Forum Discussion

itslouf's avatar
itslouf
Joining in
2 months ago

ABSOLUTELY WORST EXPERIENCE SWITCHING TO VIRGIN MEDIA

We just switched to virgin media from sky using the quickstart setup cabability, but little did we know, that this capability does not work if you do not have a special virgin media coaxial port already installed in your house. 

In a phone call with virgin, they stated that they had records indicating this was already installed in our house, but clearly it was not. What's even more surprising, is that virgin has notified our previous provider to discontinue service before confirming that we are up and running with their new service! So now we have absolutely no internet service in our house and virgin is unable to provide a same day engineer to provide a fix. 

The next availability will be the next day 12-4pm.  This is a day and a half - maybe two days without internet all because virgin discontinued our previous service on our behalf prematurely!!!

This a nightmare experience!! Not a great way to start of with a new customer when you could have simply asked a few questions about our setup on the outset to prevent all this. 

  • Elm's avatar
    Elm
    On our wavelength
    2 months ago

    There's a bit of 'caveat emptor' here I suppose, in that there's a bit of responsibility on the householder to check whether or not there is a VM box in the house before electing for Quickstart.  Even if their records claim its there, if you can't find one, how would you plan to use the Quickstart kit?

    The other response you're likely to get is that it could be much worse.  Two days without internet would be a dream; after a Quickstart house move, I'm now on day 19 without any service.

    • itslouf's avatar
      itslouf
      Joining in
      30 days ago

      Ya I guess there is some responsibility on me for thinking that the same port can be used as the previous provider. This was not obvious to me upon selecting quickstart, otherwise I would elected for an engineer to perform the installation.

  • unisoft's avatar
    unisoft
    Knows their stuff
    2 months ago

    Welcome to Virgin Media!

    VM had records saying previous customers at your address. They will not know if the wall socket and cables were removed later by a previous owner. They would have proceeded based on what they knew and the fact you agreed to a quick install rather than engineer visit.

    During sign-up - you can elect for Quick Install or an engineer visit install. Hindsight a wonderful thing, but if you checked for any previous sockets/cabling and found none, then you would have picked engineer visit or not signed up :)

  • Adduxi's avatar
    Adduxi
    Very Insightful Person
    2 months ago

    Yes, but some users have no idea how VM is installed.  To a lot of users it's just "a Wifi box" and don't care/know how it's installed.  I'm wondering if there is even an Omnibox on the outside of the house for the VM technicial to attach the cable?  If not, the delay may be more than 2 days if a cable repull or something is needed.

  • goslow's avatar
    goslow
    Alessandro Volta
    2 months ago

    If you have had a failed 'Quick Start', VM should count this as a fault rather than a failed installation (item 6 below)

    https://www.virginmedia.com/legal/fibre-optic-services-terms-conditions/automatic-compensation

    Once you have phoned in the fault to VM, VM has two full, clear working days to fix the fault. If VM fails to do that, you get an initial payment of £9.76 for the first few days of the outage and a subsequent day rate of £9.76 for each full day until your service is activated

    https://www.virginmedia.com/help/billing-and-payments/automatic-compensation

    Keep detailed notes, along with evidence such as emails, texts, screenshots etc. to ensure you are paid the correct amount. A per Adduxi though, check you still have an omnibox outside which might be something like this (styles, colours and company branding vary)

    https://www.ispreview.co.uk/wp-content/gallery/2019-article-illustrations/virgin_media_external_wall_box.jpg

    If your external cabling has also been removed, you may be in for a much longer wait.

  • Akua_A's avatar
    Akua_A
    Forum Team
    31 days ago

    Hi itslouf 

    We are sorry to hear you have had a poor experience with a failed quick-start order. We can understand the inconvenience caused. We want to do our best to help look into what happened. 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,