We have a 95-year-old lady in our community who lives alone in her own home. I, my wife and others help her to remain living independently. She is registered “severely sight impaired (blind)” and has significant hearing loss. Since she cannot read emails, has no desktop computer, laptop or smart phone, she receives printed bills from Virgin Media for their services. Hearing loss coupled with the inevitable effect of age makes phone calls and conversations difficult to understand and can cause confusion when people speak too quickly. This lady is a very vulnerable person.
We and her other neighbours agree
- That she has been mis-sold an unsuitable contract
- That Virgin Media have failed to honour her right to cancel the contract
We have been trying to help her resolve the problem, but nothing is working. We have made long frustrating phone calls. We have helped her compose and send a letter explaining the problem and asking to be put back in the position she was before the contract was imposed, and another letter authorising us to make a subject access request on her behalf. 5+ weeks later there is no response.
We must give Virgin Media 8 weeks before we contact the ombudsman. Is there anything else we could do in the meantime? I cant help feeling this could be sorted out easily by someone with an ounce of sense and a bit of compassion.
Further Details
This lady had an email account, but she cannot use, read or access email. Sometime ago we helped her to ring Virgin Media and ask for the email address to be removed from her account. She was told an email address could only be changed. It was not physically possible to remove it. We made sure the rep understood that she was unable to receive communications by email, and the rep confirmed that she was flagged as a vulnerable person, and that her disabilities (including her need for paper billing) were known to VM.
She rang Virgin Media on 28th of September because her TV service had stopped working and she wanted to get it working again. It appears that the agent tried to sell her new services, and she felt confused. She found it difficult to follow all that was said. She said she did not want to consider anything else until after her TV was working. She had no memory of agreeing to a change of contract, just that he said a Service engineer would come out and got her TV service working again on Wednesday 2nd October.
On Friday 18th October (when we returned from holiday) she asked us to explain some changes to her latest paper bill (dated 7th October). We said it looked as though her contract had changed even though she had received no other letters.
We thought to check the old email account which is unusable to her. There were several very important recent messages about her new and previous contract, none of which she could have known about. I printed these and showed them to her on the 19th of October.
These were:
Sent from VM 21 August – contract ends 13/9/24 – package cost to go up.
Sent from VM 28 September – Virgin Media Contract Information Sheet.
Sent from VM 28 September – Virgin Media Contract Summary Sheet.
Sent from VM 5 October – Service Change Receipt.
Sent from VM 5 October – “Thanks for making these changes”
According to the contract terms, she has the right to cancel within FOURTEEN days from the later of: (i) the day after the delivery of the equipment; (ii) the service start date; or (iii) the day she received a contract. She could not possibly have received the contract until 19th October, when we went through it with her. Surely according to the contract terms Cooling Off Period of 14 days she should be able to cancel this contract.
Not according to our conversations with Virgin Media on Saturday 19 October. Two long conversations which got cut off when we were being transferred to another department and a third in which we were referred to another member of VM team. He was adamant she agreed to the new contract/service on the 28th of September phone call and the only way she could terminate it was by agreeing to a different 18-month contract or paying the £700+ early cancellation fee.
She is upset by these events. She is afraid of losing the service. Her phone line is her link to the outside world, and she also depends on it for 24-hour emergency homecare, but she has lost trust in Virgin Media. Signing up to another 18-month contract may not suit her needs. She wants to be put back in the same situation as before this new contract was created. She needs time and support to consider her options.
We thought to check the old email account which is unusable to her. There were several very important recent messages about her new and previous contract, none of which she could have known about. I printed these and showed them to her on the 19th of October.
These were:
Sent from VM 21 August – contract ends 13/9/24 – package cost to go up.
Sent from VM 28 September – Virgin Media Contract Information Sheet.
Sent from VM 28 September – Virgin Media Contract Summary Sheet.
Sent from VM 5 October – Service Change Receipt.
Sent from VM 5 October – “Thanks for making these changes”
According to the contract terms, she has the right to cancel within FOURTEEN days from the later of: (i) the day after the delivery of the equipment; (ii) the service start date; or (iii) the day she received a contract. She could not possibly have received the contract until 19th October. Surely according to the contract terms Cooling Off Period of 14 days she should be able to cancel this contract.
Not according to our conversations with Virgin Media on Saturday 19 October. Two long conversations which got cut off when we were being transferred to another department and a third in which we were referred to another member of VM team. He was adamant she agreed to the new contract/service on the 28th of September phone call and the only way she could terminate it was by agreeing to a different 18-month contract or paying the £700+ early cancellation fee.
She is upset by these events. She is afraid of losing the service. Her phone line is her link to the outside world, and she also depends on it for 24-hour emergency homecare, but she has lost trust in Virgin Media. Signing up to another 18-month contract may not suit her needs. She wants to be put back in the same situation as before this new contract was created. She needs time and support to consider her options.
