Looking to downgrade package to just TV

[AndrewFisher]

I'm not sure if I should have posted this here or in the managing your account section, but here goes, please correct me if I need to post this elsewhere...

Times are tough, income doesn't match expenditure and all that stuff, so I'm looking to split off the services I currently get from VM across suppliers to get the costs down.

The thinking is, I currently pay £105 for M100 Broadband, Landline and 'Full House' TV. The landline I can really live without, but I can get here Full Fibre 100 Broadband from either Openreach or CityFibre for about £35 a month, so that leaves me thinking I'm paying £70 a month for the VM Tivo service. I'd probably value the TV service, going by what's on and the amount I use it at £30 max, and that's being generous.

So, the change your package bit in My Account only gives me options for dearer stuff and the VM website, unless I'm missing something, only gives prices for packages, which I don't want anymore.

Really, all I wanted to price up my plan to see I was misguided in my thinking or, and look up the price of just having TV from VM. Are those prices available on the website somewhere and I'm missing it?

The nearest thing I can see on the VM website is the 'Bigger Bundle' which is £45, M100, landline & TV, so presuming the VM Broadband is the same price as everyone else, if I knock off £35 for that, maybe £5 for the landline, maybe £5 for the call plan, that leaves me with... err, £0.0p for the TV.

I think my method of working out VM's prices is not working!

Maybe, as I'm out of contract, I should ring up cancellations and let retentions come up with an amount, although at the moment the landline doesn't work and the broadband is always dropping out, so I'm really keen on offloading those onto another supplier?

Any ideas?

[SpacePhoenix]

Be aware that it appears that when TiVO boxes are breaking they're now getting replaced with V6 boxes which require VM broadband to work. I'm guessing that VM have run out of spare TiVO boxes and probably don't have any options to acquire new ones from the manufacturer

[AndrewFisher]

Good point there SpacePhoenix about the demise of the TiVo boxes, I think I saw another post on here somewhere about that, so it sure is the case. The V6 box... I've heard of it, as an existing customer get no access to it, so know nothing of it. Any good?

You know, I'm not wishing to get rid of VM altogether, the product is quite good apart from the wonky landline and the even more wonky router, I just don't see any value for money in the TV part of the package, hence I'm on a mission to get the price down to about £60 max, which is where I'd value what I'm getting. Any of the decent stuff currently on Acorn TV, Britbox, Apple Tv etc etc I just download from the internet and play it off a hard drive on the TV, so that's the bulk of my viewing.

I'm beginning to think that I'd be best off, as I'm out of contract, terminating this contact, signing up as a new customer for the £45 a month bigger package, that way I'd get a new 360 box, whatever that is, and a new router that hopefully doesn't drop the wi-fi once a week.

Hmmm, when VM eventually reconnect my landline, I'll give them a ring.

[SpacePhoenix]

Might be worth calling retentions to see what they can do

[Vikki_M]

Hi @AndrewFisher

Thank you for your post and welcome back to our community.

As @SpacePhoenix mentioned, we no longer supply/replace TiVo boxes so to have a TV service with us, you would need our broadband.

I would recommend speaking with our retentions team please and they would be happy to go through all the options on packages, equipment and prices with you. 

Please could you call into the team on 150 from a Virgin line or 0345 454 1111 from any other line.

Alternatively you can text us on 0753 305 1809.

[AndrewFisher]

Hi there Vikki,

Thanks very much for that. I've never come across a device that needs to be connected to a particular brand of internet in order for it to function, so it is indeed fortunate that SpacePhoenix mentioned it as I never would have thought things worked that way. You learn something every day!

I will indeed give retentions a call during the week and see what they come up with.

Regards, Andrew

[Vikki_M]

Thanks Andrew,

I do hope we can get something sorted for you. 

Please do let us know how the call goes 🙂

[nodrogd]

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@AndrewFisher wrote:

Hi there Vikki,

Thanks very much for that. I've never come across a device that needs to be connected to a particular brand of internet in order for it to function, so it is indeed fortunate that SpacePhoenix mentioned it as I never would have thought things worked that way. You learn something every day!

I will indeed give retentions a call during the week and see what they come up with.

Regards, Andrew

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Despite the fact that the V6 uses the internet modem to access its updates & the EPG, these are all on an internal VM system, so are not accessible outside of their own network infrastructure.

[japitts]

There's photos of the 3 TV boxes https://www.virginmedia.com/care/tv-fault/which-tv-box 

TiVo & V6 both run the same TiVo-software, and if you have a TiVo currently you could do very well to upgrade to a V6 which runs on much newer, far more capable hardware.

TV360 is the newest software platform - it uses the same physical hardware as the V6 but fundamentally TV360 is not TiVo - the two platforms are substantially different.

As already explained, TiVo boxes are now considered legacy but TiVo-software remains fully supported on V6. Both TV360 & V6 require VM-broadband to operate - that is non-negotiable.

[Vincetimmins]

Andrew good luck in your quest, hopefully you will get someone nice from retentions (not Mr Romesh) and you get sorted but alas from my experience and from others in the same boat I fear you may have to go elsewhere.