Absolute nightmare with Virgin Media

mac.d

Bibibirdie wrote: »

Hi new here so hope I get this right

I've been with VM for two years, we've had many issues in the last year since recontracting in August 2018.

Firstly, we received emails saying we had illegally streamed or downloaded films, this happened twice and both times we could prove we were not at home but they didn't accept this. I used their online complaints form to pursue it and then received a call from their customer care team admitting it was a well known fault in areas where lots of households have virgin media.

Then, in late March, our net and TV service started to drop out every day, sometimes for ten minutes, sometimes up to an hour. Then in April it died for 6 hours. Engineer said there may be a fault in the area but he got the hub back on. It continued to drop out for hours at a time then an Engineer came out and said the hub was broken and it was simply a case of swapping it. I made a complaint which was fobbed off and they said my bill would be credited automatically. It never was.

In July, I received an email saying my bill was in arrears and I had not paid in June. I checked my bank and showed their missing payments team that it had been paid. They said they would investigate but after a fortnight and my service being switched off that day, I was called and told they had in fact found my payment. No apology though.

I was then told in August I was being charged a late payment fee for June, for the payment I had paid. I have since sent three complaints via their online form, all of which have been ignored.

So on the 5th August I called to give my 30 days notice as they had emailed that my bills would be increased from £35 to £56. The guy gave me a sales spiel and offered £40 instead of £56 but I again said no. However, he didn't cancel, instead I've been signed up to a new contract and I will have to pay a contract early cancellation fee!

I'm at my wit's end. I have been to resolver but have a month to wait until escalation, I've now supposed to be going to sky on the 9/9 but no doubt they will block it. Has anyone got any ideas? Any help would be greatly appreciated

Trimmed down your post a little to make it easier to follow. I'd agree the route to go down is to send them a written complaint. If you've already followed the proper complaints procedure and then complained via resolver, there isn't anything else you can do but wait for this to reach its conclusion (see Ofcom's page on billing complaints).

I'd personally have put in a written complaint focusing on the billing issues (June payment), and the non-cancellation of your service and new contract instead, and just ignored the rest.

If you are signing up for Sky, that will use a standard BT phone line, not Virgin's existing cable (you are aware that these fibre to the cabinet - aka FTTC - broadband services are not likely to be as fast as what you get from Virgin?), so as others have said, you can go ahead and do that, get your Sky up and running and your complaint with Virgin will have no effect on it.

Bibibirdie

Thank you
I'm not bothered on speed, I don't think a bit quicker net is worth the aggravation.

I've been speaking to one of their forum people today, and despite them agreeing on July that they were wrong and I had paid the bill in June (bit hard to deny when you could see it leaving the bank), he is now saying the £106 includes the June bill, it also includes August and lots of late charges. He has now said he doesn't agree I called about cancelling and can't see anything about my agreeing to pay £40, saying I have been charged the original amount they wanted of £56.
I genuinely don't think they even know what they've done, it's ridiculous. I'm to the point of going to the small claims court.

mac.d

If you'd not previously complained about them signing you up for a new contract when you phoned to cancel, I'd start a new complaint about that, along with the billing carry on dating from June. The most important thing is leaving them and taking your custom elsewhere. Then you can at least be thankful you are no longer a customer of theirs while trying to sort out all your complaints.

When they finally laid cable in my area last year I was initially thinking, great I can finally get superfast cable.... then I read how bad their customer service has been in recent years. Wouldn't go near them now no matter how good a deal they might have. In saying that, they are far from the only ISP that tell you different things each time you speak to them, good customer service is hard to find with most of them.

Good luck!

Bibibirdie

Oh I wouldn't wish them on my worst enemy!

