VirginMedia scamming through orders not placed

VIRGIN WILL SELL AND SEND YOU STUFF WITHOUT ASKING YOU BUT IF YOU CANCEL YOU WILL END UP PAYING MORE!!!!!!

Its the time of the year when a lot more orders are placed and more problems occuring.

I had trialled virginmedia when I moved and I was given 28 days to trial or cancel. I wanted phone and broadband. This was totalling to £20 but with £5 extra -I was told, I can get more tv channels. So I went for it. £25 a month direct debit. I was told I would be sent a new modem only as the old one is non functional but can use the other equipment - set-top box. The 'box of tricks' as they call it, (was meant to be delivered between 7am-6pm) turned up 9am (was told by the delivery person his delivery says 7-9am), not with the modem alone but the set-top box and a wireless router as well.

I already had my router, so why they send me a router as well, I had no idea. Because it was all in the sealed box I had no idea what was in the box and so signed for the box.

The TV set-top box worked for a day and stopped working. The phone was not working. I called the set-up team and was told its gone past the set-up team and would have to talk to tech support. I said the box does not go off standby but she still insisted I power it up again and again. It was like speaking to a talking machine. I asked about the phone and was told I have to plug another phone to the socket to check that its not the phone. I said I have already tested the phone on a working line and it works but she still insisted I plug in another phone to confirm the phone is not dodgy. I asked what number I was assigned, but was told due to Data Protection, she cannot give me the number assigned to me. (Basically it meant to me that the line was not working.). What a load of nonsense. I said, if its going to be like this, then I do not want their services, and asked them to pickup their box. I had also said I get more channels through freewview and she agreed. So why was I paying £5 extra for TV?

Engineer was assigned to sort out the problem and he swapped the set top box (this is what I had said - not working) and line was not connected from the outside, which he had to do. I got the services running a week later.

I checked the speed of the broadband 2-4 times after install. twice it was 2mb and on the day of the cancallation it was <1mb. They had sold me a 10mb cable connection.

On cancallation, I also said I get more channels through freeview but she insisted I get more through their box.Yeah, through catchup - you can get these through broadband (like BBCiplayer) and ONDEMAND - which you have to pay for. That's NOT more than freeview!!!. I wasn't going to waste more time with virgin and hence decided to cancel. I was told since I had ordered the wireless, I would have to post it my expence or get charged £49.99 SCAM.I DID NOT ORDER IT!!!!

I insisted to speak to a Manager, and I was put on hold. Few minutes later, I was told the manager was unavailable and the manager will have to ring me back. I had ended the call at 3pm and I waited for 1 hour. I tried calling again at 4pm BUT the line was dead. How the heck is the manager meant to ring me back?

SO WATCH OUT, VIRGIN WILL SELL AND SEND YOU STUFF WITHOUT ASKING YOU BUT IF YOU CANCEL YOU WILL END UP PAYING MORE!!!!!!

you should change that to:


VIRGIN SENT ' ME ' STUFF WITHOUT ASKING ' ME ', BUT WHEN ' I ' DECIDED TO CANCEL' I ' ENDED UP PAYING MORE!!!!!!





kos iv been with them for a while and never been sent anything i never asked for,my bro is with them as well and as far as i no he has never been sent anything either that he never asked for.....


just because you have had service that you dont agree with,does not mean that every v/m customer is going to be the same....9/10 times no one else has even heard of these issues never mind be affected my them..




good luck..

Why did you not just send the equipment back??..... Also no idea what you mean about TV channels, didnt you check what channels you would get with the order first?

Virgins 10Mb speeds vary depending upon time and amount of data you use.

No doubt Virgin can be a pain to deal with but you didnt do yourself any favours either.

Id say this is more a lesson of look carefully what you are signing upto first

Being a pc engineer I would know when they said a router will be sent out as well. I already have a router, so why do I need a basic router that virgin send to its customers?
At the time of placing the order, I said why can they not use the same equipement that was already in the property I moved to. They said it does not work, even though I could basic TV channels 1-5 and a couple of others. For the modem, I could connect to the modem but it was asking for activation. They said new modem needs to be sent out for the services to work!!!
There was no mention that a new set-top box or router will be sent with the modem 'the box of tricks'

As for TV channels, at the time of placing the order (via phone - no access to the net to check more details, and I was told they do not send information via post) and from the information I was given at the time, I was going to be get more channels than freeview. I wanted to sign up for phone and broadband but for £5 extra they said I would telly and lots more channells.

