considering moving from sky broadband to virgin fibre - experiences

anna42hmr

I am considering moving from sky broadband (normal non fibre) to virgin media's fibre service (plus calls/phoneline) unfortunately i am in a slow standard broadband area and at this time virgin are the only fibre provider in the area.

I am really getting fed up with the slower speeds etc, especially when trying to watch streaming services such as netflix etc. I understand however that the process of moving to virgin is different to those on other networks that use the bt system. Has any one on here had any experiences of this? I am still under contract to sky internet for another three weeks, would i be able to start the application to switch now or would i need to wait until after the contract end date.

I am intending to retain sky's tv service etc so does moving internet/phoneline have any affect on these services?

Also is is possible to retain the telephone number that sky provided?

Would i need to get a mac code from sky like your used to have to years ago?

jb66

You dont need a MAC to change to virgin and as they dont use bt wiring you can overlap services so you dont have any downtime. When you transfer your number to virgin the sky phone and BB cancels

john1

Had Virgin BB for around 10+ years. It is just there - no big deal but like water and electricity always there.
During this time cant recall date of last fault but over the years I guess we have had around half dozen outages. Then only lasted a couple of hrs. or so.

My speed is 50Mbs which is fairly constant. We run Netflix plus other on line services simultaneously with no problems.

Recently went over to Virgin from BT for phone as they offered a deal which saved me around £250pa overall. One call to Virgin and they looked after the ceasing of BT phone. You will need to check if your BB ceases at same time as phone number transfer. Also it may NOT be possible to transfer an orignal Sky Telephone number as I recall in the past these have caused problems

One thing to remember, if possible used a cable to connect Netflix TV directly to Router /Hub as WIFI is less reliable.

As jb66 says Virgin services are carried over their own network so you dont have to wait to get transfered

anna42hmr

Thanks for your replies, i appreciate it.

cajef

jb66 wrote: »

You dont need a MAC to change to virgin

From June last year a MAC ceased to exist to change ISP's.

anna42hmr

john1 wrote: »

One thing to remember, if possible used a cable to connect Netflix TV directly to Router /Hub as WIFI is less reliable.

Unfortunately due to the location that the router had to be in (as there is no other phone extension sockets etc) it was over wi-fi, however have moved over to using home plugs when using streaming/smart services a few months back which has improved the reliability.

Think i will be making the move over so thanks everyone for the replies, just need to wait now until my contract with sky for the broadband and phone element is up (in around 2-3 weeks time) and will then contact virgin again to start the process.

steviemoz

I use SKY for my TV (I prefer their User Interface- Menus/Screen presentation etc) and Virgin for everything else.
I pay approx £33/month for : Telephone line with anytime weekday and weekend calls and 70Mbs BB. A few years ago I was on SKY's 'up-to' 16Mbps with an actual speed of about 10Mbps (obviously line-loss took care of the missing Mbps), now on Virgin my actual speed regularly tops 70Mbps (but can go as low as 55-58Mbps).

shopaholicz

We've just swapped from Sky to Virgin Media. I ordered it in December and it was installed yesterday. They advised me not to cancel anything so there was no down time and it was easier to keep the phone number.

So I contacted Sky yesterday, after Virgin Media had left, via online chat, and they cancelled everything. That does mean we'll have to pay for 1 month on both, but that was our choice. The tv takes 31 days to cancel, so will be active till 8/2/16 and the phone and internet 14 days so active till 21/1/16.

We've also paid for 12 months line rental up front saving us about £30.

I'm happy with how smooth everything went.

jem16

shopaholicz wrote: »

and the phone and internet 14 days so active till 21/1/16.

if you transferred your number to Virgin, Sky phone and BB will automatically cancel on the day of the transfer.

anna42hmr

Thanks for the replies all I appreciate it I have decided I will switch to Virgin for broadband and phone, like you Steviemos, i prefer sky tv itself so no way will i be changing that.

Just now working out if I want to keep my old number or get a new one, to be honest not many people have the number (less than a handful) so will be no effort.

Plus that way i can order Virgin to be fitted before the sky contract end date and then cancel sky afterwards, otherwise i understand i need to wait to get them to set up after the end date so that it doesn't cancel the sky to early when number gets switched over. Especially as there will be a cross over period between the two any way (though I will try to time them as close as possible to minimise it.

Hopefully the install will go ok, apparently as long as my actual property number shows on their systems they can install it (as I was concerned as I'm in a ground floor flat and most in the building are fitted with sky etc rather than virgin.

Phil_Knight

If you are moving to Virgin, might be an idea to start the move now as Virgin normally take a few weeks to get installed (I have know 8 weeks) as they use completely different cables etc. They could over lap services while you wait out your notice period. Why not push Virgin for a free month etc. You never know.

anna42hmr wrote: »

Unfortunately due to the location that the router had to be in (as there is no other phone extension sockets etc) it was over wi-fi, however have moved over to using home plugs when using streaming/smart services a few months back which has improved the reliability.

Think i will be making the move over so thanks everyone for the replies, just need to wait now until my contract with sky for the broadband and phone element is up (in around 2-3 weeks time) and will then contact virgin again to start the process.