Forum Discussion

TheBardenBowler's avatar
TheBardenBowler
Joining in
2 months ago

Upgrading To a V6 Box

I currently have 2 old Tivo boxes and the red button function on Sky Sports is no longer supported.  A message is displayed, saying I can upgrade to a new box for free by contacting the Virgin Media contact centre.

I rang the contact centre and said I would like to upgrade my two tv boxes to the V6 model rather than the 360, as we would rather stick with a Tivo based system.   The person said that was fine and arranged the deliver, when the new boxes arrived they were the 360 type.

I rang the Virgin Media call centre again and was told it was not possible to get a free upgrade to a V6 box unless I paid an additional £240.00 and the 360 boxes were the only ones available free of cost.  As I didn't want the 360 boxes they have now been returned to  Virgin Media and I'm still using the old Tivo sets.

Is is still possible to upgrade my two existing boxes to V6 models?  There is conflicting information as some posts say that as an existing customer you can, but the contact centre will push you to change to a 360 box.  When I contacted the contact centre in the first instance, they said I could upgrade to a V6 box free of change, but when I rang the second time, I was informed there would be a cost.

This is extremely disappointing as we have been Virgin media customers for many years and avid Sky Sports watchers and feel we are missing out on a full service.

6 Replies

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

    VM would like you to go to the 360 as it uses the Horizon software and VM/Liberty Global don't pay licence fees.  They do however for Tivo software, so from a business point of view that's the push. As far as the change I don't know, I've only ever seen reports of "failed" Tivo's being changed to V6's as a fault by the technician.

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

    As mentioned by Adduxi, VM as a business want to encourage TV360 at any opportunity so it's no surprise that CS are incentivised to encourage that. As to whether they are briefed to refuse TiVo > V6 conversions, we can only speculate.

    Faulty TiVo's are fault-swapped to V6 as a matter of course (assuming you have VM broadband) although there have been some reports on here of customers being swapped to TV360 under slightly unclear circumstances.

    The VM staff team on this board may be able to intervene and assist, if you don't mind waiting a few days for a response.

  • TheBardenBowler's avatar
    TheBardenBowler
    Joining in
    2 months ago

    Thank you both for your help.  I shall wait and see if a member of the Virgin Media Team responds.

    • David_Bn's avatar
      David_Bn
      Icon for Forum Team rankForum Team
      2 months ago

      Thanks for reaching out to us TheBardenBowler, and a very warm welcome to our Community Forums!

      We would need to advise that if this would be a free kit swap upgrade this would be for our 360TV services only.

      There may be a possibility of customers obtaining V6 boxes, but these would only be issued at the point of sale of a new package, with the prospect of them being eventually upgraded to our 360TV services at a later date.

      Thanks,

      David_Bn

  • PhilTip's avatar
    PhilTip
    Tuning in
    2 months ago

    I had a V6 and a Tivo and managed to get the Tivo  replaced with a V6 a couple of months ago. It was hard work getting the agent to understand what I wanted and avoid getting a new contract or a change to 360 which I put down to a lack of product knowledge rather than conspiracy. 

  • jpeg1's avatar
    jpeg1
    Alessandro Volta
    2 months ago

    No conspiracy, it's simply a business decision by VM management, and the staff just follow instructions.

    If the script says push the "upgrade" to a 360, that's what they do, it's their job. You might just be lucky and get a person who is more sympathetic and tries to give you what you want, but don't rely on it happening.