VM unwilling to help with cable fault

[paullos45]

Hi all,

Please can someone from VM help.

On the 7th the broadband went down, fault in the area. Broadband issue was not resolved the next day. Engineer visit arranged for Sunday 11th. I work from home so had to go to various coffee shops to get wifi, and then spent £100 on an ee wifi box so I could work.

The engineer arrvied on the 11th, installed a mains powered signal amplifier and told me the cable needed to be replaced from the roadside cabinet to the house (the cable is 15+ years old). The engineer said the signal was the weakest he'd ever seen and the cable could fail at any moment.

The TV picture is blocky and the internet keeps dropping out.

I cancelled the service, final date being 8th October.

After various phonecalls to VM, I explained the situation only to be told, accept VM's offer to refund the final bill of £93 and we would also have to accept that Virgin are not liable for total loss of service if the cable fails.

As I had cancelled, VM said they would not replace the cable.

I didn't accept the refund and have not been offered VMs compensation, which should have started from the 8th.

I called today, as I noticed the complaint raised has been resolved, but there is not resolution.

Today I had to disconnect all VM equipment, as the service was so poor, assume the cable could fail at any time.

I again rang VM today to explain that the equipment has been disconnected due to the poor service, only to be told a deadlock letter has been sent and would arrive in 30 days.

I was also told a letter was sent on the 18th, but still not received.

Please can someone from VM help, as I feel the only solution now is to contact a solicitor and follow this up legally.

[Matthew_ML]

Hey paullos45, thank you for reaching out and a warm welcome to the community, I am sorry to hear you are having some connection issues.

I have taken a look at our side and I can see you have been speaking to the team who have given you some advice on this.

Have they managed to get this resolved for you? Thanks 

[paullos45]

Hi Matt,

As I have cancelled my contract, VM are unwilling to do anything.

I should have received compensation for total loss of service from the 8th to the 11th, but have received nothing.

The compensation should have continued as the problem can only be resolved by replacing the cable from the roadside cabinet to our house, which VM are unwilling to do as I have cancelled the contract (but am still under contract until the 8th October).

The poor quality tv picture and wifi signal are not what we signed upto.

The engineer had to install a mains powered signal amplifier to get any signal at all, he said we need to keep the signal amplifier plugged into the mains, or we would loose the signal completely. He also said the cable could fail completely at any time.

I have now had to unplug the VM kit, as the TV picture was blocky and the wifi kept dropping out.

VM told me they have sent a deadlock letter, which I knew nothing about, they have told me they cannot do anything now the deadlock letter has been sent out, which will take 30 days to arrive. The last payment is due on the 12th October, if I decide not to pay, I will receive bad credit.

What advice have they given, as I have not received any?

Cheers

PH

[jpeg1]

For total loss of service from 8th to 11th, they only pay for full days loss after the first 48 hours.

You would have been in a better position if you had not volunteered to cancel, as that relieves them of further responsibility. The best you could argue for is not paying the 30 days' notice. 

[paullos45]

They still have to fulfill the contract until 8th of October. Whether I have cancelled my contract or not is irrelevant.

[Vikki_M]

Hi @paullos45

Thank you for your post and welcome back to our community.

I am sorry to hear of the issues you have been having and that you have decided to leave us.

A deadlock letter is sent if we have been unable to come to a resolution with the customer.

To clarify, this is when we have made an offer of resolution that has been declined.

Once the letter is received, the customer can then take their complaint through independent adjudication (CISAS)

The details on how to do this will be on the letter.

I have included our complaint code of practice for convenience here.

The reason the team would no longer be able to discuss the complaint once deadlock has been reached, is because at that point the customer would have exhausted our complaints process.

Any claim for credit/refund would then need to be made via CISAS.

If you have any further questions please pop back to us here.

[paullos45]

Hi Vikki,

I didn't agree or disagree to anything on the phone with VM Indian call centre.

VM still owe compensation for full loss of service from the 8th to the 11th. This compensation has not been credited to my account, it does state in VMS terms this will be credited automatically to my account.

Cheers

[goslow]

---

@paullos45 wrote:

Hi Vikki,

I didn't agree or disagree to anything on the phone with VM Indian call centre.

VM still owe compensation for full loss of service from the 8th to the 11th. This compensation has not been credited to my account, it does state in VMS terms this will be credited automatically to my account.

Cheers

---

I think you might have possibly scored a few own goals here in dealing with this. My understanding of how the compo scheme works (nothing more than a personal opinion mind) would be ...

VM's full auto compensation info is here

https://www.virginmedia.com/legal/fibre-optic-services-terms-conditions/automatic-compensation

and the OFCOM info is here (which IMO is a bit easier to read IMO)

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0026/216962/Industry-Code-of-Practice-for-Automatic-...

The OFCOM doc defines a TLS at para 23. I'm sure VM would debate the point whether there was a TLS (as in no service at all) or (from your POV) that the service was intermittent to the point of being unusable.

Ref the outage from 7 to 11 Sept, VM gets two full clear working days (working days being Mon to Fri) to fix the fault before and compo applies. So, if you phoned in and reported the issue on 7 Sept, when the fault first appeared, VM had 8 and 9 Sept to fix the problem. Payment would be an initial £8.40 for the first few days of outage (7/9 to 9/9 inc.) and then £8.40 per day after that from 10 Sept inc.

VM should pay the compo up to your termination date but you should also refer to para 40 of the OFCOM doc which refers to the customer preventing 'the service issue from being resolved'. If you have unplugged the VM kit then I am sure VM would be arguing along those lines.

If VM has actually issued a deadlock letter then your next step would be to go to arbitration with CISAS (rather than a solicitor).

Best case you might get 28 days (10/9 to 7/10 inc.) compo at £8.40 plus payment trigger time of £8.40 which would be £243.60. Worst case VM might argue that you had an intermittent service, not TLS, and having cancelled and unplugged the equipment you 'prevented' further resolution in the remaining time of the contract. I would guess the devil would be in the detail of what exchanges actually took place between you and VM and being able to prove them and how a CISAS adjudicator weighed up each aspect.

If you would be relying on phone calls with VM as evidence of what took place you should request a DSAR for those calls (which may be deleted after 180 days) along with any other relevant account info

https://www.virginmedia.com/help/dsar

If you get your deadlock letter then CISAS info is here

https://www.cedr.com/consumer/cisas/complainnow/

[paullos45]

Thanks for the info.

Due to cancelling the contract, there was some kind of block on my account which prevented the cable being replaced (replacing the cable from the roadside cabinet to the house is the only solution to the issue).

VM gave me the following options, resume the contract and they would repair the cable, no time frame given OR....

They refund the last month @ £93, but have no responsibility if the cable fails completely, which would leave me with no service.

I work from home full time and need reliable broadand, the intermittent service wasn't any good and with the looming threat of total cable failure. I had no choice but to remove their kit.

[goslow]

If you are now 'deadlocked' by VM, then your remaining route for redress is via CISAS.

You'll need to go through the two compensation doc's linked at message #8 and see how they apply to your situation and also see what evidence you can collect that supports your case for any payment under the auto compensation scheme.