on 21-02-2024 22:16
Early February, I noticed after trying to log into a few online accounts and TV services was showing an incorrect location. After wasting my time, spending all day, speaking to Virgin Media customer services & technical support I was unable to get the problem fixed, reason being, most of the people I had spoken too had no clue of what I was talking about, half of them did not even know what a WAN was. The very last person I spoke too, did understand what I was talking about but was unable to fix the problem and told me the only way to get the issue fixed was to make a complaint, so below is what I first wrote, through the complaints system.
I noticed that our WAN IP had changed to Edinburgh, which is 400 miles from our location. I logged into the HUB 5 and checked the Default gateway and it was 92.238.80.1 which is Scotland. I call customer service and ended up speaking all day to about 11 people in different departments most did not have a clue of what I was talking about, others tried to tell me the issue was mine, not VM. I have had computers over 30 years and cable broadband over 20 years, so I know what I'm talking about. This is affecting my TV and many other online accounts because of the current WAN IP assigned. I was told by the last person I spoke to that the only way to get this fixed is to make a complaint, when really all I need to do is speak to someone in the UK network team tech department, which you cannot do. This must be a one off because I couldn't find anyone who has had this problem before and I have searched online for hours. Please can you pass this problem onto the network team, so that they can change my Default gateway in the HUB 5 back to a local one, so I can obtain a local WAN IP or provide me with a telephone number to call the UK Networking team.
I received a reply from Virgin Media Complaints, see below the two important paragraphs from Virgin Media Com :
We have thoroughly investigated your complaint and confirmed that your concerns are legitimate. We identified an error in our network configuration that resulted in your WAN IP being assigned to Edinburgh instead of your local area. Rest assured, we can take immediate action to rectify this issue. Your HUB 5's default gateway is supposed to be reconfigured to a local one, ensuring you receive a localized WAN IP address aligned with your geographical location. This change should resolve the issues you were experiencing with your TV and other online accounts, so to make any technical changes we suggest you call us or even chat with us.
We have implemented additional measures to prevent similar occurrences in the future. We acknowledge your extensive experience with computers and cable broadband and apologize for any suggestion that the issue originated from your end. We value your expertise and appreciate you bringing this matter forward. We understand your frustration with reaching the appropriate support team. We are continuously working to improve our customer service structure and ensure efficient resolution of inquiries.
Well the problem was not resolved, as they stated, I reset the HUB 5 back to factory default and switched off for 10 minutes, but still it had the default gateway for Scotland. So of course I wrote back to them again, this is my response to them, below :
Dear Virgin Media Team,
With reference to my email below and your reply, I am very disappointed that this issue have not been resolved by yourselves and that the problem still remains with my WAN IP location.
You replied to my email below and mentioned that you acknowledge the problem is legit (highlighted below for your ref below) and that you identified the error was in your configurations and that you (can take immediate action to rectify this issue) . This issue is still not fixed. I have reset the HUB back to default, turned it off for about 5 minutes and it is still saying location Edinburgh, Scotland. So the default gateway have not been changed. Is this issue just isolated to me or is it for the whole of Devon?
In my original complaint below, I asked you to provide me with a contact number for the Virgin Media UK Networking Team, however, you only provided the usual customer service number in your reply. I called this number and spoke to them, asking them to put me through to complaints, which they did, but this was in a foreign call centre who had no idea of what the technical issue was or how to help and was totally unhelpful and a waste of my time, again.
My complaint have not been resolved and the fact that you stated that it was fixed immediately is untrue, as the issue remains for me.
I received the following response from Virgin Media complaints, as follows :
We have a little update on your complaint with us. We didn’t want to delay things, so we’ve gone ahead and looked into a resolution for you.
Here’s a quick recap
We’ve looked into it and here’s what we found:
We are writing to let you know that we have received your complaint regarding the recent problems you have been experiencing. We are sorry that you are not happy with the service you have received from us. You can be confident that we will do everything we can to ensure that it is put right. It is a pleasure to assist a loyal customer of your stature. I understand that your concern was in regards to the fault you have been experiencing while using our services and its impact on your day to day activities. I do understand your apprehension on this and I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience. I have checked your account and there are no area faults or issues with your account at the moment. I would be more than happy to assist you with the same, but unfortunately, I would not be able to do that over the email. Therefore, I would request you to get in touch with our Technical team, who would be able to go ahead and help you with the same. Kindly give us a call to the given number so that we can do the needful and assist you better. Also, we are working on our interfaces to make it customer friendly.
Well, I don't know what all that waffle was about, it certainly wasn't anything to do with my WAN IP being fixed and this why Virgin Media needs to sort out their Customer Services issues. It is obvious that these call centres abroad that Virgin use are simply following a scripts and they cannot fix the problem from there, as they are limited to only being able to reboot the HUB. I am seriously frustrated with the back and forth, and the issue not getting to the right people.
The last couple of years now Virgin Media have really gone downhill, their customer services is total sham, which is a shame.