I have now made, and have outstanding, 4 complaints. I was promised on Tuesday (after a 45 minute plus call at my expense) that a manager would call me back yesterday or today, but unsurprisingly they didn't call. The only person who did was from retentions who got told in no uncertain terms to remove my phone number

Bibibirdie

So, been speaking to yet another patronising twit on their forum.
Despite sending copies of emails showing that Missing Payments confirmed they had found my payments, he is still saying I owe three payments- July 8th, August 8th and now September 8th (despite us still being in August). He refuses to explain how he has come to that conclusion, accept to say that on his screen it says so. He is completely ignoring a stream of emails where it was confirmed I didn't owe money, plus me chasing them regards the fact my landing screen had still not updated to reflect this fact. They kept saying it was a glitch at my end only and would update.
This was exactly what I wanted to avoid happening. I would have thought the fact I had kept the emails and shown him them would help sort the matter but no.
I could cry frankly.

Sinclair2000

My experience of Virgin Media is that when it comes to resolving anything less than a routine query is that they are completely inept. But you have to work through the process and then if not resolved escalate to the independent complaints body they work with - CISAS

You need to document the issues you have had and there is the option to state the £ compensation that you feel may be due.

Our complaint was upheld and compensation paid.

However even after this there are still some ongoing issues with standard letters and marketing communications that we expressly stated were not to be sent. Perhaps another complaint is due!

But the key point is this - Virgin Media appear to be incapable of operating an effective customer service operation and they seem to employ staff who are not able to act in the best interests of the customer as a consequence of systems and processes that are restrictive and place short term financial gain above customer service.

Virgin Media - avoid like the plague.

Otherwise - make friends with CISAS - you may well need them.

Bibibirdie

So,I tried to ask Resolver if there was any movement on their waiting two months until I can escalate due to the circumstances and they did apologise but said no (which I totally understand). After exhausting the Forum chat guy (who was as rude and patronising as is possible) and Twitter (who apologised and actually acted a little more human than usual), someone on twitter suggested I contact the Ask Tony email page on the Daily Mail.
Now, I never thought in a million years I would hear back, and I'm not a huge fan of the paper, but the person on twitter said they're mother had been in a similar situation and they got them to respond after months of back and forth.
I was out doing some shopping earlier and came home to an email from a lady from the CEOs office (same one I sent an email to and was ignored over a month back) saying that the daily mail had indeed emailed them, along with their twitter team, and she will now investigate.
I'm still not holding out much hope for a complete resolution, and all I want is to leave on 5/9 and not to be charged money I do not owe, plus the money they owe me for the service drops, but it's a start finally.

D_M_E

Try hitting them with a SAR - the info you particularly want is transcripts of any and all phone calls you made to them about your issues which should help your case.

https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/how-do-i-make-a-subject-access-request

cooltt

Bibibirdie wrote: »

So,I tried to ask Resolver if there was any movement on their waiting two months until I can escalate due to the circumstances and they did apologise but said no (which I totally understand). After exhausting the Forum chat guy (who was as rude and patronising as is possible) and Twitter (who apologised and actually acted a little more human than usual), someone on twitter suggested I contact the Ask Tony email page on the Daily Mail.
Now, I never thought in a million years I would hear back, and I'm not a huge fan of the paper, but the person on twitter said they're mother had been in a similar situation and they got them to respond after months of back and forth.
I was out doing some shopping earlier and came home to an email from a lady from the CEOs office (same one I sent an email to and was ignored over a month back) saying that the daily mail had indeed emailed them, along with their twitter team, and she will now investigate.
I'm still not holding out much hope for a complete resolution, and all I want is to leave on 5/9 and not to be charged money I do not owe, plus the money they owe me for the service drops, but it's a start finally.

To be honest mate you sound like the customer from hell and judging by the way you write it must be impossible to listen to your rants at Virgin customer service.



Take it from me, the notes on your account will guarantee you get nothing but a diplomatic two fingers.



p.s. they have millions of customers and they couldn't care less about your daughter.

Bibibirdie

@Cooltt
Do you feel big being so rude to a female?
Thanks for the mansplaining
Do you work for VM by any chance?
Lucky I do give a stuff for my daughter isn't it? And what do you think I should do? Pay money I don't owe? Put up with disgusting service?