Virgin Media retention deals (post your haggling successes)

Noctu

My recent experience:
About to come off a deal (friends & family deal originally through a Virgin engineer):

TV: Mixit TV - Ents Picks: Drama & Documentaries (with 360 box)
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Talk Weekends

for £30p/m

Live Chat only offered me £50-odd for the same package so I told them to cancel. Missed a phone call from VM loyalty team on Saturday. They called again today and offered me:

TV: Mega TV
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Weekend chatter

(i.e. pretty much exactly the same as the above but more TV channels)

He offered me this for £39p/m. I asked him if he could be a bit keener on the price (mentioned that I was looking at going to Sky) and he 'found another discount on the system' to take it down to £34/month, no price rises guaranteed within the new 18 month contract. Agreed the new contract and the new channels are live on my TV right now.

Hope this helps someone

victor2

Noctu said:

My recent experience:
About to come off a deal (friends & family deal originally through a Virgin engineer):

TV: Mixit TV - Ents Picks: Drama & Documentaries (with 360 box)
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Talk Weekends

for £30p/m

Live Chat only offered me £50-odd for the same package so I told them to cancel. Missed a phone call from VM loyalty team on Saturday. They called again today and offered me:

TV: Mega TV
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Weekend chatter

(i.e. pretty much exactly the same as the above but more TV channels)

He offered me this for £39p/m. I asked him if he could be a bit keener on the price (mentioned that I was looking at going to Sky) and he 'found another discount on the system' to take it down to £34/month, no price rises guaranteed within the new 18 month contract. Agreed the new contract and the new channels are live on my TV right now.

Hope this helps someone

Sound like a good deal.

Interesting that he agreed to no price rises within the 18 month contract. Do you have that in writing, because the T&Cs now state that the April increase of RPI plus 3.9% will apply?

You can no longer leave without penalty if they impose that increase either.

Noctu

victor2 said:

Noctu said:

My recent experience:
About to come off a deal (friends & family deal originally through a Virgin engineer):

TV: Mixit TV - Ents Picks: Drama & Documentaries (with 360 box)
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Talk Weekends

for £30p/m

Live Chat only offered me £50-odd for the same package so I told them to cancel. Missed a phone call from VM loyalty team on Saturday. They called again today and offered me:

TV: Mega TV
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Weekend chatter

(i.e. pretty much exactly the same as the above but more TV channels)

He offered me this for £39p/m. I asked him if he could be a bit keener on the price (mentioned that I was looking at going to Sky) and he 'found another discount on the system' to take it down to £34/month, no price rises guaranteed within the new 18 month contract. Agreed the new contract and the new channels are live on my TV right now.

Hope this helps someone

Sound like a good deal.

Interesting that he agreed to no price rises within the 18 month contract. Do you have that in writing, because the T&Cs now state that the April increase of RPI plus 3.9% will apply?

You can no longer leave without penalty if they impose that increase either.

Good point, doesn't say that on my paperwork. To be fair I'd still be happy with that price with an uplift. I'll come back and update if my price does in fact increase or not ;-) 

victor2

Noctu said:

victor2 said:

Noctu said:

My recent experience:
About to come off a deal (friends & family deal originally through a Virgin engineer):

TV: Mixit TV - Ents Picks: Drama & Documentaries (with 360 box)
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Talk Weekends

for £30p/m

Live Chat only offered me £50-odd for the same package so I told them to cancel. Missed a phone call from VM loyalty team on Saturday. They called again today and offered me:

TV: Mega TV
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Weekend chatter

(i.e. pretty much exactly the same as the above but more TV channels)

He offered me this for £39p/m. I asked him if he could be a bit keener on the price (mentioned that I was looking at going to Sky) and he 'found another discount on the system' to take it down to £34/month, no price rises guaranteed within the new 18 month contract. Agreed the new contract and the new channels are live on my TV right now.

Hope this helps someone

Sound like a good deal.

Interesting that he agreed to no price rises within the 18 month contract. Do you have that in writing, because the T&Cs now state that the April increase of RPI plus 3.9% will apply?

