The petition
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While signatures and comments can be made and read here, the running totals for the poll questions in the petition can be viewed at the main site.
I would like to once again thank those who have taken the time to sign this petition and show their support. I could not achieve anything without you. Nevertheless, to have any impact we need far more signatures. If you've already signed, I urge you to do what you can to encourage others to sign. If you haven't signed yet, I would urge you to do so now, then get everyone you know who has also experienced poor service with Virgin Media to sign also. Every signature counts!
PLEASE DO NOT USE PROFANITIES WHEN SUBMITTING YOUR COMMENTS. MINORS READ THESE PAGES AND SUCH PROFANITIES COULD RESULT IN THE PETITION BEING REMOVED!!
I STRONGLY recommend all Virgin Media customers cancel direct debits and pay by any other means in which you have complete control over a payment being made to avoid being overcharged then being made to jump through hoops to get your money back. I also strongly recommend you all check your bills meticulously EVERY month! NEVER PAY BY DIRECT DEBIT!!!
Is Sir Richard Branson going to continue slapping sticky plasters on everything that fails while his loyal customers are paying in good faith for a less than adequate service? Is he going to give his loyal customers what they want and deserve, i.e. value for money and a worthwhile, reliable service or will he continue the current trend of deceptive marketing tactics ("blistering speed!"), inadequate maintenance, questionable customer support, traffic shaping and spurious new, or in some cases inapropriate and/or erroneous, charges? Are you, the customer, happy to accept the status quo or do you demand satisfaction? One man's voice cannot be heard in a crowd, but the crowd speaking in unison is hard to ignore! SIGN THE PETITION!
My story, the reason for this petition and various updates follow, but if you just want to go ahead and sign the petition then just scroll down the page, and thanks again.
_______________________________________________
Over recent years, as the amount of internet users has increased exponentially, I have become increasingly frustrated over paying for an 'Unlimited' connection of 10Megs. I have lost count of the times I have had to endure Virgin Media/Blueyonder's first line tech team assert there is something wrong with my set up. After having gone through the mill many times I have eventually achieved not only several admissions by Virgin Media/Blueyonder representatives that they do indeed have an ongoing over utilisation problem, but have also received a refund of a full years payments as an act of good will. I am very grateful for this, but the problem still remains. In January 2006 I began a dialogue with head office who informed me they were working on the over utilisation problem and this would be corrected by the end of May. May became June, June became July. Then In September another frontline rep admits there has been another over utilisation problem since 12th August 2006. So, in short, they are, and have been, fully aware of an ongoing over utilisation issue and still we suffer slow connections, slow download, and more than sufficient down time where there is no connection at all. Interestingly, in a recent recorded conversation with a Virgin Media/Blueyonder frontline tech rep, I was told "I do agree, they should be putting the money into getting the equipment sorted if what your telling me is true like this has been going on for ages, it does seem to be a bit of a joke.... obviously speak to them (customer service) and get your money back for the service you've been given which is obviously not good enough". It has to be said that this particular individual did everything and more to try to correct the slow speed issue I was suffering at the time, the phrase "above and beyond" comes to mind.
The reason I have started this petition is to ascertain how many other Virgin Media/Blueyonder customers suffer regular slow connections, time outs and down time, the frequency, duration and their frustration level in the hope that I can raise enough numbers to force Virgin Media/Blueyonder to start ploughing their substantial revenue back into the business and curing the problem once and for all instead of using a sticky plaster remedy while creaming it off their customers, most of whom are either oblivious to the fact the problem is not with their equipment or refrain from complaining because this assertion has been made so many times.
Addendum..
Once more I have received a call from a Virgin/BY rep attempting to assert that there may be a problem with my equipment and one of their techs could fix that. Been there, done that. Then they assert that they do not guarantee a 10Meg connection. Granted, but they do take money in return for a 'service of a reasonable standard'. I do not consider less than half the suggested level as reasonable. Granted, it is unreasonable for anyone to expect any ISP to provide a constant uninterupted speed of 10Megs, but if you're paying for ten megs it is unreasonable to recieve an average of 2 megs most of the time. This rep also asserted that the 10Meg refers to the amount of data downloaded in a month!! Naturally I strongly disagreed. I wonder what their next lame excuse will be?
