Need help & customer service staff are not listening

[KAZH1974]

Last Thurs (6th April) a virgin engineer arrived at my house when I wasn't there and attempted to upgrade my cables outside. He left without completing the job or telling me he had left me without any services - I have had no WIFI or Television since then and no home CCTV system in place due to no WIFI. Every time I speak to customer services they say they will send an engineer, the engineer arrives and says they need the cable pulling contractors to come out and I am told they will come the next day. Today is day 6 where the same thing has happened. The customer service guy this morning guaranteed me the engineer would fix my issue -they are just not listening and I am going round in circles as well as getting more and more annoyed at the disgusting treatment we are receiving. Does anyone know how I can get hold of someone who actually listens and can help rather than just promising me an engineer - wasting these poor guys time as well as mine? I have emailed, tweeted and I phoned them around 3 times a day each day - all I get is thank you for bearing with us, we are sorry but well get you someone out to you???!!! - not helpful that the staff just read off a standard procedure card - need someone who can actually solve the problem? 

Any ideas or contact info for anyone helpful at this company??

[goslow · Accepted solution]

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@KAZH1974 wrote:

Last Thurs (6th April) a virgin engineer arrived at my house when I wasn't there and attempted to upgrade my cables outside. He left without completing the job or telling me he had left me without any services - I have had no WIFI or Television since then and no home CCTV system in place due to no WIFI. <snip>

Any ideas or contact info for anyone helpful at this company??

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Familiarise yourself with the compensation scheme for fault repairs.

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0026/216962/Industry-Code-of-Practice-for-Automatic-...

and rates after April 2023 here

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-telecoms-and-internet/advice-for-consumers/costs-and-billing/automat...

Start creating a timeline and working out what you are due based on the above.

VM gets two clear working days to fix a fault before any compo is applied. You need to phone in (or use one of VM's automated tests) to report the 'total loss of service'. TV is not covered by the scheme. Loss of broadband is.

When communicating with VM, refer to a 'total loss of service' of your broadband service (not a loss of wi-fi).

If you phoned in to report the TLS of broadband on Thursday 6 April, VM has until end of today (12 April) to remedy. The Bank Holiday w/e will have delayed the start of your pay-out.

If not resolved by end of today, you get an initial payment of £9.33 to cover the initial days of the outage (the 'payment trigger time). After today it is £9.33 per full calendar day until the service is restored.

VM's cables installation and replacement operations are a total shambles for some unlucky customers. You may, possibly, be in for a very long wait for a replacement cable.

VM has outsourced much of its cable installation work. In the topics on here, VM seems to have no direct control over how/when the sub-contractors carry out the work. When you speak to VM customer support on the phone they will 'guarantee' you the work will be done on a certain date but, in fact, they are doing nothing more than reading a date from their screen. They have no direct knowledge of the scheduling nor any influence over the timing of the work as reported in topics on here.

Start considering some backup options such as an unlimited data SIM/hotspot on a rolling monthly contract until VM reconnects you.

Keep detailed records as you go along of all VM's attempts/failures/missed appointments to replace the cable. This will ensure you are paid the correct compensation once reconnected.

[Akua_A]

Hi @KAZH1974 

Welcome to our community forums and thank you for your first posts.

Sorry to hear you have been having an ongoing loss of service since the appointment. We can understand the inconvenience caused and want to best help. Was the initial appointment booked for an installation or a fault? Are all services completely down? Also, have you checked here to see if any appointments have been booked for the re-pull?https://www.virginmedia.com/my-virgin-media

Thanks, 

[KAZH1974]

the initial appointment was because a previous engineer who had visited said the wires on the outside of the house were old and could do with replacing, he booked it and someone attended on thurs 6th April whilst we weren’t there and made an absolute mess of our front garden, before deciding to just leave it as it is and go. We discovered this mess and the total loss of all services on our return at 9pm that night. Rang your company and were told someone would be coming on Thursday 20th April to complete the repair - 2 Weeks with no services?? This also means we have no home security either as the CCTV won’t work without wifi. The customer service guy said he would get a manager to call us back the next morning. No call. We chased twice and were promised an engineer would come on Monday. So an engineer turned up Monday who couldn’t do anything as he needed the cable guys to come first. He promised they would come that afternoon. They didn’t turn up and he did contact to apologise and say he hadn’t realised they didn’t work bank holiday but they would come Tuesday. No one came on Tuesday!! 
my partner had 3 conversations with staff who have no idea of what is needed and just kept on reeling off their lines to get him off the phone. I called weds morning and was guaranteed that the engineer attending that day would fix this issue, highly skeptical at this point I asked if he could pull cables and was told yes he could fix it all. 
the engineer arrived around 2pm - same guy from Monday- he expected the cables to have been pulled and went to find why not? Someone had completed the job on your system as if it was all fixed. It isn’t. 
he called his boss and then came back to us to say they had booked us in for today 8-1pm for the cable guys. It’s now nearly 1pm and no one has attended. We need someone to actually help out and get the right people to us ASAP. This is the worst service I have ever come across in my whole life, no one at the end of the phone has a clue what they’re doing and spend 90% of the time on a call saying sorry or thank you. 
please help 

[Akua_A]

We truly apologise for this experience @KAZH1974 This is not the level of service we look to provide. To best look into this, I have sent you a private message. Please look out for the purple envelope and provide a response when you can.

Thanks,