total loss of service today

[madheaduk]

This morning (30/06/2021) at just after 9am, I found that I lost all broadband and tv services in my area CT179LD. This was apparently a planned outage. However it can't have been planned because I would have been notified of it in advance right? ... 

I lost a whole day of work, and my employer expects me to book holiday to make up for it. 

so 

1. why is this work necessary during the week between 9-5 ?
2. Why was advanced noticed of this "planned outage" not given so that I could plan work around it?
3. This is not the first time this has happened.. but I have now had enough. How can I complain and get some compensation? (or better still ensure I also get advanced notification of any "planned" outages!!)

In addition colleagues of mine suffered this yesterday in nearby locations to myself also planned

The is terrible service management. .. 

[madheaduk]

So How do I find out when you posted this and why didn't I get advanced emails and phone text messages to tell me you were breaking my services all day...

[japitts · Accepted solution]

One way of looking at this is...

I'm assuming you have a residential contract with VM? Whilst in the current climate, many people are using domestic connections for business use, it does open a legal can of worms.

If your connection is vital to you, then you need to either have a business-grade account with appropriate SLAs, and/or a separate connection with another provider to maintain continuity.

In the past, VM have mailshotted out to advise of major planned outages, but (in my experience at least) that's not been the case for many years.

[jpeg1]

Engineering work should certainly take place during the daytime on weekdays, so that the primary residential service of entertainment and gaming is not interrupted at the times when most people want to use them.

If working from home is so important, either get a business line or at least get a backup service by mobile data.

[madheaduk]

Ok so if I now reword my post to
I paid in advance for tv and internet services from VM that give me 24/7/365 days a year access.

I expect that at the very least I would get advanced noticed of planned work. This is planned work so if you don't tell me and just cut of my supply I expect to be compensated for the lack of services. All my other services to my property, i.e. water, gas and electricity don't have planned outages without prior notifications. I deem internet as an essential service everything is now done online... 

Whatever I choose to use my internet connection for (especially for domestic use, which includes creating vpn connections into work networks btw ) I have a service contract with VM. This means if you chop my services without warning.... that means I get that money back. I pay for a service which provides internet not random chopping of services without prior notice.

Like I said terrible service management

[jpeg1]

I paid in advance for tv and internet services from VM that give me 24/7/365 days a year access.

Wrong. Virgin Media gives no guarantee of continuous service. Read your contract.

Compensation starts after two full days of no service.

[madheaduk]

So what your saying is that if people work weekends and only have time off in the week that they should have to put up with having their services cut off without notification ? 

[jpeg1]

Virgin Media don't tell you when to work and when to play. It's not their job and they are not interested in your lifestyle.

They provide you with a service and you use it the best you can. There is a contract which specifies the service you are paying for.  I suspect other providers are very similar.

[japitts]

The pertinent section of the T&C (https://www.virginmedia.com/shop/the-legal-stuff/terms-and-conditions-for-fibre-optic-services ) seems to be Clause F(2)...

"2. We may upgrade and update the network, equipment and the services from time to time. We will give you notice beforehand where we reasonably can if we believe such an update may materially affect your service."

As to what is reasonable, is for VM to answer. I'd be minded to agree that - in the current climate of WFH being common - there should be some prior notification of all-day outages. However, and this depends what the nature of the works was, outage windows are very often many times longer than necessary, to allow for overruns, rollbacks and unplanned eventualities. It is rare for them to genuinely be all-day.

Legally, you will be very lucky to get any financial rebate for outages like this.

[Sofia_B]

Hi @madheaduk.

Thanks for your post 🙂 

I'm very sorry to hear you're services have been affected by a planned outage, I can appreciate how frustrating this must be and we apologise for any inconvenience caused. 

We do always aim to give customers as much notice as possible for any planned outages, apologies if on this occasion you did not receive this.

I've had a little look into your account and I can see the planned outage has now been resolved, how is the service performing currently? 

Thanks,