Virginmedia Contract and Moving house

tinyt1977

Hi, I am new to the forum so I hope I am doing this right.

Please may I ask if anyone can recommend the best action to take on the follow issue.

My partner and I had virginmedia installed in our home in March 2011 with a 12 month contract. We have always been happy with the service and after seeing the adverts for the new TIVO box we decided to upgrade. Now the account is in my partners name however as I knew the password the virginmedia customer services/sales team were happy to take my order. At no point in the conversation did virginmedia explain that by adding this we would be entering a new contract and I just assumed it would continue on a rolling contract.

We are now six months down the line and looking at having to move to my parents for a short term while we save a deposit for a new house. We would like to keep our existing services however Virgin want us to enter a new contract with a minimum period of 18 months! Now don't get me wrong I love my parents to bits and we are grateful for their hospitality, but 18 months!! :eek: I explained this to virgin and said if necessary we would cancel the contract, this is when they dropped the bombshell that we were tied in until September 2013. I protested and pointed out that we signed up in March 2011 but they explained about the tivo upgrade instigating a new minimum term. We were apparently notified of this in writing, sadly this would have been in my partners name and probably never even opened, never mind read!

Please may I ask if anyone can offer any suggestions of how to get out of this situation. Yes I am niffed they didn't tell me about the contract extension when I placed the order on the telephone but at the end of the day they probably did send the letter. I am happy to honor the next 6 months of the contract and probably beyond if I move to another cable area however Virgin refuse to install the equipment at my parents without us entering a new 18 month agreement. I don't want to agree to that and then be in the same situation 6-12 months further on! I know I can pay a fee for early termination but why should I when virgin are refusing to transfer the service. Am I being so unreasonable????

DUTR

You can't really get rid of the situation, you will have to see out the minimim term or pay the early termination charges, I'm a VM customer too, and other than the double speed thing, they do make it quite clear about the agreement being extended.

tinyt1977

Thanks for the reply. I don't suppose you know how they calculate the ETC fee do you? Currently pay £90/month for our package and lets just say I don't have £540 laying around for if I cancel it

tehone

Have you tried downgrading the non tivo related parts of the contract

e.g. lower broadband speed to minimum, reduce calls package to just phone line, stop all premium channels -change tv package to M

tinyt1977

Trying to help myself here, found a copy of the terms & condition. The following extract has been taken from the VM terms and conditions.

H Changing this agreement

You may add to or reduce the services you receive from time to time by contacting our customer services team. If you ask us to provide any extra services to you, you agree to accept those additional services for at least the minimum period that applies to them. If you ask us to reduce your tier of services within the minimum period for those services, we may ask you to pay a fee depending on the services being reduced and the remaining length of the minimum period.

I added a TIVO box in September 2012, an additional cost of £6 per month. If I am understanding the T&C's correctly can I not close my account and pay £36 for the remaining TIVO subscription (6 months at £6/month)? Many thanks

DUTR

tinyt1977 wrote: »

Trying to help myself here, found a copy of the terms & condition. The following extract has been taken from the VM terms and conditions.



I added a TIVO box in September 2012, an additional cost of £6 per month. If I am understanding the T&C's correctly can I not close my account and pay £36 for the remaining TIVO subscription (6 months at £6/month)? Many thanks

It looks that way, can you have TIVO without the other services?
BTW £90 a month seems very high

tinyt1977

DUTR wrote: »

It looks that way, can you have TIVO without the other services?
BTW £90 a month seems very high

Good point, didn't really think of that. Guess I will have to phone in the morning to find out more. At least I can be ready for if they try stinging me with the full package.
Yeah £90 per month, VIP package with 2 extra digi boxes. Was only £71 when we first signed up but they like to have their price increases...plus the TIVO in Sept of course

older_wiser

sorry to hijack your thread and it will be abit of a rant but why do virgin insist on an 18 month contract while sky only does a 12 month minimum period. I'm in similar postion where i'd love to change from sky to virgin but don't want to be tied to an 18 month contract as i'm not sure if i'll be in a virgin area in a years time. They do offer 12 month contracts but only on certain bundles like tv and telephone etc. why don't they offer 12 month contracts ? i wouldn't mind paying slightly higher monthly bills to have a lower minimum period.

visidigi

older_wiser wrote: »

sorry to hijack your thread and it will be abit of a rant but why do virgin insist on an 18 month contract while sky only does a 12 month minimum period. I'm in similar postion where i'd love to change from sky to virgin but don't want to be tied to an 18 month contract as i'm not sure if i'll be in a virgin area in a years time. They do offer 12 month contracts but only on certain bundles like tv and telephone etc. why don't they offer 12 month contracts ? i wouldn't mind paying slightly higher monthly bills to have a lower minimum period.

...because they can. And people still sign up.

macman

Higher provision costs. A cable install takes longer, and costs more, than a dish install. VM have 'engineers'. Sky have 'installers'. Go figure.

older_wiser

so why not offer a higher price for the increase costs it would be different if virgin were nationwide like sky but its not it has a limited installer base why offer only two products on 12 month contracts. why not triple play like sky ? i know your not here to defend virgin but when i asked virgin why they don't offer this they couldn't explain either. Have you seen some of the offers including quidco and topcashback your talking hundreds of pounds that could easily subsidise a 12 months contract and not keep you locked into a longer one i'm just having a rant i see so many posts where people are locked into contracts and yet can't access virgin cable from the new house it would be interesting to see how many termination fee's virgin have recieved from people in this situation.