| Non-motoring > Virgin Media | Miscellaneous |
Thread Author: smokie |
Replies: 9 |
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New Sat 12 Feb 22 15:16
Virgin Media - smokie
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Long time readers will recall that I have regular discussions with VM about the cost of their package - in my case basic TV, 200mb internet and (unwanted) phone line. This necessarily a long post so don't read if you're busy :-) Last year they put it up to a criminal £62 for 18 month contract, but then decide to land me with a £4 rise from Feb. I spoke to Retentions but that was the best possible price they could do. So that gave me the get-out. On browsing for alternatives, I found Virgin Media doing a very similar (slightly better) package but plus a 10Gb o2 SIM for £44. New users only. So I decided to cancel for March ( - I'm away anyway) and re-instate in April. So I called up for the new package, and it actually came out a couple of quid cheaper than advertised. They were happy to cancel the existing package and put the new package on the next day (under SWMBOs name) but I have to have new equipment, which is a small nuisance as I oose al the recordings - but not insurmountable. So I signed up for it. 24 hours later someone from Retentions called me. He didn't seem to know I'd signed a new package with him, so I told him and he was OK with it. I said I didn't really want the SIM so he managed to get the price down to £37 - that's nearly £30 a month cheaper - for an 18 month contract. All without having to swap out my equipment. So I've accepted that. As I hadn't had any confirmation in email I called Retentions last night. They could see nothing about it on my record. They didn't know the bloke's name. They could knock another 0.75p off the £66 but that was it. They said there was another Retentions on the sales side, which was nothing to do with them. So I left my contact a voice message saying I had nothing in writing (still over a week to go till the change date though). Within 10 minutes he called me back and assured me that all is going through. So that is two retentions departments, seemingly completely ignorant of each other. Meantime, in today's email I got an email from Virgin Media. Subject "Don't go. £44 a month for the Bigger bundle". Yet another Retentions offer, presumably from another Retentions department!!!! What a crazy company. At least three retention departments which don't know about each other, all singing from different hymn sheets. And a seemingly disconnected Sales department. They must be spending a fortune trying to keep customers... I expect it'll all go wrong in some way but as I'm away for March there is plenty of time to sort it out... and I now have handful of Firesticks to tide us over if necessary. |
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New Sat 12 Feb 22 20:26
Virgin Media - Crankcase
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That tale of woe cements me in the decision I took a day or two ago. Yes. had the letter saying it's going up by about a fiver a month. That will put us to £84 monthly. Ouch. However. I already have a £14 "loyalty discount" from the last negotiation, which runs out in July. Experience tells me that whatever they say, if I manage to get them to drop the fiver, price increase they will do it by renewing me for another 18 months - and will remove the £14 discount. I suspect then, a world of pain such as you describe, a huge wait on the phone, and at the end of it, at best, I'll probably be a tenner a month worse off and be locked into a new contract. I'm going to get to August when the discount ends and look at it all again then, when I'm feeling strong. I think there's a market for a service that undertakes, with your permission, to negotiate with all these companies, get you the best discount they can and charge a small fee for doing it. No discount achieved, no fee, something like that. I'm sure there's lots of people that would love to ring Virgin repeatedly asking for discounts. I'm not one of them. |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 09:23
Virgin Media - Kevin
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| I did some work on a Hadoop cluster for Virgin Media a while ago. If all of their server estate lives in similar conditions to those I saw in St. Helens I'm surprised that their network stays up for more than an hour at a time. |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 10:16
Virgin Media - legacylad
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£13.37 a month for my TV Licence here in LL land. I once almost paid for Spotify ...my only media outgoing is my phone contract. |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 10:18
Virgin Media - sooty123
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Last year they put it up to a criminal £62 for 18 month contract, That's cheap. |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 10:38
Virgin Media - Falkirk Bairn
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Sky play the same game as VM every 18 months. Was paying £75 TV & BB and they sent a letter saying do nothing as we are giving you the following discounts. Did a bit of investigation and it would have been £95+, phoned & £92 was the next offer.. Left it 2+ weeks and gave them 31 days notice, so out of contract and now just 2 days to go. Lo & behold with 2 days to go they have found it can be done for £73 TV&BB - I was paying £72 5 years ago. I know £73 is a lot for mainly Sky Sports but the SkyQ box is magic compared fiddling about with other methods buy SWMBO cannot handle the Firestick RC. |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 11:23
Virgin Media - smokie
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"Last year they put it up to a criminal £62 for 18 month contract" and Sooty said that's cheap. I don't think it is, not for the basic TV package, phone line with virtually no freebies that I don't want anyway and admittedly large internet, which I do want. SWMBO is used to Firestick and catch up now but there is no doubt having a box to record onto, and a consolidated programme guide has a value. I'm quite happy with the internet cost as no other service appears to get near the same speed and reliability around here, and we all get good use from it. The line and its costs are shared with next door too :-) Oh, and VM presumably agree it's not cheap either, otherwise they wouldn't have dropped their pants so spectacularly. But for once I really would have gone ahead with it. They said I'd been with them 27 years which sounds about right (well, them and their predecessors) Last edited by: smokie on Sun 13 Feb 22 at 11:24
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 11:27
Virgin Media - sooty123
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>> "Last year they put it up to a criminal £62 for 18 month contract" and >> Sooty said that's cheap. >> > Just a (wasted) joke. |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 12:05
Virgin Media - smokie
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| Oh. Yeah, Wasted on me :-) |
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New Sun 13 Feb 22 12:20
Virgin Media - Terry
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Insurance, energy suppliers, media and broadband companies thrive on customer inertia. Last time my broadband and telephone came up for renewal - (a) looked at comparison websites, (b) understood cost of alternatives, (c) called Talktalk to discuss renewal, (d) made it completely clear if they did not match the alternative I would leave. As it happened they reduced their price appropriately. Equally I was not bluffing - if you do they quickly realise and you will get nowhere. Insist on swift email confirmation so rubbish admin systems can't wriggle out of the deal you have agreed. They use low pricing to attract new customers. But keeping existing customers is cheap. For a broadband company their costs are almost 100% fixed whether you renew or not. They would rather have (say) £30 per month than nothing. Losing existing customers also removes the opportunity to sell them add ons (which often they don't need or use anyway). |
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