Potentially Scammed into a a longer contract with no communication

[ScammedByVM]

Okay here is the entire run down. I have called numerous times to resolve this , every time I've been told I will be contacted by a manager via email or phone , yet I never I still haven't spoken to no one. I set up my contract in September expecting to be given a student contract , or a 1 month recurring contract as I was living in a student house , so after two 1 hour conversations with sales representative that confirmed to be I was being given a 1 month recurring student contract and that I would be able to cancel after 1 month anytime for free and the monthly charge would be £39 increased to £50 after 13 months if I choose to stay. I was given a contract summary sheet with all this confirmed with it stating the minimum term was 1 month and this was consistent with the virgin media student page where there was 2 contracts on offer 12 months and 1 month recurring. I asked numerous times to confirm if I would be able to cancel after 9 months and with no fee and if this is a student contract with witnesses, I was told yes.

Now around a month after this period we were having issues with our WIFI not reaching areas of the house and we tried to requested a WIFI pod. We had an engineer come out and tell us that we are entitled to a free one due to virgin medias policy (as the Wi-Fi in the 3 rooms was below 0.2mbps and we were paying for 200mbps and the engineers told us the policy is that is there is rooms below 20mbps we are entitled to a free booster), but after around over an hour on the call again with the represented trying to get this pod(this is the 3rd phone call around 2 weeks after our broadband was set up ) however the representative was telling me conflicting statements saying that we have to pay, but with the engineers help we were able to resolve this. However during this conversation I believe that the represented changed my contract to 18 months without me authorising it or being told directly that there was gonna be changed to my contract however I'm not sure if this conversation is the result of the change. This went undiscovered until I attempted to cancel my contract in the month of June (contract started in October). During my first conversation I was told which again was around an hour, that I would be charged a £300+ cancellation fee. I though this is wrong as I have gone the entire past 9 months with the assumption that I could cancel for free because I was on a 1 month recurring contract. They told me that I was on a 24/36 month contract , I cannot remember exactly the estimated date , but regardless I was being transferred to numerous people and I believe my call ended up being over an hour long.

So during this call I was informed by a member of staff that I was actually on an 18 month contract, already different to what I was told by the previous representative which said 24/36 months. They said they will contact a manager to resolve this and speak to me because they were also unsure of what happen exactly as to them it seemed like I should've been on a student contract not even on an 18 month contract , as it turns out I was never on a student contract at all and when it came to talking to the manager my phone had died (so my bad here) but I was on that phone conversation for more than an hour and a half which I was not expecting. And there was no attempts to call me back. Now a few days passed and I received a new phone call from a represented saying that my contract had been changed to a 12 month student contract and that I would only have to pay £72 I think(I believe that the manager that I was going to speak to before my phone died made this change, and I was okay with this acceptance as a student paying £70 is more reasonable than paying £360) considering that I never agreed or was told that this was an 18month contract. As I was about to make this transaction to confirm this was okay the phone call ended. A few weeks had passed and I then attempted to contact virgin media again. Which was when It was then confirmed to be I was always on an 18 month contract and that I'm now a 12 month student contract. I asked how is this possible as the contract summary sheet I was sent to me before setting up my contract stated I had a 1 month minimum term and that it would cost £39 a month which I accepted. This is when I was then told that my previous contract was 18 months I was never on a 1 month recurring contract or a student contract, and that I was previously paying for both cable( I was never paying for cable so I don't understand why I was told this confirmed in another later phone call) and broadband hence why I was paying £39 a month instead of the typical £29 a month a student would pay.( again under my assumption I was on a 1 month recurring contract paying for just broadband , which I had quadruple confirmed multiple times with both representatives I spoke too when I was setting up my contract).

