Proposed 237% increase on my billing!

Well, the only way you will get new customer pricing with VM is to leave and then return as a 'new' customer.

Worth keeping in mind in your decision making process that VM does not allow new customers to create a VM email address. Existing customers cannot create a new VM email address. VM has been very active in closing down mailboxes that are not linked to a current broadband service.

As customers leave VM, the total number of VM email users is only going to get smaller and smaller. VM has made no announcement about the future of VM email but there is only one logical conclusion about what is going to happen to VM email at some point in the future.

To tie yourself to VM because of a VM email address is somewhat ... limiting!

I would suggest you start moving your contacts and services under your VM email address to a new provider which is not linked to any ISP.

You will then have the freedom to move suppliers as you see fit and will not have to engage in VM's silly renewal antics each time your renewal comes around.

(You are, of course, unlikely to receive the past offer via email and, even if you did, it is highly likely any past offer would not be honoured. There have been sufficient past topics on here to confirm that any offers from VM are in the majority of cases 'of the moment' and won't be there if you don't take the offer there and then)

Thanks for your thoughts on this. A bit grim really!

I kept a copy of the Online Chat along with the offer details so I could try and hold them to it!

I have been switching my email to a gmail.com as I was suspicious that the ntlworld.com address was going to disappear but having had it for over 30years you always worry as to who has it that you can’t remember. Will Virgin respond to posts on here?

The only time that VM have ever sent email confirmations of offers, is when you re-contract and you get the confirmation of changes within a couple of days.

Otherwise the standard advice applies, that VM's retentions offers are usually "of the moment" and only as good as the duration of the call where they're offered. Martin Lewis' otherwise excellent advice to say "I'll check with the dog" or whatever, has never worked with VM. You are far better going into a retentions call with some idea of pricing, and what your red-lines are, accepting any offer that's good enough, and having the 14days statutory cancellation to fallback on.

Relying on an ISP-supplied email address is rarely a good idea. As mentioned already, either get your own domain (which you then own for as long as you keep up renewals) or a freebie Hotmail/Gmail, Outlook or whatever.

Be aware that VM offer prices are a ‘here and now’ price, unless you accept it next time you request a price it will most likely be higher. There are many posts on the board about this.

I noticed when my contract was up for renewal, prices in 'My VM' went up and down each day. Obviously a bit of psychology going on. However ringing retentions got a far better price than anything online.