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Has anyone left Virgin before end of contract?

I'm about 5/6 months into a 12 month contract with Virgin Media for their Broadband Size L - which is the up to 10mbps package. I don't have a telephone line - just the internet.

For the last 2/3 weeks, the internet has been incredibly slow in the evenings and weekends. Services like Skype are completely unusable. (For the techies, it has been due to packet loss of up to 40% and ping of >400ms to UK servers. The upload speed has never been higher than 0.4mbps, even on a good day.)

I've written a letter to Virgin explaining this and am currently awaiting their response. I can't phone them as it would cost far too much from my mobile.

What I ideally want is to leave the contract. Has anyone had any experience of leaving early? Was it very easy to do and did you need to kick up much of a fuss?

Thanks

Comments

  • macman
    macman Posts: 53,128 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    glider3560 wrote: »
    I'm about 5/6 months into a 12 month contract with Virgin Media for their Broadband Size L - which is the up to 10mbps package. I don't have a telephone line - just the internet.

    For the last 2/3 weeks, the internet has been incredibly slow in the evenings and weekends. Services like Skype are completely unusable. (For the techies, it has been due to packet loss of up to 40% and ping of >400ms to UK servers. The upload speed has never been higher than 0.4mbps, even on a good day.)

    I've written a letter to Virgin explaining this and am currently awaiting their response. I can't phone them as it would cost far too much from my mobile.

    What I ideally want is to leave the contract. Has anyone had any experience of leaving early? Was it very easy to do and did you need to kick up much of a fuss?

    Thanks

    You can leave whenever you like, but you'll be charged an early termination fee equivalent to the rest of the 12m contract.
    No free lunch, and no free laptop ;)
  • robt_2
    robt_2 Posts: 3,401 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture Combo Breaker
    You need to post on the Virgin Media newsgroups and 2nd level support will be back to you within an hour and book an engineer if required.
  • Scrounger
    Scrounger Posts: 1,069 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    glider3560 wrote: »
    I can't phone them as it would cost far too much...
    Just call them for free on 0800 052 6060 (options 3,2,2) (from a payphone if necessary) and let them pick up the bill, that's what I do. :beer:

    IMO You have a valid complaint.

    Scrounger
  • glider3560
    glider3560 Posts: 4,115 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Thanks for the help. I've been on the newsgroup and found someone who has exactly the same problem and is in my area. I've also posted on there and got a "stock" reply about the problem being worked on. On several other forums, people in my area have been given timescales of June before this is fixed.

    I've also spoken to three other friends, who all live in my area with exactly the same problem. Even people on 50mbps are having this problem.

    The person on 50mbps went through Virgin's complaints process and have had 2 months worth of payments refunded to cover the period until it is fixed. Although this would be nice, I'd rather have a working internet connection and it is almost essential for my uni work (need access to online journals on a daily basis).

    I'll give them a few days to reply to my letter, then I'll be on the phone.
  • jem16
    jem16 Posts: 19,494 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    I have had exactly the same problem since at least last December if not longer.

    I was on the 20Mb service and was getting speed of less than 3Mb, sometimes 1.5Mb every evening after 7pm. I have escalated this, had an engineer out, had a credit of £30 and supposedly it was fixed. All that happened was the slow down happened after 9pm instead of 7pm.

    Basically I'm in an ex-NTL area with obviously too many subscribers - Virgin call it utilisation spikes in my area!

    I'm now on the 10Mb service and still speeds drop every evening, sometimes less than 1Mb. I cancelled in January and was persuaded to stay by retentions. Meanwhile I'm also using O2 and speeds there are contsant throughout the day.
  • ACDeag
    ACDeag Posts: 742 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 500 Posts Combo Breaker
    Monitor speeds carefully for a while, if they cannot offer anywhere near what you are paying for I would suggest writing to them telling them that they are in breach of contract (provide your proof) and that you will be terminating your contract. You may have to battle a bit, and I know that they will say no speed is guaranteed but there will be a minimum below which a court would say that they are not giving you what you are paying for.
  • glider3560
    glider3560 Posts: 4,115 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Good news. Problem was resolved last week - problem was "noise on the network". They have agreed to credit £20 to my next bill - which is equivalent to a one month refund.
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