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Bluefusion · ‎29-12-2023

I feel like I have exhausted all avenue with Virgin Media and am now left with raising my complaint with the Ombudsman and/or Small claims court.

In brief, I gave my 30-days cancellation notice to VM for my provided services (Broadband & Phone).
They agreed a final termination date in 30-days time as expected, however the next day my phone line was dead (broadband carried on for the remaining 30-days as expected).

I spent the next 30-days on calls, What's App, to numerous teams at VM and even had engineers visits to resolve the issue and reconnect my phone line for the remaining days of my service. Engineers and technical staff confirmed the line had been incorrectly terminated by VM and was promised numerous times it would be reconnected, but it never was. I was even advised my one team that they would only reconnect my landline if I renewed contract with them!

I logged a complaint to OFCOM and wrote a detailed complaint letter to Virgin Media's head office requesting compensation for loss of my phone service for 28-days (OFCOM state is £9.33 per day). I have since received a letter from VM's complaints department stating that as my account is disconnected that they cannot help and I need to contact the Customer care team on the usual Virgin number to get the matter resolved.

Today I spent 1-hour on the phone to the customer care team and they advised they cannot help and I need to speak to the customer complaints department as they are dealing with it, even though the letter I received clearly states they are not.

So what next, as Virgin Media are completely incompetent in dealing with a straight-forward complaint.
Is it to write to the Ombudsman or take this to small claims court?

goslow · ‎29-12-2023

This issue seems to have been mentioned many times on here recently where giving 30 days notice to cancel results in a service (typically the landline) being disconnected or all services being deactivated immediately.

Your route is a formal complaint to VM first of all (sounds like you have done that). VM then has 8 weeks to resolve. If you do not agree with the 'resolution' from VM, VM should provide you with a deadlock letter. 8 weeks after you first complained, or earlier with a deadlock letter, you can go to arbitration

https://www.commsombudsman.org/our-process

You would do this first AIUI because a small claims process would expect you to have used arbitration first.

You are correct that VM owes you £9.33 per day after 2 working days from when you first reported the total loss of phone service using one of VM's approved methods (namely phoning in or using one of the telephone/online test processes)

While waiting for a VM forum team reply ...

You can share your unhappy cancellation and complaint experience with OFCOM.

They launched an investigation into VM on 13 July 2023 specifically into VM's cancellation and complaints processes.

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/bulletins/enforcement-bulletin/open-cases/cw_01275

Case ref. no. and an email at the bottom of the above page or submit with same info via the contact form

https://ofcomforms.secure.force.com/formentry/SitesFormCCTMonitoring

Submitting information won't help your individual complaint but it will contribute to the OFCOM investigation and it sounds like your experience is directly relevant to the terms of reference of the investigation.

While you are preparing your evidence, you might find it helpful to have some past links to similar cases (some links contain multiple complainants)

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/Disconnect-early-left-without-no-service/td-p/543249...

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Community-Natter/Home-phone-disabled/td-p/5433215

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/Landline-Disconnected/td-p/5425269

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/LANDLINE-DISCONNECTED-EARLY/m-p/5412113

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/Leaving-Virgin-next-month-landline-already-disabled-...

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/End-of-contract/m-p/5399916

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/No-Dialing-tone/td-p/5431948

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/Why-has-my-home-phone-been-disconnected/td-p/5407771

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Managing-Your-Account-Cable/Phone-disconnected-by-Virgin/td-p/5...

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/No-Landline-Since-Cancellation/td-p/5442431

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Home-Phone/Landline-has-stopped-working-since-cancelling-servic...