[MOD EDIT: Subject title changed for clarity]
on 24-02-2024 16:31
@Lette wrote:I noticed that our WAN IP had changed to Edinburgh, which is 400 miles from our location. I logged into the HUB 5 and checked the Default gateway and it was 92.238.80.1 which is Scotland. I call customer service and ended up speaking all day to about 11 people in different departments most did not have a clue of what I was talking about, others tried to tell me the issue was mine, not VM. I have had computers over 30 years and cable broadband over 20 years, so I know what I'm talking about.
If you were familiar with this you wouldn't have been blagged by the absurd and awful response you received from the complaints team. Shame on Liberty for sending everything offshore and not caring about quality despite cynically trying to charge a fortune: they helped you make yourself look very silly first with the argument from authority then trying to use their reply as a further argument from authority. They told you what you wanted to hear and agreed with you to get you off the phone even though you were completely wrong.
You couldn't find may reports on this online because as a general rule it doesn't matter: it wasn't a one-off just most people aren't bothered, don't rely on sites fixated with where they think their IP address is, because it's nearly always wrong, and/or their ISP doesn't tell then whatever to try and make them go away.
The issue with sites relying on such precise geolocation and basing it on nothing more than IP address are with those sites: ISPs do not have some massive database where the update the location of every customer every time they change their IP address.
on 24-02-2024 16:45
What I would like to understand is why this is so important to @Lette that it needed complaints to VM. Are we missing something?
on 25-02-2024 22:11
Well this was a waist of time, no replies or private msgs from any VM representatives. We have had cable broadband since it was available in UK, well before Virgin Media. Every ISP I have had in past has always assigned an IP that is within 25 miles of location and mostly static.. If anyone does not understand why that would matter then they need to try watching a tv service that uses IP location to watch local news as well as other services thinking you have shared passwords.. If I want to hide my location I use a vpn..
This was a complaint about how VM avoid to rectify a simple problem and make it so hard to talk to someone with just a little bit more knowledge and to get a strait answer. Customer service is a joke, Tech support have no more control over my Hub than me and less knowledge. one guy didn't even know what a WAN was.. The last Tech person I spoke to told me the only way I can get any answers was to make a formal complaint so I did, but guess what, complaints are are dealt with by the same people in customer services who have no technical knowledge, so don't know what the complaint is about and just follow scripts they been given.
My Default Gateway on my hub 5 changed around 4 weeks ago to 92.238.80.1 which is in Scotland, before that I had a gateway in Plymouth. Maybe they are working on local servers for hub5x or an its a settings error but the problem is still here and they don't care. Resetting the hub to factory default and disconnecting didn't assign a new gateway so I will guess I will have to wait. most sites and tv apps are ok now.
Did a little looking more into my IP over the years and in an online account that logs signing in account activity (IP and Location) found my IP changed 4 weeks ago to Scotland but for more than 5 years was the same static IP location 92.238.120.*** United Kingdom, Plymouth.
25-02-2024 22:25 - edited 25-02-2024 22:28
It can take several days for a reply from VM on here, since it isn't a direct line to their support team.
26-02-2024 07:44 - edited 26-02-2024 07:45
So you have proof the IP your on is a problem? aside from location
on 28-02-2024 10:50
Hello Lette.
Thanks for your first post and welcome to our community.
We are very sorry that you haven't had a constructive answer from your complaint regarding your IP address changing location.
Like most companies we do issue a dynamic IP address for our customers, This can remain the same for X amount of time.
One of the reasons for the location for the IP location changing, would be if we had to carry out any maintenance or the local server is having an issue.
Has the location change had a negative effect on your services?
If so? can you please let me know.
Gareth_L
on 28-02-2024 17:31
Hi Garath,
Yes, the location change has had a negative effect on my TV / Apps and some websites, it's not that they don't work, but because the IP location is 400 miles away from me they don't give the correct results. Some Apps say that the region is wrong and won't play videos and some say the IP does not match my accounts postcode.
I have had a static IP address with Virgin for over 5 years until around 4 weeks ago when it changed, please see my last post above. I've had cable broadband for over 25 years and have never had a problem with my IP being set by an ISP over a 25 mile from my actual location, until now. I understand that this is not a major issue but it is a big inconvenience for me.
Lette
on 28-02-2024 17:39
Guess the paper work for updating a subnet location got lost...
on 29-02-2024 16:21
My contract ends April, so I think this time it will end for good. After looking at Trustpilot 1.7* its obvious people are leaving this sinking ship. I blame the merge with O2, since then the customer service is abysmal.
on 29-02-2024 17:02
WAN IP addresses are global in nature. My experience is that these addresses, for residential customers, are dynamically allocated and, although can remain unchanged for years (not the same as static), do change sooner or later. There can be multiple reasons including network segmentation and edge routing changes, but nothing lasts forever. I do not for a moment believe that any ISP will guarantee to allocate you an IP address which is near you and keep doing so.