You can no longer leave without penalty if they impose that increase either.

Good point, doesn't say that on my paperwork. To be fair I'd still be happy with that price with an uplift. I'll come back and update if my price does in fact increase or not ;-) 

Do please come back and let us know. The current train of thought is that the increase applies to the base price before the discount is applied - and the discount will not increase. So the actual monthly cost will go up significantly more than RPi plus 3.9%

barafear799

That would be quite painful then - in the example quoted - if your deal is for £34 - then the real cost might be £60 - and if you're unlucky you might get hit with two increases - April 2024 and April 2025 within your 18 month contract. We know that Apr24 is 8.8% - so that might be £5 - and then let's say another £4 next April - so £43 for the last four months or so of your deal?  

Although I tend to think that maybe you're ok for the April 2024 increase - i.e. it might not apply to you. 

Anon

victor2 said:

Noctu said:

victor2 said:

Noctu said:

My recent experience:
About to come off a deal (friends & family deal originally through a Virgin engineer):

TV: Mixit TV - Ents Picks: Drama & Documentaries (with 360 box)
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Talk Weekends

for £30p/m

Live Chat only offered me £50-odd for the same package so I told them to cancel. Missed a phone call from VM loyalty team on Saturday. They called again today and offered me:

TV: Mega TV
Broadband: 250mb
Phone: Weekend chatter

(i.e. pretty much exactly the same as the above but more TV channels)

He offered me this for £39p/m. I asked him if he could be a bit keener on the price (mentioned that I was looking at going to Sky) and he 'found another discount on the system' to take it down to £34/month, no price rises guaranteed within the new 18 month contract. Agreed the new contract and the new channels are live on my TV right now.

Hope this helps someone

Sound like a good deal.

Interesting that he agreed to no price rises within the 18 month contract. Do you have that in writing, because the T&Cs now state that the April increase of RPI plus 3.9% will apply?

You can no longer leave without penalty if they impose that increase either.

Good point, doesn't say that on my paperwork. To be fair I'd still be happy with that price with an uplift. I'll come back and update if my price does in fact increase or not ;-) 

Do please come back and let us know. The current train of thought is that the increase applies to the base price before the discount is applied - and the discount will not increase. So the actual monthly cost will go up significantly more than RPi plus 3.9%

Virgin have said since the new contracts came in that the price rise is added to the discount price for as long as the agreed discount, then you move to the increased base price from month 19 (in the example of an 18 month contract with an 18 month discount) : https://www.virginmedia.com/help/prices

They give examples in the FAQs. I am no fan of the price hikes (I much preferred the old contract which had a right to leave!), but this is slightly better than other providers who base the rise on the base (not discounted) price.

BigBlueSky

Does anyone know what date the new contracts came in that prevent you leaving penalty free due to the price increases?

victor2

BigBlueSky said:

Does anyone know what date the new contracts came in that prevent you leaving penalty free due to the price increases?

It was certainly in place by June 2023, when I renewed my contract.

niktheguru

If it helps anyone. I was on a retention deal for gig1 broadband at £36 a month. It was about to go to full price next month, On live chat when threatening to cancel I was offered to keep gig1 and add a phone line with the basic weekend calls and they could do it for £31 a month, on an 18 month contract, waiving the set up fee, which i gladly accepted. 

(i couldnt be bothered to fully cancel and do the hoop jumping again.....i probably could have shaved it off to £29 by doing this, but I am already paying £5 less than i currently am, so its a win win as far as i can see)

Hope this helps someone.

ididgetwhereiamtoday

niktheguru said:

If it helps anyone. I was on a retention deal for gig1 broadband at £36 a month. It was about to go to full price next month, On live chat when threatening to cancel I was offered to keep gig1 and add a phone line with the basic weekend calls and they could do it for £31 a month, on an 18 month contract, waiving the set up fee, which i gladly accepted. 

(i couldnt be bothered to fully cancel and do the hoop jumping again.....i probably could have shaved it off to £29 by doing this, but I am already paying £5 less than i currently am, so its a win win as far as i can see)

Hope this helps someone.

That is a cracking deal.