Things did not go badly wrong. I want to join virgin after may years on the BT line as BT has higher coverage of lines and broadband (monopoly vagely). Wanted to given virgin more customers but it turned out wrong. I would have stayed with virgin phone & broadband, if they said they give me 10mb and stayed on it. Virgin sells 'fibre optic' through adverts. BT line also have fibre optic but both of them the fibre ends at the junction boxes. Rest of the way is copper, so NO way you will get 10mb or the speed any providers says, unless you get fibre to you premises.
I am not a heavy user and did my test at between 11am to 12am and other was a 2pm when demand would have dropped but to get <1mb is ridicolous. I would rather be ona BT line and get half the speed and pay less.
I did ask for cheaper broadband but the cheapest was £6 more expensive than on a BT line.

I did use virgin years ago. customer service has not changed at all because they do not have competition on cable so can do what ever they like. I had virgin broadband via BT line but never did get the service or realibility and emails to support/customer services tooks days to reply.

As for manager ringing me back, they terminated the line without the manager ringing me back - BRILLIANT CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Rest of the way is copper, so NO way you will get 10mb or the speed any providers says, unless you get fibre to you premises."

Technically incorrect, with the fibre/coax hyrbid network the modem connects at 10Meg on the Virgin 10Meg service. You are confusing throughput of a shared resource with connection speed, and the issues of DSL signal fall off over the twisted pair network.

The distance of coax in the VM network means the modems will connect at the purchased speed.

Without looking at the issues closer for all anyone knows there may have been a PC setup mismatch, or a service fault that was not rectified.

If you acted early enough you could have used the distance selling regulations to back out of the contract, any reason for not utilising those basic consumer rights?

forgot to mentio, I have gone to BT line, not necessarily BT but ultimately BT do benefit from it - shame, this monopoly.
At the time of signing, (I couldn't sign via net as I had already been disconnect), I was told I will be sent a router, BUT I said no router as I already have a router.

Being a PC engineer, I have been to other people who have cable broadband BUT none of them have had a router sent to them, as they ask me to get them router and set-up for them. I think form these people a router is highly beneficial as when problems occur, virgin says to them 'we do not support the router and so go to the manufacturer for assistance',

At the time of cancelling conservation, I said I was a pc enginner, thats when their tone changed and they probably realised they have made a mistake but did not admit they send out equipement without asking!!!!!!!!!

Virgin Media started sending out routers some time ago and certainly at this time 10Meg lists a free one

http://allyours.virginmedia.com/websales/product.do?...

I have been on BT lines for years now and always recommended others on BT lines (but never for virgin services, be it cable or BT lines) and when broadband is enabled on a line, it takes time to settle and stabalise. Having used VM for the first time on cable braodband, I was assuming the same. Having ready so many posts - no one actually getting the speeds they had signed up for, it also made me conclude that this was the case. Same as BT, contention ratio and the time of the day, also applies to cable. I have worked for companies with fibre to the premieses (lease line as its called) and contention ratio , so I know all about fibre as well.

check out http://allyours.virginmedia.com/html/broadband/speed... it says the speeds achivable are 8.1 to 8.7Mbit/s not 10mb to the modem as you mention. All packages have upto written on it, so its not better than BT lines when also says upto.

Virgin do charge for modem, if you want broadband only with cetain packages. Once again its a upto service. I'll post the link when I find it.

For the free router, it does says it remains the property of VM. but not on the modem!!! Its a basic router, not for me. (mine does lots more than theirs)

NOTE: I was not disputing your experience but your reasoning as to why its a problem.

What you are seeing is an effect of the contention ratio nothing to do with the modem connecting at a different speed.

If you have the 10Meg service you will see the cable modem always connects at 10Meg. Obviously throughput as the page you linked to will be less, that is the difference between two ISP's that use the same connection technology. The Ofcom research was measuring average download speed, which is very different to connection speed again.

Obviously you know all this as you know all about fibre, but perhaps the way you are expressing is coming across poorly. For others leased lines generally perform very well due to the low contention which translates as a high price.

Correct Link:

http://allyours.virginmedia.com/html/broadband/speed...