I was recently required to have a hub upgrade to enable our phone to work through the internet cable; I was pleased at the ease of connection and automatic activation. Following this, my VirginMedia bill had the surprise of £35 ‘activation fee’ and £5 ‘delivery’. (I see there’s other posts making similar points to mine on the community).
- These charges are unfair when the hub upgrade is not of the customers choosing,
- I was offered an engineer’s visit, but chose delivery, partly thinking this would save unnecessary expense! (Would there have been a delivery charge if I'd had an engineer's visit?)
- I was given no notice beforehand of these charges, in the letter or a phone call.
Through the complaints process I am receiving a credit of £35 (but not the £5 delivery charge) on the basis that I was not informed beforehand. But I still wanted to raise the question here of Virgin Media making charges for an upgrade not requested by me (and in fact resulting in us having to relocate our phone to a less convenient place). I appreciate there are costs to such upgrades, but when making changes which have not been requested by the customer, shouldn’t Virgin Media absorb the costs in overall customer charges? I hope VM management will reconsider this policy which spoils an otherwise good service.
