Virgin Media never upgraded my service and charged me for the higher service for nearly 18m!!!

lildannys95

Nearly 18m ago I upgraded my contract to the M200 and it should be coming to an end in January 23. 

When I took out the renewal, I was on 50 and renewed at 50, then a few days later I managed to haggle a cheaper price for the M200 for £32 including a Simcard for extra £5 per month so £37 total. Due to whatever issues with Virgin, we never received the Sim card and after chasing it the person on the phone said they cancelled the sim, and our bill will drop back to £32 till our contract end. Since then, I haven't been in contact with Virgin as I haven't had a reason too. 

I realised back in August my internet service has been very slow lately and doing a speed test I saw I am only getting 50mbps. A week later I checked still 50.

I contacted Virgin to say ask what is happening that I am only getting 50 when I should get 200, and they said I am only on the M50. 

I told them that's not correct, and I checked my contracts, and it says I have 3 for this period, an M50, an M200 with Sim and M200. The latter, just the M200 is the current contract what shows. 

I explained to them the contract is M200, its contract number and this is showing as my current contract, after some umm and ahh and even TRYING to say I can take out a new M200 contact with them now as an upgrade!!! (The cheek!) he said that because I "never accepted a new router" that my contract reverted to my old contract, and it actually ends September where it will increase to £49. I said thats impossible as I can see it right here my current contract is what it is, and what will Virgin do to rectify this as I have not been on the correct service and been paying for it and that I dont beleive their silly excuse.

The representative wasn't helpful and just again tried to SELL ME an upgrade so thanked them for their help, and I ended the call with them. 

I sent a complaint to Virgin, explaining all the detail and what I was told and said (and kept copies) of my contracts. 

They informed me that aparently I was never on the M200 only M50 and my contract is not £49 a month from September and I am free to cancel it. Basically, a carbon copy letter ignoring all my issues. 

What can I do to rectify this? I really don't know what to do or my next steps. I don't want to currently end my "contract" till the time it says or enter a new one with them as I got my contract here in plain English. I don't have any other connection than Virgin. 

I want compensation for this and to be spoken too properly, because I have paid for a service I haven't received, and they just ignore me. 

All I can think about doing is going to my bank and showing my contract to do a direct debit guarantee till it's finished. Or wait till my contract end then do the direct debit guarantee for the extra they are charging. 

Any advice would be great. 

Thanks

Danny 

Alderbank

First things first, you won't get any compensation 'to be spoken too properly'.

You say your contract is in plain English (good) but you also say 'I checked my contracts, and it says I have 3 for this period, an M50, an M200 with Sim and M200. The latter, just the M200 is the current contract what shows.'
That is far from plain. Do you have three contracts or do you have one? What exactly does your contract actually say?

lildannys95

Alderbank said:

First things first, you won't get any compensation 'to be spoken too properly'.

You say your contract is in plain English (good) but you also say 'I checked my contracts, and it says I have 3 for this period, an M50, an M200 with Sim and M200. The latter, just the M200 is the current contract what shows.'
That is far from plain. Do you have three contracts or do you have one? What exactly does your contract actually say?

Hi,

Thanks for your reply. 

Sorry, to clarify, I did mean that I wanted compensation for basically not receiving what I had paid for. I meant that I just want them to speak to me properly and not keep chucking me to pillar to post even though they are in my account. 

There is just 1 line, the contracts relate to the changes I made.

The M50 was my renewal, and then a few days after I haggled an upgrade to M200 and a sim, the final contract was because of Virgin not getting me the sim, they cancelled the sim and reissued the contract for just the M200 and no sim. 

The contract which is the M200 states that my end date is Jan 23, and I entered it July 21.

They are claiming on the phone that because I never took delivery of a new router, which they said they sent me July 2021 they put me back on the M50, and this was the first time I was told about this when I enquired over my speed. No email or letter or any communication.

prowla

My experiences...

Virgin are a disjointed company and their customer services are shambolic.

My experience is that I have to put in about a day's work in terms of phone calls before I can get to someone who is actually helpful; along the way the first line people will usually tell you anything they think you want to hear to close the phone call.

I've had one of them promise me equipment, another assure me it's in the post, and another say they were lying (yes,, they said that word!) because there was no stock in the UK.

In my adventures with Virgin I've found that it is also possible that one person thought they had ordered the item at their end but the receiving end simply binned the order.

Almost all of my issues have involved an engineer coming out and then a second one to do the job which the first didn't do properly.

I've also found that things require a call to cancellations to get any progression: amusingly the lat-but-one end of contract cycle I decided I'd had enough and was (genuinely) cancelling and I got a call from the retentions folks who promised me they'd sort it and offered me a good deal which I accepted; a couple of days later I got a call from retentions saying they were sorry I was leaving and offered me a better deal to stay!

Enough of my history...

Did you actually fail to take delivery of the phantom router, or was it never ordered?

It's possible that the upgraded service required that newer router to work, so they couldn't upgrade without it in-place (I had that happen - they sent me a faulty router but upgraded the line before I got a replacement, so my service stopped working altogether!).

Based on my experiences above, it is entirely possible that they never ordered it.

Dealing with Virgin...

The only question with Virgin is how much effort are you prepared to put in to getting them to supply you with the service you're paying for.

Also, keep a log of phone calls, times, things said - you will need it when you finally decide to call cancellations.

born_again

Better still use web chat as you can keep a transcript.

saajan_12

If they're agreeing you're on the M50 speed and they (unilatterally) reverted to the prior contract, then that should come at the prior price you renewed at. So the easiest thing seems to be to get them to refund the overpaid £32 / £37 for the last 16 months and correct the DD down to the old renewal price too going forward. 
The router etc is probably just spurious excuses, but you can't go back in time and get the faster speeds, so paying less is a good result. Do keep complaining - it takes a long time to get to someone senior / logical enough to 

Do you actually want the M200 speed for the next 4 months? That might make the above more complicated and it might be easier to haggle that as a new upgrade (they're usually willing to break mid contract if its for more money). 

born_again

saajan_12 said:

If they're agreeing you're on the M50 speed and they (unilatterally) reverted to the prior contract, then that should come at the prior price you renewed at. So the easiest thing seems to be to get them to refund the overpaid £32 / £37 for the last 16 months and correct the DD down to the old renewal price too going forward. 
The router etc is probably just spurious excuses, but you can't go back in time and get the faster speeds, so paying less is a good result. Do keep complaining - it takes a long time to get to someone senior / logical enough to 

Do you actually want the M200 speed for the next 4 months? That might make the above more complicated and it might be easier to haggle that as a new upgrade (they're usually willing to break mid contract if its for more money). 

Except that OP 18 month contract had expired, so if they reverted back. Then they would be on a rolling monthly contract, which would not be the same price as the in contract price. So may have been exactly the same price as the new 200 contract.

Without knowing exactly what the 50 price would be after contract ended, all we can do is guess.