Hi Matthew,
It has been sorted though not without many follow ups and differing responses from sales and support teams.
I'm quite disappointed with VM basically not having a process in place as this is a common scenario that has happened to many people.
For anyone facing the same situation, VM could not resolve this on their own, they had to get a confirmed cancellation from the prior homeowner. And even after that it took them over a week to deliver the kit. Also the kit was meant to be delivered in the morning before noon but came at 6pm.
I'll give a complete timeline so folks can be mentally prepared for this
03/09/2025 ordered my kit for delivery between 3-6pm on 06/09/2025. The short delivery time seemed too good to be true.
06/09/2025 receive an email at 11am saying I need to contact the previous homeowner and ask them to cancel their account. Called support and got a shrug saying nothing they can do. Transfered to sales and they said backend team will reach out and try again, no action possible over the weekend. Expect an update on Tuesday 09/09/2025 (and here I thought ISPs provide 24/7 service!). I asked why do I need consent from someone else when I own the house and was told that it was "policy".
08/09/2025 called support and was told previous homeowner denied closing account again and I have to get in touch with them. I disagreed and was transferred to sales. Here I was told they can raise a "gone away" form and within 24-48hrs my account would be up and running, no prior homeowner approval required.
09/09/2025 called again and was told by support that prior homeowner has denied the "gone away" process and they cannot create my account. This was not what was I was promised and it really irritated me. I asked what else can be done and was told to provide proof of residence and expect an update on 24-48hrs.I sent any documents I had.
10/09/2025 called again and was told they can now proceed as the previous homeowner has agreed to cancel their account. Was asked to fill out the entire form on a call all over again, this took over an hour and VM tried to get me to pay a higher amount till I pointed out my previous offer. I was told that they can deliver on 17/09/2025 between 9am-7pm and not before as that's when the previous homeowner requested it to be cancelled on. At the same time I got a message from the previous owner saying they cancelled on 09/09/2025 so I don't know who is lying to me here.
All in all, VM does not have a polished and shared understanding of this scenario between their own departments for onboarding a new homeowner without consent from the previous homeowner. Even though multiple customers have faced this issue, VM has demonstrated they won't change processes to make a customer's life easier.
