Negotiating with Virgin Broadband

[Deleted User]

I have 350mbs and a Hub 3.   No TV or phoneline.   The price has just gone up to £53 or so a month.    I'm out of contract.

What if anything should I be able to negotiate them down to?  All the upgrade options on their site involve paying more money when I want to pay less!    I did consider switching down to 200 package but it didn't seem much cheaper.

Or is it not possible to get any discount these days without actually starting the cancellation process then waiting to be phoned back by retentions?

I'd be interested to hear your experiences.

Neil_Jones

Find a deal from somewhere else (genuine deal that's publicly available/viewable, don't just pluck random numbers out of the air) and use that to bounce them off when you phone up.  Or look at what you were paying before and see if they'll renew it.

Also consider whether you actually need 350Mbps.  If you just use the internet to buy shopping from Asda, look at email and find new deals then its complete overkill.  If you had a family of six all watching Netflix in UHD 24/7 it may be a better option.

[Deleted User]

Thanks Neil for your practical advice.  I will give it a try.

Yes I'm sure it's bandwidth overkill!  For the number of devices and the likelihood of them all being on at the same time, a slower package e.g. 200 would be fine.   

I see that the TV is 50-60 Mbps when playing a movie for example, it's not higher than that.  And, crucially, nobody is playing console/PC games!

JJ_Egan

VM haggle tips .

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/categories/phones-tv

Neil_Jones

Poster_586329 said:

Thanks Neil for your practical advice.  I will give it a try.

Yes I'm sure it's bandwidth overkill!  For the number of devices and the likelihood of them all being on at the same time, a slower package e.g. 200 would be fine.   

I see that the TV is 50-60 Mbps when playing a movie for example, it's not higher than that.  And, crucially, nobody is playing console/PC games!

Pardon me but I'm only on a 38Mbps connection and I can stream on the Smart TV absolutely fine (in HD and occasional UHD as well).

[Deleted User]

There is recently updated Virgin Media haggle guide on the main site:
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/broadband-and-tv/haggle-with-virgin-existing-customer-tips/

Read the above guide, prepare yourself and do haggle - the Virgin Media website is useless for getting a better deal, as you say, it is only for upgrades. Phone them or write a letter like I did moaning about being a loyal customer for 5 years and I got 18 months of £15 off my package even though I only re-signed for 12 months, so I'm out of contract now and still get the £15 discount until August this year.

The M350 package is incredibly good value being 5-10 times faster than typical fibre broadband for about 2-3 times the cost - but only if you actually make use of it. However I do think this really is where broadband should be nowadays but that's for a different argument I have - for example 65% of Spain & Portugal have Gigabit capable connections - the UK is ludicrously behind the times and has the cheek to call 30Mbps "Super fast" when I'd call it the "bare minimum".

Then the M100 package at £44 and M200 at £50 vs M350 at £56 for out of contract prices does make the M350 look attractive, but you don't need to see it like that, M200 is £72 a year saving before you start to haggle, and M100 £144/yr saving. You could try the lower speeds, they will let you increase mid-contract if you wish so nothing to lose with dropping to the M100 and see how it feels?

Unless you are a heavy user or have a specific need for M350, you probably won't notice any difference at M100.

[Deleted User]

Thanks, tallmansix!

They offered me £42 a month for the 200 mps.   I accepted it.