Phone Line cut off after placing order for phone and internet, what are my rights?

lydjar

I've just moved into a new house, and before I moved, decided to set up an internet and home phone contract with Virgin media because I know that phone lines are cut off when contracts end and I wanted to avoid paying for reconnecting a line.

The current supplier for the tenants before me was BT. Virgin told me that the landline number I provided for the property was live and working at the time. They also boast that you don't need to contact the current supplier about cancelling the contract because they will do it for you, so I didn't.

I had poor customer service whilst waiting for the activation date to be arranged with lack of information being the problem. They eventually told me the activation date would be 2rd September, the day before I moved in, which was great. I still hadn't received a router though, or had payment taken from my account.

On 3rd September, it had not been activated. So I called them and they asked me to call back on a week day in order to find out why. I had a call from them on Monday and they said that the reason it hadn't been activated was because BT had already cut off the phone line, so they had cancelled my order and asked me to re-order where I would have to pay to reconnect the phone line.

I'm not happy about this at all, firstly because it costs £80-£120 to reconnect a phone line, and whichever provider I choose now is going to charge me this. Secondly, because I tried to avoid this by setting it all up before I moved in, assuming that Virgin would do as they said and contact BT in order to stop the line being cut off.

Before I talk to Virgin about this, what are my rights and where do I stand?

fluffnutter

The crux of your argument rests with Virgin's claim that they contact BT to arrange transfer of the service without break (hence there should be no need for a reconnection fee).

Is this in writing?

bod1467

But did the previous owner (tenant?) migrate their number with BT to another property? If yes then BT will have taken the decision to disconnect the line at that property, so there's likely very little you could claim against VM.

PS - the line itself has probably not been physically disconnected, just the port in the exchange deactivated. As such the exorbitant reconnection charges are a bit of a scam in many cases. But that's a different matter.

fluffnutter

Virgin's website claims the following...

When you have a Virgin Phone line, you don't need a BT line, so there's no need to keep your BT phone line or anyone else for line rental

... which suggests to me that it's irrelevant whether BT have cut you off or not.

lydjar

This is what it says in their terms and conditions "If you are keeping an existing phone number but taking the relevant phone line from us as part of the services, you authorise us to cancel that part of your agreement with your old provider which relates to renting that line." I don't think the previous tenants took the number, because the landlord took out the contract with bt and told me she cancelled it for when we moved in.

fluffnutter wrote: »

Virgin's website claims the following...



... which suggests to me that it's irrelevant whether BT have cut you off or not.

And I think that means that you only pay line rental to virgin when you take out their home phone package, rather than paying line rental to bt for the bt line, as well as virgin for the home phone services. Or it might only be applicable to cable customers as they don't need bt lines as it's completely through virgin.

steveE2

lydjar wrote: »

This is what it says in their terms and conditions "If you are keeping an existing phone number but taking the relevant phone line from us as part of the services, you authorise us to cancel that part of your agreement with your old provider which relates to renting that line." I don't think the previous tenants took the number, because the landlord took out the contract with bt and told me she cancelled it for when we moved in.

There's your answer,neither the line nor number were ever yours to place an order on.

fluffnutter

steveE2 wrote: »

There's your answer,neither the line nor number were ever yours to place an order on.

I tend to agree. I think their 'you won't need to pay a reconnection fee because we'll cancel your existing contract' is to tempt people who already use that line but through a different carrier, e.g. BT.

If the line's already been cut off, as it was in this instance, by the previous contract holder, then it's tough titties it would appear.

Mind you, I think Virgin's sales spiel is misleading, but then they're murder for their marketing anyway - they spam me like crazy.

smileylondongal

This does make sense - it seems like it was the landlord's contract and no one else's to cancel or not. We actually didn't have a landline before we went with VM so it sounds like the best thing to do is to start from scratch when it comes to VM in particular. Plus, I wouldn't trust what they say about cancelling anything as you're better off doing it yourself and knowing it's done.

VM are notorious for this kind of c0ck up and if I had my time again, I'd go freeview. Sadly, I'm stuck with them for the time being though I'll be out as soon as I can!

arcon5

I've never had to pay a 'connection fee' for a new line :huh:

In our last property they drilled through the wall and installed a new line free, we created a new account in my partners name when we moved this year -- same again, no setup fee.

This isn't for business purposes is it?

spike7451

fluffnutter wrote: »

Virgin's website claims the following...



... which suggests to me that it's irrelevant whether BT have cut you off or not.

Only applies if the OP is on Virgin CABLE & not Virgin NATIONAL.If it's the former,then a cable service does not connect into the local BT exchange at all until it gets to the Head End,which can be up to 50 miles away from you.
With cable,VM will run a new siamese drop cable containing the phoneline & coax (for the bband & tv) from the street cabinet to your home & install new services,it doesn't touch the BT line at all.

If you're on Virgin NATIONAL,then VM will use the existing BT line to provide the service.
In this case it sounds like the previous tennants have taken the phone nuber with them so the line has been ceased.

lydjar

Yes the landlord cancelled the contract, but when she did so, she told BT that I would be taking over the contract in order to change to a cheaper provider. The previous tenants definitely did not take the phone number with them either, as it was not theirs to take.

It sounds like I'm not going to have a leg to stand on though.

I'm a bit confused about this though. There is a phone line to the property, and the last house I lived in we were told to reconnect it would cost around £100, so we took cable. This time, I have no option to take cable, but the phone line has only just been disconnected. Can it be done for free? Is there a difference between being disconnected and 'switched off at the exchange'?