Virgin media - cooling off period

Zhorian

Hello,

Apologies if the quality of my writing is bad but I've had to write this on my phone.

The other day I phoned up virgin stating that I was thinking of leaving them, much like all companies they offered me a reasonable discount provided I sign up for another 12 months. Yesterday I got home and my broadband was down, which sadly is not a rare occurence.

Luckily yesterday was the last day of the cooling off period (despite what the agent tried telling me), on trying to cancel I was told that I couldn't because I have been using the equipment which voided the cooling off period. For starters I was never told this when I verbally agreed to this over the phone, secondly I never received a new copy of my terms and conditions after agreeing and lastly is that not an unreasonable stipulation as surely a customer has to check they are happy with the service before sticking with it?

kwikbreaks

I've seen it mentioned before that extending a VM contract for a discount is a done deal and there is no cooling off period. I've no idea of the legality of that but I suspect VM will be right and you'll find you are stuck with them for another year unless you buy out.

Zhorian

I'm certainly hope that isn't the case. I'll be fighting my case and report. I've sent a question to consumer direct to get some more info. I'm going to be running with the argument that them stating I have a cooling period is a bit pointless.

Anyone thinking of renewing your vm contract for the sake of a tenner beware!

macman

You're wasting your time. It's not a new contract, you've simply extended the old one. No cooling off period applies.
Why did you renew the contract if you weren't happy with the service?

Zhorian

I was happy and the issues seemed to have stopped. The thing is the agent specifically said that there was a cooling off period.