I emplor you to sign this petition and do what ever you can to get others to also sign. Put links on your websites, send emails, phone your family and friends, anything. I'm aware this has apparently been attempted before to no avail. I promise when I have a reasonable amount of signatures I WILL run with this until I am satisfied and do not care how much noise I have to make!
Addendum...
I am now witnessing sudden severe drops in download speed after a short time period. I am reading that this is happening to others also. This begs the question are we now being capped?
After going through the mill once again with Virgin techs only to hang up feeling I just wasted a call, I was prompted to check the signatures. I don't normally make a habit of posting someone's comments here but I feel Alan Hindley has hit the nail right on the head with his comment. "I find my connection to virgin's servers to be satisfactory, but my connection to the internet (through virgin's servers) is disgraceful in terms of speed. They need to up their bandwidth by about 800% in order to cope with demand. They signup far too many customers without any kind of upgrade in service (i.e. they take the money and don't invest it back into the required areas of the business)."
Well said Alan!
Addendum 12/5/07
I am interested to know if any others with a similar petition or those signing this petition have received phone bills racked up by charges for calls to a number they have never dialed. I have just attempted to pay my bill only to find there are calls totalling more than £60 to a mobile number at very strange times, for lengthy periods with a frequency not reflecting our normal usage. I have queried this with Virgin Media who have explained they will investigate and contact me on the 17th of May with their findings. One rep told me it was definately made from this house, another told me it 'seemed' like a mistake but would not be pinned down. If their investigation results in them asserting the calls originated from my home then I have the option of having an engineer check the line. If the engineer finds no fault then they will charge me a further £75.
I feel a dotcom coming on.
Customer Concern
Virginmedia Ltd
NCLC
PO Box 50
Wythenshawe
Manchester
M22 0BA
The latest instalment of the ongoing ridiculous debacle...
12/5/07 Spoke to Khan at 7:50pm who advised me there was an investigation
underway and the charges to the number 07879xxxxxx seemed like an error. He stated a ten pound charge would be applied on the next bill for non payment but should be removed when this is rectified. He also provisionally agreed that the bill should be £142.06 which consisted of what we owe (£36.33), the £35 refund not applied and the over charge to the number not known to us and a ten pound credit not applied.
I was told to expect a call back 17/5/07 with the results of the investigation.
17/5/07 I received a call back demanding £276! This person had no knowledge of
any investigation. I rang back three times to try to get some sense out of someone and no one knew what was going on. Eventually (4th call) I was told to call back the next day.
18/5/07 I was due a call back 17/5/07 to inform me of the result of the investigation. I received a call back demanding £276 and varying amounts on subsequent calls. Out of 4 calls only one rep was worth his salt and advised me to give them 24hrs and then call back. I called back and was told I would be cut off on the 28th of May. Three different people hung up on me for no good reason. I was eventually told the investigation had been sent to the wrong department at head office. I was told I could not contact head office by telephone. So I rang head office on their none existent number 01256752000 and asked to speak with the department dealing with my investigation. The first woman I was put through to hung up on me as I was explaining the case. The second attempt resulted in me being forward to an old NTL announcement which informed me the department was closed. The third attempt resulted in the operator being unable to connect to anyone and taking my number to get them to ring me once she actually got an answer from a person. I eventually spoke with a very obstreperous woman who stated in defiance to my claims “I’m going to have this investigated” to which I replied “I sincerely wish you would as you promised you would a week ago!”
21/5/07 Called head office to find out what was going on. Was told an engineer would be out to check the line 25/5/07.
25/5/07 Engineer called 8:15am. He checked the line and could find no fault to charge us for. Further, he looked at the bill and commented on the strange timings of the number in dispute. He called his supervisor and told him, in my presence, that he was confident we were not in the house at the times of some of the calls. He told us to expect a call the next day from the investigation team to inform me of the credit to be applied to the account and the new balance to pay. He assured me we would NOT be cut off. He advised me to have mobile calls blocked and informed me that I would still be able to make calls using a pin. Others omitted to mention the pin.