This  new conversation(me trying to cancel) lasted around an hour and I was told I would be able to speak to manger and I was put on hold and then the phone call ended on their side not mine before I did speak to one and did not receive a call back. Now I then called again afterwards to try and resolve this, this time I was told I was only paying for broadband, I was never on a 24/36 contract and I was always on a 12 month contract, all information I have been told in the 3 calls trying to cancel conflict one another. After around an hour and a half phone call I was told I would be contacted by an manager, but this never happened.

I then attempted to make 1 more call this one was almost 3 hours long I believe. This conversation I was told that I was on a 18 month contract the whole time and was never on a 1 month recurring contract. I have now been changed to a 12 month student contract and that I would only have to pay £29 a month for the next 3 months( however again it turns out I am on a contract for £39 a month for 12months so this is still incorrect information). I was at this point frustrated because this feel like I have been scammed by yourselves into a contract without any communication with the details changing 1 month into the contract without me being told by a represented that this was going to happen, the only information which I received was an email that changed my contract , but this change was assumed to just be the addition of the wife pod. I requested the phone logs so that the team could go over them, but I was then told that they had been deleted which I find very convenient.

AS those logs are the logs where u will hear me multiple times ask and be given confirmation that I am on a 1 month recurring student contract and I could cancel with no cancelation fee , I have 2 individuals on my end that heard this entire conversation and them confirming it . I was then told in this last conversation that Apparently you don't do this kind of contract and that all student contract are 12 months so again why was I told the opposite when I made the contract with yourselves in my initial conversations to set up my account. I digress, in this last 2+ hour conversation phone call to try and cancel I spoke with 3 individuals, with the last telling me that my case is going to be review and id be contacted by a manager via email or phone conversation in 48 hours , yet I have heard nothing and it has been over a week. I'm getting really fed up with this and am debating to go to a legal team with this, because this seems fraudulent on your end and I don't believe it is typical for a company of your standard to be scamming student unknowingly into longer term contract without being told this directly with no verbal agreement or written  exchanged made.

I was only sent an email to state that the contract had been change a month into my contract however I purely focused on the addition of the wife pod being the only change in the contract not noticing that the minimum term had been changed to 18 months even though in my previous contract sheet it said 1 month ( this is my own mistake for not looking in more detail but again I assumed that the only change made was that I was getting a wifi pod not fathoming the idea that my contract terms would change as that was never discussed in the conversation or brought up.

So to summarise- Again there was 2 hour long conversation in late September/early October when setting up broadband, I had  confirmed and was told I was on 1 month student recurring contract( which i now understanding never existed) and that a month into my contract when I requested a wife pod after another hour long conversation it was changed to 18 months without me ever requesting this or being told this on that phone conversation. When i went to cancel, around over 7/8+ hours in phone calls i still haven received concrete information on what has happened exactly, but I'm still expected to still pay for broadband(and apparently cable, but also not cable just broadband) which I am no longer using or require.

I would like this resolved as soon as possible, and it seems like going through calls and chatlogs aren't working so I'm resulting to this. This is absolute poor level of customer service, and I was initially okay with paying the smaller fee but overlooking this entire situation I think it would be unjust as clearly no one on the team can accurately tell me any consistent information about my account or how this even happened in the first place. But I am willing to work to a resolution.

[Gareth_L]

Hello ScammedByVM.

Thanks for your first post and welcome to our Community.
Sorry to hear you are having an ongoing issue with student contract.

It's not great at all and I would like to get this looked into for you right away.

As a rule we tend to not deal with package issues on here. However due to the severity of what has happened, I'd like to take a look into this for you and make sure everything is resolved.
If you don't mind, I will need to send you a private message to pass security. 
If you can check your logo at the  top right of your screen that would be great. 
Regards     
Gareth_L
 

[ScammedByVM]

Hello Gareth_L , Thank you for the response,I looked at my messages and cannot see a private message from yourself. Can you please send me this message and then reply to this forum when you have done so please.So we can continue with this

[Gareth_L]

Hello there.

The message should be with you now.

Gareth_L