Renewal short changed

[Johno1993]

A customer for >15yrs, NTL days

Coming into my renewal, 250mb BB, weekend calls and mega TV normally £50, renewal £90.

This is ridiculous, the price is astronomical when compared to new customer bundles, why do virgin not appreciate their loyal customers?

I have had numerous calls, all of which include a hold time of upwards of 25 minutes, I get they are busy but to then get asked my mobile number should a disconnection happen  which I had two  no return call.

The WhatsApp system is a complete waste of time, 2 hours before I had a renew quote for a lesser service for £75 which is 50% more than I'm paying for less.

I instructed a disconnection but got let down by my new supplier so had to go cap in hand to get an extension at £90 pm for the privilege.

This is my worst customer service experience for a long long time, what has happened virgin it's just terrible?

I can get a 250mb, BB, weekend calls and TV plus movies for £57 as a new customer, I want that.

The powers that be need to look at legislation to force suppliers penalising new existing customers who are prevented from accessing all offers.

If you are thinking of joining virgin, then so be it but if you want longevity then think on, if you want good customer service forget it.

Thanks for reading my rant

[goslow]

For every person who thinks low introductory prices for new customers is a terrible idea, there will be another person who thinks it is fantastic as those who are prepared to switch and move around would say it allows them to get the best prices for their services.

If you want new customer pricing, you need to become a new customer somewhere else for a time and then return to VM once again as a 'new' customer. There is regular debate on here as to how long that time is. The figure I read most often on here is 90 days away from VM to be a 'new' customer once again (although you should not take that information as fact due to the random and unreliable ways in which VM customer service works).

Some suggest you are likely to get the best renewal price from VM once you have cancelled via a call back from the VM 'retentions' team but there is no guarantee that this will happen and it is advised to have marketing options turned on in MVM to allow such a call to happen.

If you are going to switch elsewhere, the usual advice on here is to overlap your existing VM service with any new one, if you can. This means you won't be cut off if the new supplier fails to deliver on time plus it allows you to try out the new service within the 14 day cooling off period while having VM to fall back on if the new service is no good. If it is feasible/affordable for you to do that, then overlapping the services avoids the situation you have described when the new supplier fails to come through in time.

It would be reasonable to assume VM does want to keep existing customers but VM will only offer whatever it thinks it can get away with as a renewal price for each individual customer. They will base any renewal offer on how likely VM thinks you are to leave and price accordingly.

[japitts]

Also to add that you only need look at the insurance industry to see what happens when new-customer discounts are made unlawful. The price for everyone goes up.

[Cardiffman282]

Anyone else (over 18) in the Johno1993 household who could take out a new customer offer? It's doable but you would lose all TV recordings, VM email accounts etc, need to return the existing kit, change SSID on all devices, and risk a short interruption between the old service ending and the new one starting. However you would still have the Russian roulette possibility of a good post cancellation retention deal - particularly as you are a "triple play" customer. 

[Anonymous]

Johno1993 

This is an interesting post as I have the exact same package current price is £60 a month going up to £94 in 7 weeks and we have had the worst year ever ( been with VM for more than 10 years ) we have made 3 separate complaints this year on different matters but when they lost my emails a few months ago i went the way with the complaint and they ended up paying my bill and over the last month or so we have had problems with the wi-fi signal from the router to the TV .

I am now looking at Sky and a similar package including Netflix is £39 a month VM are just doing the Pure Utter Greed route thanks for posting 

[Dennis8]

GOSH! I been with Virgin for over 30 years. When NTL first came to Swansea and with the Sun Newspaper 1p a minute. Tried today to contact them as they putting up my price from £56 to £76. Scandalous! Could not get through on my mobile as i am not with virgin o2. anyway had to use house phone in end and got my old deal back of £56..

[Alby41]

I would really like to know in 7 days how many loyal or maybe not so loyal VM customers give cancellation notices and say " adios " to VM  ..loosing revenue/ money for VM ..against new aspiring hopeful stary eyed new customers signing up.for.VM services... There is probably  some sort of table /league .. I wonder what is the % of goodbye to hello is in 7 days ?  anyone know? ...

[asim18]

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@japitts wrote:

Also to add that you only need look at the insurance industry to see what happens when new-customer discounts are made unlawful. The price for everyone goes up.

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You think they weren't fully aware of the effects, beforehand?

In my opinion, they knew exactly what was going to happen.

The fact that they ended up making more money, when they “apparently” set out to help the people, makes me think it’s just a PsyOp to make people “think” the aim was to help people out to help them. The fact that the reality of the situation is completely opposite and that they ended up sucking more money than ever before means that they knew exactly what was going to happen and it was planned this way. They don't just start sucking more money out of the economy than ever before by fluke.

The proper way to do it is to outlaw new customer discounts. Force fair-trade pricing. AND outlaw extortionate pricing/cash cowing. Make there be a limit to profit. You cant just ban new customer discounts, and then let there be unlimited profit margins you also need to enforce fair-trade.

No wonder inflation is increasing. I was reading some silly economics story the other day and it's absolutely bizarre how they only talk about "reducing the rate of inflation" they never talk about enforcing fair-trade, banning modern slavery, and ending inflation outright.

It's a shame how companies sell £5 products for over £100. Then take all the country's money out of the economy, ship it off to private islands and offshore accounts and leave the country's economy in absolute tatters.