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HopelessCause's avatar
HopelessCause
Tuning in
4 months ago

Compensation Entitlement

I received a letter today from Virgin which sought to close my complaint from 30/12/24 with no financial compensation for loss of service as I had cancelled my package after a month of no service. 

I called customer service as specified on the letter to explain I was not satisfied with this outcome - obviously - they were meant to provide service from the 21st of Dec but due to problems with the cabling it never happened. I had several messages that a cabling team would arrive and when they did show up on the 2nd of Jan 2025 they took one look at it before getting back in their van and driving off - apparently their ‘drill was knackered’ 

After another week of fruitless calls to Virgin I decided to go with BT fibre as we need the internet to work from home. I called on the 17th of Jan to formally cancel the contract as we had been 28 days without service and according to their cancellations team we can break contract if this amount of time had expired without service.

I digress, after an hour of customer service nonsense they are saying that they have already credited my account for missed appointments which is why I have not paid any bills since the house move. I mean, can they even charge me for a service they never actually provided?

Secondly, they said because the issue was with an external contractor - Comex2000 -

not repairing/replacing the cable it does not fall under their auto compensation scheme. Surely this cannot be correct as this would effectively mean you could go years without internet and they could blame it on contractors which they pay to install their cables!?

As a good will gesture they have offered a small amount of ‘credit’ - again, no where near what I believe I should be entitled too given the endless nightmare they caused me by being absolutely useless.

Am I going mad or do I have a case?

6 Replies

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  • Cardiffman282's avatar
    Cardiffman282
    Wise owl
    4 months ago

    As far as I can see your service never went live so you can cancel whenever you like. All automatic compensation for delayed installation is still due to you. I can see that you have a complete set of compensation lies and fob offs (knackered drill, Connex, derisory offer, corporate gaslighting) as expected. Work towards escalating your complaint to the Communications Ombudsman. The forum team might choose to save VM's blushes here but don't bank on it. Do also please let Ofcom know all about your cancellation and complaints management experience with VM. 

  • jpeg1's avatar
    jpeg1
    Alessandro Volta
    4 months ago

    The fact that they have offered a 'goodwill' payment shows they know they are liable, and they are hoping to avoid paying the full amount.  VM just don't do goodwill.

    You may have to take this further as Cardiffman suggests, but you have a strong case.

  • goslow's avatar
    goslow
    Alessandro Volta
    4 months ago

    Your process you have followed is a bit unconventional in so far as notifying VM of your move after it had happened (from your previous posts) but the rest of your understanding seems correct to me.

    If VM sent you cables as part of the move, and the connection did not work when you plugged everything in on 21 Dec, that would be the start date for any compensation if you notified VM of the problem on that day.

    The compensation would start from that point at £6.10 per day up to/inc. 16/1/25 (if you cancelled on 17/1/25) so that should be 27 x £6.10 = £164.70 . Add in any missed appointments where VM said you had to be in but failed to show up without giving you 24 hours notice of the cancellation.

    VM does have the right to make deductions from the compensation if delays are outside of VM's control (that would be things like waits for council permission for street work, wayleave permission from freeholders etc. where third parties are involved). VM's contractors are agents of VM and (theoretically at least) are under VM's control so their failure to do the work should not reduce your compensation. It's up to VM to organise its contractors to complete work in a timely fashion.

    If your complaint has been closed, you can reject VM's 'resolution' and VM should then provide you with a deadlock letter to go to the ombudsman. After 8 weeks from when you first complained you can go to the ombudsman in any case. The ombudsman process is explained below

    https://www.commsombudsman.org/our-process

     

    • HopelessCause's avatar
      HopelessCause
      Tuning in
      4 months ago

      We moved on the 18th and were already in contract with Virgin at the old address so this was a case of transferring to a house with an existing line. Cable arrived and didn’t work so engineer visited on 24th and he said it needed a new external cable. 

      We were told they would arrive on the 30th of December. They never did. Then 31st…again, did not arrive. Then the 2nd..nope. Out of nowhere the cable team arrive at 9am on the 3rd.. I speak to them outside and after 10 mins they drive off. 

      When I discovered the works were booked for the 30th of Jan I decided this was not worth the hassle and cancelled as the house had a BT line already. They activate my service in 5 days…

      They asked how much compensation I was expecting and I said over 200. It seems to me they have no idea what they are doing as they have no control over their cabling team who repeatedly miss appointment dates. I am also unsure when to start counting delayed service..is it from the date the service was due to start or from after the Virgin engineer arrived? 

       

       

      • Akua_A's avatar
        Akua_A
        Icon for Forum Team rankForum Team
        4 months ago

        Hi HopelessCause 

        Welcome to our forums and sorry to hear you are unhappy with the compensation offered due to your failed house move. We can understand the inconvenience caused and we are happy to take a further look into this for you. We have sent you a private message. Please keep an eye out for an envelope at the top right corner of your Forum page. Let me know if you have any issues locating this.

        Thanks,

  • jasonu's avatar
    jasonu
    On our wavelength
    4 months ago

    any compo if lucky to get offer .
    i had to wait 9 months and knightmare time spent trying to get the compo offered .

    as over sea people was problem after problems.

    offered me feb 2024 and 3 months of asking they paid out nov 2024 £90.00 .

    over 30 hours of calls and emails i sent was unreal ,