for every month. Every single month for several years. Despite writing, phoning, emailing and sending the bills back it just kept coming and in the end we just ignored it because it was costing us money, time and quite frankly our sanity to try and make them realise we didn't owe them anything and indeed the letters stopped for a few years.

Then NTL are bought by Virgin Media and another £9 bill arrives. Aha we think! Maybe they will take notice when we tell them about this. So we rang them and told them an were assured we'd never see a bill for £9 again.

Well we haven't - it's gone up to £15. They added more money for "non payment". We rang again and were told to "just ignore it". So we did. Then we receive another letter telling us our financial situation is so dire that we've been appointed our vey own customer services person to help us deal with our debt. Hubby rings and was admirably polite - and was again absolutely assured that we have nothing to worry about. That it is just a glitch and it will go away.

Last month a letter telling us our service has been ceased (you think they'd know we hadn't watched it for 7 years), another phone call, another reassurance. Yesterday a letter from a debt collection agency, with fees added and a black mark on our credit record.

I cannot tell you how desperate I'm starting to feel. How positively haunted I am when I see another one of those damn letters come through my front door. We've spent so much time and effort trying to get them to STOP and now this mess. They can't even stop a £9 bill for seven years - I have no faith at all that they will rectify our credit record properly. There are those that will say "why not just pay the £9" - but to that I'd say that I refuse to be taxed for their stupidity and indeed shouldn't have to give a multi-national company money they aren't due, just to get some peace of mind.

Can anyone think of any legal avenues we can follow with them at this point? It doesn't seem to matter who we write to, or who we speak to - they say one thing and another happens. I'm completely non-plussed and have no idea where to go next.

bingo_bango

Florrie,

Follow the advice in THIS THREAD. Slightly different scenario, but the same issues.

Florrie_Fimble

Thank you.

I have also decided to add to this letter that I am charging Virgin for 6 hours of my wasted life, 3 letters, numerous phone calls and a nasty twitch everytime the post comes. I think at the very least Mr Branson can buy me dinner.

CHR15

A similar thing happened to my Mother.

She had an old defunct, cancelled 5yrs previous, account with NTL.

Virgin took over and sent her a bill.

She made dozens of calls to explain she has never had a Virgin account and the old NTL account had been closed 5ys ago with no monies outstanding.

All the calls on hold for up to 40 mins and being pushed from pillar to post still didn't stop the demands arriving. This culminated in letter from Debt Collection agencies. at which point she explained it all to me to see if I could think of a way.

I sent an email to Neil Burkett (CEO of Virgin Media), politely but firmly asking for an explanation.
My focus on the email was that there is simply no mechanism in place to speak to someone who can resolve this problem, it is all notes, and passing to other departments. There is no direct route.

About 2hrs after sending the email I received a reply (I still have it in my inbox)

This is the email I sent to Neil Berkett

Account Number (as stated on the Invoice): xxxxxxxxxxx

Moorcroft Debt Recovery Agency Ref: xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Email complaint Ref: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Dear Mr Berkett,

I write on behalf of my Mother (Mrs xxxxxxxxx ) who has received several demands for payments of a Virgin Account TV Service subscription.
My Mother does not, and never has, subscribed to any Virgin subscription service with the exception of a Virgin mobile phone account.

At the receipt of each invoice she has contacted Virgin Media’s helpline. On each occasion she has been transferred to another department where she is then left waiting in a queue until the line ultimately goes dead. The last occasion she remained on hold for almost an hour and a half! As a non-subscriber this call is not free to her.

I have attempted to contact Virgin through the “Contact Us” help page from within Virgin Media’s Website. My email was acknowledged on xx November xx and a reply stated I would be contacted within a few days (12 days have now passed with no further email response).
Other than automated written responses from Virgin Media informing her the complaint is being dealt with, there has been no contact with reference to her specific concerns over these invoices.

This morning (xx Nov xx) my Mother received a letter from Moorcroft Debt Recovery Agency threatening Bailiff Action if she does not pay the outstanding amount immediately.
Despite my reassurances, she is understandably extremely stressed over this threat but without any mechanism to contact Virgin Media feels helpless against these demands.

Moorcroft Debt recovery agency has been contacted and have also stated they are attempting to contact Virgin Media for confirmation.

My mother has never missed a payment on any account and has further concerns about any detrimental effect this may have on her credit file.

Could I please ask that this email is addressed promptly to put my mother’s mind at rest? Contact details for her are at the bottom of this email.



Regards

Mr CHR15

The reply I received within a couple of hours

[FONT=&quot]Plse accept my personal apology; I will have someone from my office contact you.[/FONT][FONT=&quot]
[/FONT][FONT=&quot]Sent from my Virgin Mobile device

[/FONT]


The following day I received a call from one of his PA's.


My mother had a call apologising and clearing the issue up.
[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
[/FONT][FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
I received a call from the same person, apologising to me and informing me they had sent a bunch of flowers to my mum, and also knocking 50% off my own Virgin bill for the next 12 Months!! Result!!

Shame it had to go that far though.

I don't think it right to publish Neil Berketts email address on here but you can have it if you PM me.

Florrie_Fimble

I agree on not publishing the email address! Many thanks for your post and I've dropped you a pm.

CHR15

Good luck