No connection for almost 2 month. How to resolve/complain??

[calumh19]

I signed up to a Virgin broadband package beginning 31 January 24. A connection failure required an engineer to attend on 5 February 2024. They diagnosed a damaged cable and tried to install a temporary fix by 'splicing' my neighbour's cable onto my Virgin box. The engineer promised this had been logged as an emergency fault and would be properly fixed within 48 hours. The temporary fixed failed and both myself and my neighbour have been without a functioning connection since 6 February (current date 16 March). Despite over 45 calls to Virgin, two missed engineer appointments (9 & 10 March) and 5 manager callbacks never received the issue has not been resolved. A final engineer visit took place on 13 March, where the engineer confirmed that the original temporary fix should never have been done as it had caused catastrophic failure both network cables and that a 'specialist network team' would be required to look at which could take months. This would leave myself and my neighbour without any functioning connection for over 3 months which is completely unacceptable and a breach of contract is Virgin is not providing a service that a customer is paying for. On top of all of this I have spoken to a number of departments including Retention, Faults and Complaints - none of which have offered any meaningful support and each of whom keep transferring me to another department who can 'help'. I'm then promised call backs from managers - I've taken time out of work to receive these on 5 occasions and have never once actually ever received such call. Virgin have also obfuscated on fulfilling their legal duty under the Ofcom rules of providing £9.33 compensation for each day of service failure (total £363.87 as at 16 March) and £29.15 for each missed engineer appointment. Virgin claims it will only be able to apply compensation when the fault is fixed, but given that an engineer has said it may not be resolveable this is unrealistic and also not in line with Ofcom's terms which require payment of compensation on a daily basis. This is a requirement of the scheme terms that Virgin has signed up to and if it fails to act on its obligations these will be reported to Ofcom. Finally Virgin staff are telling me they do not know about the Deadlock Letter that I am entitled to receive from Virgin to escalate this to Virgin's Alternative Dispute Resolution scheme, despite their own guidance on their website being absolutely clear on this. This is incredibly frustrating and distressing as my wife and I work from home and cannot do so. I want an acknowledgement of the failure, the compensation I am entitled to and to actually be able to end this nightmare by cancelling my package (offsetting any termination fee against compensation if needed). Given Virgin have not helped me with any of this so far, any help or advice very much appreciated. 

[newapollo]

Hi @calumh19 

I believe the below extract from the page /broadband/our-speeds-explained  shows that you should be able to leave without paying any early cancellation fees. It says about actual download speed problems, but you aren't able to receive any speed due to the damaged cable.

Right to Cancel - FAQs

How do I end my contract without paying an early disconnection fee?

If you’re having speed issues and we haven’t been able to fix things on our call with you, we’ll set up a few scheduled speed tests for your Hub, beginning on the day after you told us about the problem. You won’t have to do anything – but it’s worth knowing that we’ll only run these tests if we detect you’re not using the connection for anything else.

We’ll let you know the results as soon as possible after we’ve finished the tests.

If the actual download speed you received to your Virgin Media Hub during the test period falls below our ‘minimum guaranteed download speed’ for 3 days in a row (continuously or intermittently), we’ll confirm that there’s a speed fault, and if we can’t fix the issue within 30 days of your report, you may be eligible to leave us without paying an early disconnection fees.

Don’t forget, our minimum guaranteed download speed is to your Virgin Media Hub, not the device you’re using WiFi on. Even when using a wired connection, some older devices might not support our fastest speeds.

We’ll always contact you by email at the end of the 30-day period to let you know what’s happening, and ask you to contact our customer service team to talk through your options.

You can read more about ending your contract in Section N of the terms and conditions. If we don’t provide the ‘minimum guaranteed download speed’ as set out above (i.e. we have not remedied the speed problem within 30 days of your notifying us or we cannot address the problem) then we’ll offer you the opportunity to end your contract immediately, without an early disconnection fee. In exceptional circumstances (for example where you cancel technician visits or miss appointments) we may extend the 30 days but we’ll always discuss this with you beforehand.