25/5/07 8:55am. Called a Virgin rep who initiated call barring of mobiles and issued a pin. He also told me there would be a credit made for the over charge to the strange number and we would not be cut off.
28/5/07 Phone and broadband services cut off!
I called Virgin on my mobile and the woman I spoke to, Anna, was kind enough to listen to my tirade then offer to call me back. Moments later she called me back and apologised for the ‘mistake’ and explained that we should not have been cut off and there were notes on the account stating that no one was allowed to discuss the account or deal with it in any way as it was in the hands of the investigation team. She told me that I should have been contacted by the investigative team. She told me the services would be back on in a couple of hours. They were back on within the hour, which I appreciated.
28/5/07 Received a call from Claire on 0845450000 at 10:25 who stated the previous balance was £140!? I explained that the bill I was looking at had £99.64 as the previous balance. She stated they had no record of that bill, i.e. the one I was holding in my hands! Another perfect example of Virgin Media’s ineptitude. She argued with me for a few minutes until I became too irate to speak and passed the phone to my wife. She argued with my wife for a few minutes while my wife told her that her Father was in hospital in the states and her son’s grandfather was on his deathbed in the states and we couldn’t contact either. My wife became too irate to speak and gave me the phone. This woman insisted I provide proof that we weren’t in the house at the times these strange calls were made. I lost it, ranted about how I was sick to the back teeth of the lies and deception and very concerned that hundreds of overcharge bills like this were going out to customers who would trust the source, panic and pay the over charge, to which Claire had no response, and then I hung up. We have since been able to pinpoint actual times where we have proof no one was in the house when some of the calls were made. Nevertheless I have no doubt Virgin Media will then attempt to avert admitting fault and apologising for their error by insisting the damn cat made the calls!
As a result of the conversation with Claire on the 28th we were instructed to obtain proof that we were not in the house when the calls were made.
29th May 2007
4:45pm Received call from accounts asking for payment. I explained the history, of which he was seemingly unaware. He explained that our details would be removed from his system so that we weren’t bothered by accounts again. He also told me Virgin Media had seven days to respond to a complaint. He stated that on the records Anna had registered the complaint when I spoke to her on the 28th. I explained this had been going on since the 12th. He advised me the service was booked to be restricted 7th June 2007.
29th May 2007
5:40pm Received call from a woman on 08454540000 asking for payment. I refused. She told me that the engineer had said there was no fault on the line. She also stated that they were going to credit us for the calls to the strange mobile number on this occasion but if future bills included the number they would insist upon payment. I took this as an insinuation I was lying and they were doing me a favour. I was told the outstanding balance was now £175. I told her this was a ridiculous figure and advised her of the credits promised previously which had not yet been applied. She reduced the amount again by £45 advising me of a new balance of £134. Last time I was at school £175 minus £45 equalled £130. She continued to argue with me over the outstanding amount and eventually attempted to justify this totally new figure with a claim that we did not pay the bill for February! This begs the question why we weren’t cut off then and they just let it ride for three months when we’ve been harassed to hell and back for the past two weeks over last months bill?
After going though the figures again I have since realised that this woman was attempting to obtain payment for the entire outstanding amount rather than the amount for April. She had meant we hadn’t paid the bill for March (April’s bill) when she mentioned February’s bill. The May bill arrived a couple of days ago and should be £121.51 in total. The above £134 is the closest we’ve been offered.
29th May 2007
6:23pm Spoke to a very nice girl called Serena after waiting half an hour to get through Virgin’s ridiculous system. Serena kindly verified that they do in fact have records of payments for in January, February, March and April of £77.69, £80.25, £50.66 and £89.64 respectively.
30th May 2007
1:50pm Telecon with Suki, again very nice and helpful, on customer services who provided the revised outstanding figure of £131.86. I explained my figure of 121.51 showed a disparity of £10 which I presumed was another charge not yet credited as promised. Suki applied the credit immediately and agreed a total outstanding of £121.86. At this point I wasn’t going to quibble about 35p. Suki explained that the outstanding amounts broke down to £19.50 outstanding and £102.36 current. I asked if it was acceptable to pay the revised April bill of £19.50 on the 2nd June 2007, and she said that was fine.
