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disgusting treatment of my 99 year old mother

alanc2k2
Joining in

so i have been a vm customer for over 23 years

my mother has been a customer for over 10 years

she is now 99 years old and hasn't been able to live at home for a few months now and is in a care home. It is not likely she will ever return home.

She has broadband and 2 tv boxes at a cost to her of over £93/ month

She is out of contract

she only now needs broadband for the door bell camera so we can keep an eye on her property

I phoned yesterday expecting it would be simple to cancel her tv boxes and just leave broadband

how WRONG i was, after explaining the situation the best i was offered was to cancel one tv box and still charge £79/month

DISTGUSTING 

i wish i could cancel everything and get broadband elsewhere however i cant start a new contract as she will just not be here

 

5 REPLIES 5

unisoft
Knows their stuff

@alanc2k2 wrote:

so i have been a vm customer for over 23 years

my mother has been a customer for over 10 years

she is now 99 years old and hasn't been able to live at home for a few months now and is in a care home. It is not likely she will ever return home.

She has broadband and 2 tv boxes at a cost to her of over £93/ month

She is out of contract

she only now needs broadband for the door bell camera so we can keep an eye on her property

I phoned yesterday expecting it would be simple to cancel her tv boxes and just leave broadband

how WRONG i was, after explaining the situation the best i was offered was to cancel one tv box and still charge £79/month

DISTGUSTING 

i wish i could cancel everything and get broadband elsewhere however i cant start a new contract as she will just not be here

 


If out of contract you can change al services down to just Broadband - though BB M125 cheapest list price is £54 (yes, ridiculous high price). If able to enter a contract for 18 months, they would usually negotiate between £20-£30, with the lower end range if you were phoning to cancel all services and seemed serious. Just a guide as retention deals vary depending on offers and agents and days of week even. Its unlikely you would get a good deal unless you used the Leaving Virgin option on the phone rather than Customer Services. You are better off ringing in and saying to cancel all services due to the situation and then they will open a dialogue from there usually. Cancelling services takes 30 days and not instant, and you can cancel the cancel within that time too. To get better pricing than the list price, they normally insist on a new 18 month contract.

Other options include cancelling all the VM services and buying a SIM only router and using 1pmobile SIM (EE network, full frequency range) for pay as you go top ups (no contracts) or another mobile provider's SIM. You'll need to know what mobile network is most reliable for data connection and speed though for this to work as some providers are clearly suffering with overloaded cells. The doorbell would connect by Wifi to the SIM Only router and the router uses cellular to route to internet. There is some initial outlay for router but longer term can be cheaper than £93/month.

Sabrina_B
Forum Team
Forum Team

Hi @alanc2k2 👋.

Thanks for reaching out to us and welcome to the Community Forums. Apologies for the issues that your mother has been facing renewing her contract, I assure you this is not the type of service we aim to provide, we would like to assist, we would need to bring you in for a private message. Please look out for the envelope on the top right of your web browser or if you are using a mobile device, it will be located under your profile icon.
 

Thanks.
 

Sabrina

fizz
Fibre optic

Is there an appropriate social tariff here?

My Broadband Ping - Virgin New Modem Mode

https://www.virginmedia.com/broadband/low-income-families

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unisoft
Knows their stuff

@fizz wrote:

Is there an appropriate social tariff here?


Maybe if they have pension credit.

Normally though, you can negotiate a better deal through retentions as the Social Tariffs are broadband only, though one of the options does include VM Stream; but for the total price, retentions can normally do a better package 😉 The social tariff for example has a low upload speed and the poster needs some upload to enable her Ring Doorbell to upload video (possibly other cameras not mentioned), so the M125 package would be better for this than the social one.