Are Virgin Media Scammers?

asacarter

I've had a £35/mo Virgin Media telephone and broadband contract for 12 months with no issues. The problems started when I renewed my contract.
My first contract was coming to an end in December. I called them in November to see what price they can offer me on a new contract.
We agreed on £39/mo for 18/mo. Shortly afterwards I received the transaction email below:

- On the 21st December they took £59 from my account which took me overdrawn as I was expecting the payment to be £26.33.
- I called them up to resolve the issue and ask them to credit the difference back to my account but they refused. They said I would need to contact my bank and ask them to sort it out under the direct debit guarantee. I contacted the bank the full amount was credited back the same day.
- I then received this second email:

- The person I had spoken to had created another new contract extending my contract by another month and increasing the monthly amount by £1 without my knowledge or consent.
- I created a complaint. To date nobody has responded.
- I went to the live chat to resolve the matter again and explained what had happened and that a new contract has been created without my authorisation. She said she would raise a ticket to get it resolved. I have a transcript of the chat.
I then got this email:

- I have created a complaint with offcom.
- I phoned again today to try and resolve it. I asked him to remove the unauthorised contract and reinstate the correct one. He said he could not do anything.
- I'm complaining about my contract being extended by a month (as well the incorrect billing amount) He offered to create another new 18 month contract for £39 as gesture of goodwill!!!! (extending it by 2 months). I told him you cant just go creating new contracts when they make a billing error.
- I asked for deadlock letter and he wouldn't give me one.
Not sure what I should do now

Browntoa

No , they are not scammers 

asacarter

Browntoa said:

No , they are not scammers 

A company that creates a new contract without knowledge or consent of another party and refuses to retract it is pretty much the definition of a scammer.

PZ19

You could try email to executiveteam@virginmedia.co.uk. That’s CEO office apparently 

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

asacarter said:

I've had a £35/mo Virgin Media telephone and broadband contract for 12 months with no issues. The problems started when I renewed my contract.
My first contract was coming to an end in December. I called them in November to see what price they can offer me on a new contract.
We agreed on £39/mo for 18/mo. Shortly afterwards I received the transaction email below:

- On the 21st December they took £59 from my account which took me overdrawn as I was expecting the payment to be £26.33.
- I called them up to resolve the issue and ask them to credit the difference back to my account but they refused. They said I would need to contact my bank and ask them to sort it out under the direct debit guarantee. I contacted the bank the full amount was credited back the same day.
- I then received this second email:

- The person I had spoken to had created another new contract extending my contract by another month and increasing the monthly amount by £1 without my knowledge or consent.
- I created a complaint. To date nobody has responded.
- I went to the live chat to resolve the matter again and explained what had happened and that a new contract has been created without my authorisation. She said she would raise a ticket to get it resolved. I have a transcript of the chat.
I then got this email:

- I have created a complaint with offcom.
- I phoned again today to try and resolve it. I asked him to remove the unauthorised contract and reinstate the correct one. He said he could not do anything.
- I'm complaining about my contract being extended by a month (as well the incorrect billing amount) He offered to create another new 18 month contract for £39 as gesture of goodwill!!!! (extending it by 2 months). I told him you cant just go creating new contracts when they make a billing error.
- I asked for deadlock letter and he wouldn't give me one.
Not sure what I should do now

You have not been scammed! Your contract was for £39 and this is what they billed, I do not get where you thought it was otherwise!

asacarter said:

Browntoa said:

No , they are not scammers 

A company that creates a new contract without knowledge or consent of another party and refuses to retract it is pretty much the definition of a scammer.

You created the new contract, as my previous quote!

I understand that Virgin increased their prices on 1st January 2021!
Virgin Media announces new broadband and TV price rises: what are your options? – Which? News

Whether you can leave will be in your agreed T&Cs, but normally these are only for increases in the first year, not for a continued contract.

Chino

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth said:

Your contract was for £39 and this is what they billed, I do not get where you thought it was otherwise!

You could usefully explain your thinking behind this because, apparently, "On the 21st December they took £59 from my account ".

danthemoneysavingman

Typical charging is you have a monthly amount agreed and 1st payment they take up to the billing point and then charge ahead for the next months line rental - perhaps this is what happened.

julieelizabeth_2

I’ve had many issues with virgin like this including adding sky sports onto my account when I don’t even like sport. Cant get a response or a reply via email/Twitter

JJ_Egan

Try a proper letter .

asacarter

PZ19 said:

You could try email to executiveteam@virginmedia.co.uk. That’s CEO office apparently 

Thanks, I'll try this.

asacarter

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth said:

You have not been scammed! Your contract was for £39 and this is what they billed, I do not get where you thought it was otherwise!

You created the new contract, as my previous quote!

I understand that Virgin increased their prices on 1st January 2021!
Virgin Media announces new broadband and TV price rises: what are your options? – Which? News

Whether you can leave will be in your agreed T&Cs, but normally these are only for increases in the first year, not for a continued contract.

It's clear that you haven't even read my post.

My payment on December 21st was for £26.33. They took £59 from my account.
I called for a refund of the difference. Instead they acknowledged the error but refused to refund anything, increased my monthly contractual payment to £40 (one month after creating my 18 month contract for £39) and increasing my contract length by a further month - without telling me they were doing and of this.

On the same day I received an email telling me a new contract had been created, I contacted them again via live chat. They again acknowledged their error and assured me it would be resolved. To date nothing has been resolved and now they won't discuss it, probably just hoping I will forget about it.

Every time I contact them they manage to make things worse. They refuse to fix to my account and refuse to provide me with a deadlock letter. And that's after hours of being on hold if I'm even able to speak to anyone at all. To date I've clocked up 5 hours trying to resolve a simple billing and contractual issue that should have been resolved on the 21st December.