Terrible TiVo - don't bother

[JBGF]

We are totally exasperated by the TiVo service and by Virgin's customer service.

Just spent 45 mins on the phone to get through to the call centre to report that lots of channels were unavailable. The other night it took 55 mins to get through, so a speedier service tonight at least! Who has the time to spend sitting on the phone for this length of time to report a fault? And why do Virgin think that this is acceptable?

We've had TiVo since Sept 2011 and have had a sporadic service from the start. I cannot remember how often channels haven't been available. We can't be bothered phoning the call centre to report it most of the time because it takes so long to get through.

The first engineer installed it (replacing a V+ box which had been fine), all seemed good, then we turned on the set a few days later and the picture was completely pixellated. 

Since then we've had visits from three engineers. First guy fiddled about with it. Second guy said some wires were tangled up. Third guy (this week) said the signal was set too high, made adjustments, all seemed fine but later that night the picture was pixellated again. We phoned to complain and got a time for another engineer to visit on Sat (24 Dec), but today we received an automated call saying the set was fixed and the engineer visit was cancelled!

And true, this afternoon all the channels were working. But earlier tonight every single channel said 'this channel is unavailable'. After spending 45 mins to get through to the call centre, some channels were working but others said 'lost picture?'... What the heck is going on? It is infuriating. We set the box to record and it's hit or miss whether it works or not, channels have no signal or are off-air (when they are clearly broadcasting).

You pay for a service, come home from work and want to watch a bit of telly, but have to spend half the night on the phone to get through to complain to a call centre.

Oh and on the subject of call centres... we called one time and the operator completely lied to us. She said the TiVo team was closed - it only operated between the hours of 0800 and midnight. We pointed out that it was 2215 and she said they weren't open that night (a Mon or Tues, as I recall), but when we got through to accounts dept they asked why we weren't speaking to the TiVo team and transferred us through. What's that all about?

After much complaining Virgin have agreed to refund the tv cost to our account, but only because we really pressed for a refund.

So, I suppose what we'd like to know is:

• Why does our TiVo service work so sporadically?
• Have others experienced these kinds of problems?
• Can this be fixed or should we just give up and go back to V+?
• Why does it take so long to get through to the call centre?

It's now 0015. We've just been watching BBC, tried to change channels and they are all gone again. This is totally unacceptable. Virgin get your act together. 

Rant over for this evening.

[PerfectChoice]

Having none of that and Tivo is perfectly stable for me, which makes me think you have an unstable signal rather than just wrong signal strength (Tivo is mre sensitive than previous VM boxes like V+).

 It could mean cable re-pull is required for you, I do wonder. Or something is wrong at the cabinet?

All I can say if you can get the signal issue (which sounds to be you issue) sorted you will be fine. Now finding the root cause and getting VM CS to think outside just another engineer visit is the challenge I agree!

[JBGF]

Thanks for your response, Perfect Choice. We suggested cable pull to the engineer but he said it involved digging up the garden and street - so don't think that's an option for us.

Typically, on the day he was here all was fine with the box. But I'm currently trying to tune in to normal tv and the only option we are getting is STV. Every other channel is showing as 'currently unavailable'. Haven't watched any telly all hols and the day I fancy watching it, I can't get anything.

I think we'll be reverting back to V+ or changing to Sky in 2012.

[Stepheninleeds]

Call back, press 5 (Thinking of leaving), they tend to handle it better, & often sort things out for you.

[Damianp]

I had endless problems similar to yours over the first month. I finally got through to someone British on the help line who 'sent some signals' down the cable to the TiVo box and it's been ok since. I admit I was dubious at first but since then we've had no more losses of signal, no more corrupt recordings, and no more box crashes. There are still many faults with TiVo  ie the lack of programme delivery control which is excacerbated with the absurd utilisation of padding and tuner control, but at least I've stopped worrying whether it's going to work now when I turn it on. Hopefully things will get better for you too.

[JBGF]

We have had the signal sent on numerous occasions, but it doesn't seem to sort it for very long.

The box just seems to be so erratic. Last night we set the BBC HD channel to record Sherlock... settled down to watch it later and every other channel was working apart from the BBC HD channel!

I've just turned on to watch Channel 4 news and the same thing has happened. All other channels are fine and Channel 4 has no signal.

It's like the box knows what we want to watch and decides otherwise!

[Ray_P]

Hi JBGF,

Apologies that you're still experiencing problems. I can see that the last technician left notes that a cable repull may be required if issue persists as everything else has been checked. However, I can see that you have not had the TiVo box replaced.

I'll send you a private message to arrange another visit and hopefully get this resolved. 

[JBGF]

Thanks Ray. We've just had the box replaced and hopefully this will sort the problem. Fingers crossed!