So, now that it’s all sorted out, here’s the figures for your perusal.
Bill Point 16th April 2007
Amount £231.70
BF £99.64
(argued by Claire 28th May who claimed it was £140 b/f and had no record of the bill I was looking at.)
Previous balance b/f claimed £ 99.64
12/5/07 Confirmed that £10 charge had been removed £ 10.00-
Paid 16/4/07 £ 89.64-
Actual Balance b/f £ 0.00
Bill amount claimed £231.70
Less payment and credit (above) £ 99.64-
Less £35 credit promised for bad service (a) £ 35.00-
Less credit for charge for 07879xxxxxx (a) £ 60.73-
Correct due amount £ 36.33
Bill Point 14th May 2007
c/f on previous bill £231.70
b/f £152.06-
Discrepancy £ 79.64
This shows the payment made 16th April
is now accounted for but the £10 credit
confirmed 12/5/07 was not applied. Also
absent are the credits listed at (a).
Thus:-
Bill amount claimed £256.65
Less credit for April not applied £ 10.00-
Less £35 credit promised for bad service not applied £ 35.00-
Less credit for charge for 07879xxxxxx not applied £ 60.73-
Less credit for further charges for 07879xxxxxx £ 19.41-
Less credit for May £ 10.00-
Correct amount due £121.51
30th May 2007
As per Suki and agreed
Balance £121.86
Overdue portion £ 19.50
Due portion £102.36
Revised 11th June 2007 to £82.86 then £71.87
Current due balance £71.87
This is all well and good, but this has taken 18 days to sort out. The plethora of harassing telephone conversations have been detrimental to our health resulting in a quite unpleasant experience in relation to our bowels. But what really concerns me is the amount of bills that go out like this every month and are paid immediately by the account holder either out of fear or ignorance. My elderly Mother comes to mind who would not dream to question such a bill. A signatory on the petition only recently wrote that he had been billed £170 by direct debit and didn’t know what for. Imagine the hell of trying to get that money back. We’ve only succeeded because we had control over whether they got paid or not.
Virgin Media lost 47,000 customers in the first three months of the year. If half of those customers had been over charged the way Virgin Media attempted to over charge us on this occasion and had paid, Virgin Media would have made a profit of approximately £3,175,790.00 for nothing. If only a quarter of them paid, Virgin Media would have profited by £1,587,895.00 for nothing. This is to say nothing of the small fortune it costs to call the various numbers which invariably make you wait an age until either you give up waiting and try another number or are eventually answered. I’d love to audit Branson’s books!
11th June 2007
Rang today in an effort to obtain a goodwill gesture and eventually spoke to someone after waiting on hold a total of 90 minutes and being transferred 4 times when in fact the first department I spoke to was the department I was supposed to deal with.
Spoke to two nice guys (Yes, I was shocked too) who were very very helpful once I explained I was considering quiting. In short, I was advised to write a letter for compensation to the National Customer Liaison Centre and was advised that there indeed had been slow speeds reported on their equipment since January 2007. Normally, I would find this eventual honesty refreshing and impressive but this is not the first time I've been given all the excuses under the sun for months on end then eventually told the truth only to repeat the whole scenario once pacified with a credit.
This is all seeming like it's all an on going repair issue largely frustrated by mostly evasive customer services staff.
All of this malarky isn't really surprising considering the company is owned by a man who freely admitted he got through Oxford by cheating. A fact he found humorous I hasten to add. Says a lot about his integrity doesn't it.
FINAL UPDATE
We quit! This last debacle was more than enough and we are now with another ISP and phone company. The upside is Virgin Media can't retaliate or persuade me to desist by playing with my service or sending crazy bills and this petition WILL continue!
