Charged for adult content for simply looking at the price

Hi Guys, it's been awhile since i've posted here. Recently I moved to Virgin Media as my I moved home and unfortunately my options were limited. (Although I just missed in looking at Toob a Full Fibre ISP operating in my general area of the UK eg Farnborough Hampshire.

Anyway I've had package issues with VM , so when I've had odd figures appear on my bill with also credits included, I've not been as drawn to what was going on as I should have. So last night all my services were cut off as apparently I had gone over my credit limit. I had not got a clue as to what was going on bar the system saying I was late paying although I have a direct debit set up and I have since been told to ignore what the system says.

So I had to pay over £40 to get my VM active again, thats Internet and TV, plus there was another charge of over £80 that I thought was due to package upgrades as there was a discount applied later to it and those charges are shown on my June statement.

It turns out I've been charged £6.99 several times for (18) content, but I've never hit a payment button for such services. There are quite a few instances of this happening posted on the VM forums. What I have done is been channel hopping in the adult TV section and found that there are some channels that indicate that they are free to watch until 05:30am. You can only find this out by entering your Pin. So on the other channels that charge £6.99 it appears that they have charged me just because I have entered my Pin and landed on their home page where they advertise their channel and pricing etc. At that point I know it's clearly not free and I use the Back key and select another non adult channel I want to watch. So it seems VM charge you just for viewing the channels home page which shows it's pricing. I have never selected anything on that type of page and always exited out of it and certainly never proceeded with a purchase.

Surely there must be something wrong with the coding as it's a far cry from using say Amazon and buying a film where Amazon ask you to confirm that the transaction is wanted. VM seems to charge you for just looking at the price.

I've been offered £20 as a good will payment, but that is just ridiculous after the amount I've paid. Anyone at VM could look at the logs and know I never proceeded to the channel content and I was probably on that channel for less than 10 seconds. For those wondering why I have accrued quite high charges which equates to many views of these payment "Pages/Portals", It's because to find out what channels are free to 05:30 in the morning, you have to try by using your pin on different adult channels to see what ones are currently free which seems to be randomiised. But if you end up being presented with a landing page showing a price on one of those adult channels you'll be charged just for the priviledge of being there and viewing their price..

I've never come across anything quite as bad as this and as I mentioned there are a few threads I've found that are mainly on the VM forums of customers having this same issue.

I'm quite happy to go down the route of the Ombusman if I dont get that money back. Plus if it wasn't for the fact that they disabled my services I might of not learnt for awhile what was going on.

Hopefully this post might help others until Virgin Media code their TV system correctly.. I believe my TV unit is the 360.

Record the process, making sure in the recording the date and time is evident. Then send it in as a complaint. You wont be able to use the Ombudsman until you have complained anyway.

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

Record the process, making sure in the recording the date and time is evident. Then send it in as a complaint. You wont be able to use the Ombudsman until you have complained anyway.

A very good idea, any content that is payable, should show the prices up front and then give you the choice. I'm afraid the op will need to incur another 6.99 to prove this as well, which is the sad bit.

In reply to a post by Taras:

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

Record the process, making sure in the recording the date and time is evident. Then send it in as a complaint. You wont be able to use the Ombudsman until you have complained anyway.

A very good idea, any content that is payable, should show the prices up front and then give you the choice. I'm afraid the op will need to incur another 6.99 to prove this as well, which is the sad bit.

I agree it's a good idea to record this process, however after all my strained discussions with VM representatives I'd rather not incur another charge. So Id rather not look as though I'm still experimenting with their adult channels interface until I've at least spoken to someone in escalated complaints.

Edit: I would imagine someone at VM would know about the fact that these channels have no concise or user friendly interface - which was another reason exited the channel. I would have thought they'd have an interface similar to the purchase screen on Amazon prime video, which I believe forces you to confirm that you wish to purchase said film/series etc. Also Amazon alow you to cancel the purchase if you haven't started to play the content.

These are some of the Forum posts I found on the subject and I wouldn't be surprised if there were more!

Example 1

Example 2

Edit: Removed last link as I didnt realise it was the one to my post on this subject on the VM forums.

Edited by Vorlon (Fri 14-Jun-24 16:23:53)

I've continued with my official complaint via the VM forums, but as time goes on I'm starting to think I may know the reason this is happening and it could be a coding design issue on VM's part.
I'm told again that I entered my PIN and I'm not denying that, BUT it appears the system requires the PIN to be entered Twice to gain access to Any Adult content, that is where I think the issue lays. I've certainly had to re enter my Pin for the Free to 05:30hrs content and I would presume the chargeable channels work in the the same way.

So there are two ways the adult channels present themselves:-
1) These offer a free watch until 05:30hrs. - which I think is channel close; and
2) These channels show a screen advertisment for £6.99, for access.

I have never entered my PIN Twice on the £6.99 advertised channels, opting to Exit out of those instead. (as there is no way I was going to pay that sort of sum). It seems that just viewing the chargeable viewing page after using your PIN to see the costs, is enough to be charged. I'm having problems conveying to VM that this is the way their system appears to have been working for me.

The only time I have entered my Pin Twice is after seeing the message (after my first Pin entry) of something like "Congratulations you can view this channel to 05:30 for free". Of course it is possible that this free viewing is being charged for, but I'd find that unlikely.

I would imagine too, that somewhere on VM's Logs that there is a record indicating there was no data streamed to me of chargeable adult content.

There is something clearly wrong with this and I wonder how many other customers have been effected. Because of the subject matter I guess other customers might not of wished to have addressed the matter if they had been overcharged. It's possible that it may have caused arguments because of the statement entry, purely because someone had gone channel hopping and did a bit of "Window Shopping".

Someone in the Technical Department at Virgin Media, must be able to help by seeing how the system is working vs it's system design?

Edited by Vorlon (Mon 17-Jun-24 17:26:16)