speed upgrade

[jc2007]

I am wondering if anyone else had the same problem about their upgrade.

I have been watching the upgrade date for my area for the past couple of months and

was really looking forward to double the speed on broadband, only to discover that they have now pushed back the upgrade from july 2012 to sometime between december 2012 and may 2013.

It's amazing the price you pay for an average service, Great Job Virgin !! good to see your priority is customer satisfaction!!!!!

[flilot]

Yes, if you search the boards many have complained about this.

Some formal communication from Virgin via e-mail or letter would be nice, saying that the original dates have slipped. Would save their call centre a lot of unnecessary calls, I think, as well as customer reps having to answer the related questions on these boards.

[apcyberax]

All dates where subject to change and planning work. As a free upgrade vm are still giving what they agreed to

[flilot]

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apcyberax wrote:
All dates where subject to change and planning work. As a free upgrade vm are still giving what they agreed to

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That may be the case.  However many customers will have checked their postcode on the double speed site months ago, and made a mental note of when their upgrade was due.  Quite a few areas were slated for the July 2012 upgrade.

Come the end of this month, there will be alot of customers piling onto these boards, or phoning up, to ask why they are still on their original speeds.  The answer from Virgin will be "Sorry the timeframe has slipped and now won't be until the end of the year or start of next year."

The customers response to this will quite rightly be "Why wasn't I informed of this?".  Virgin spent alot of time promoting the double speed upgrades, and its still poked in your face everytime you log into My Virgin Media on the website.

For a communications company, Virgin don't seem to have communication with customers as a high priority.  All it would take is an e-mail or letter to the customers affected saying something like "Oops, there's been a bit of an issue in your area.  We're sorry but we can't double your speed according to our original timetable (July 2012).  However don't fret, our engineers are still working on it and it should occur sometime between December 2012 and May 2013.".

Guidelines are guidelines are guidelines.  I accept that.  What I don't accept is the lack of official communication from Virgin informing their customers of a change in schedule. If you didnt put your postcode into the doublespeed website, you'd never know.

[apcyberax]

if the users had to check the date to start with and that said subject to change then users should go back and check before posting here and see its been puched back

[flilot]

People only checked in the first place because Virgin announced they were doubling speeds to all and sundry.

Virgin should now also properly announce that some areas dates have slipped, rather than letting customers discover for themselves one by one. All the posts regarding this issue on the forums are a case in point.

[apcyberax]

but VM never told anyone the dates they went and checked themselfs. so they should recheck.

[TheBowelsOfLove]

Virgin won't announce these delays because they have nothing to  gain by doing so but plenty to lose. They were quick enough at announcing the upgrades as a prominent marketing ploy because that meant more potential profit/ customers.

[nosurprises]

I was down for a July upgrade originally and have just noticed its been moved out to a 6 month window from the start of 2013. There must not be too much confidence in the estimated level of effort to complete the task with such a wide estimate. As mentioned the lack of communication is frustrating from a customer perspective, also we grimmed and beared a price rise earlier in the year pretty much because it came after an annoncement about a 'free speed upgrade'. I said to myself, its really not a free upgrade but thats ok as double the speed sounds good to me. However, now for 2012 it just looks like a price increase. Roll on sometime in the first half of 2013.

[flilot]

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apcyberax wrote:
but VM never told anyone the dates they went and checked themselfs. so they should recheck.

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Still completely missing the point.

The majority upgrades were due sometime this year.  This may now run into next year.  Regardless of date, regardless of the dates being 'estimates', Virgin should be informing existing customers of a setback to the original estimated rollout, if they are in an affected area.  Similary, if the date slips again, I'd expect for them to tell us again.

But if you advocate large companies never communicating with their customers, then carry on.