12th Sept 2007
Well, let's bring this up to date. Virgin continue to send bills despite the fact we told them we were terminating their services. They want £102 for final billing plus a further £77 for services rendered since termination of their services!?! Of course they'll claim this is for 'one months notice'. As far as we're concerned Virgin can buy a ticket on one of their planes and fly off! They're not getting a penny!
My God! We terminate all ties and it STILL doesn't end! We owed them just over £71. They've since inflated that to various amounts and are still trying to get money out of us. We consider the outstanding amount the claim we owe to be only part payment of what they should be liable for as a result of the harassment and poor service we've endured, and it seems continue to endure. I am begining to wonder if 50 years from now a Virgin rep will be sticking a summons on my headstone!
Here's a copy of my response to their latest correspondence for your enjoyment.
Please find below corrections of the two erroneous assertions you make in your letter of 27/9/07, which come as little surprise, for which I believe an apology would be in order.
I did make the payment you claim I did not!
Please check your records, if indeed you have any, for a payment made by debit card for the sum of £19.50 made at 10:20pm on the 2nd of June 2007 for which I was given the authorization code of 002816 by a Virgin employee once the payment had cleared. Once you discover I did in fact make the above payment, which you claim I did not, then please amend your records accordingly, or perhaps a post-it note on someone’s PC would be more reliable.
An engineer did attend and confirmed the strange mobile number, against which you erroneously charged a huge amount, had not been called from our home!
The credits you speak of amounting to an alleged £155.28 consisted of two credits of £35 totaling £70 for poor, nay, deplorable service, two refunds of £10 totaling £20 erroneously charged as a result of Virgin’s repeated errors and £80.14 erroneously charged for calls to a number no one has ever dialed from this house; a fact which your engineer agreed with upon attendance at my home and confirmed verbally with his supervisor over the phone in my presence. These charges actually amount to £170.14 (wonderful things these calculators), so I suggest Virgin consider spending some of the millions creamed from suffering customers on training Virgin employees in basic mathematics. Uhoh! I’m doing Virgin’s job again it seems! Perhaps I should bill you for this service? Let’s say £300 and we’ll call it a day huh?
We owe you nothing! On the contrary, for the perpetual and extreme harassment and anxiety my wife and I have endured throughout as a direct result of the incredulous ineptitude of Virgin, you should be paying us restitution!
I regret to inform you that your words of sincerity apologizing for the considerable inconvenience and distress caused in this matter are considered no more than words, words which are distinctly lacking in sincerity. Furthermore, I have good reason to believe that, contrary to your assertion, this level of service is indeed what Virgin aim to provide. Penalising customers for paying late due to a heart attack, a trend of double billing by mistake, charging erroneously with reckless abandon and the list goes on. I thought we had it bad, but upon reading about the scenarios other customers of Virgin have had to suffer I have to wonder if Virgin is attempting to reach a new all time low!
I am so glad this matter has been passed to a debt recovery agency and cannot wait for them to contact me. Actually, as I have still not yet had any contact from said agency, I would be overjoyed if you would provide me with their contact information and I’ll contact them with haste. I absolutely cannot wait to provide them with copies of all the bills, letters and recordings (made with consent) showing Virgin’s addiction to err, habitual self-contradiction, tendency to embroider the truth, accounting by randomisation, occasional deception and utter, utter incompetence. Oh, and please do call me to task on any of these accusations.
Yours sincerely,
Colin Nunn
Copied to:-
NCLC
Condord house
Concorde Business Park
Threapwood Road
Off Shadowmoss Road
Wythenshawe
Manchester
M22 0EY
Customer Concern
Virginmedia Ltd
NCLC
PO Box 50
Wythenshawe
Manchester
M22 0BA
Virgin Media Payments
Milton Keynes
MK77 1TW
Ofcom
Riverside House
2a Southwark Bridge Road
London
So there's another Virgin lesson to be learned here. Don't allow them to 'test' your line or anything else as they promise not to charge you for it, assert there's nothing wrong with your equipment and assure you're not at fault then they'll do an about turn, stick you with a bill and lie about the engineers findings to suit themselves.
The moral of this story - DO NOT TRUST VIRGIN!
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