Virgin Media Community

[jstubley80]

Hello!

I'm reaching out to the hive mind in the hope of some help regarding a delayed and then cancelled installation at my new home.

The initial order was placed at the start of December 2020, with an install date of 18/12/20. On 17/12/20, I was informed by text message that the installation had been delayed due to external work being required.

After chasing up all over Christmas, the Construction Team told me that the work has passed costing and was now with the Civils Team to arrange the work. Happy days.

Today I received a call telling me that this was, in fact, not the case and that the work would be too expensive. After explaining the situation, I was told that the gentleman at the other end of the line would look into it for me and get back with some kind of update.

Only now I see that my account has been closed.

Virgin assured me all the way from my first viewing of the property (back in August 2020) that it was possible to get an installation, and the vendor of the property had numerous letters an promotional materials through the door offering superfast broadband. This is now apparently not possible.

My wife and I are both teachers and currently rely on a fast and stable connection to teach our classes. As we have to move into our new home in the next few weeks, we are starting to panic at the prospect of buying a new home in which we are unable to work. If Virgin had told me from the start that it wasn't possible to connect to the property, it's honestly not an exaggeration to say that we would have thought twice about buying the property.

Would there be any way to overturn the decision regarding costs?

As we only signed up for broadband, perhaps taking a more expensive package would help our case?

I'd even consider making a contribution toward the cost of the work required is all else failed.

If anyone could offer any kind of advice or suggestion, I'd be super grateful!

[paultechy]

guessing the ROI (Return on Investment) too low, since if needing to dig up street/road and then all the paperwork and redtape is a lot of costs, as for the flyers possible did a mail drop in your area, could pay for the work yourself but this could run into thousands.

[jstubley80]

I would seriously consider covering the costs, or at least contributing toward them, but actually speaking with someone from construction is very difficult at the moment.

Any idea how I might contact them directly?

[Adduxi]

Or as an alternative, have you tried Openreach for FTTPoD ?  or a simple VDSL install from another ISP ? 

[-tony-]

wait for VM to pick up the thread - they should be able to look into it @VM-Jon @Corey_C 

[Andruser · Accepted solution]

VM's new connection process seems to generate a lot of complaints for installations that are "non-standard", meaning anything with high costs, long cable runs, or access across shared drives, or third party owned land.  So, whilst it is possible that the forum staff (or a few of the field staff WFH who participate here) may be able to get VM's very slow wheels moving, even then that may still require a surveyor to do a detailed estimate of costs, the generation of an offer to you based on you contributing, all probably done in writing, and after that there will be a few maybe many weeks lead time to get the different teams of construction, "pullers", installers to do their different bits of work.  And that assumes they don't need to get council or third party permissions, which can take months...

I would suggest that the chances of this being resolved quickly are low, and you are in danger of moving into a property with no internet connection at all, and should consider what is your most pragmatic strategy here.

[VM-Jon · Accepted solution]

Hi,

Happy to take a look for you, please can you PRIVATE message me your full address when you have a moment and i will see if its at all possible.
Jon

[paultechy]

the forum team might point you in the right direction but there is a bit of wait, could fill in form via https://www.virginmedia.com/lightning/network-expansion/cable-and-construction#form and they might contact you directly.

[jstubley80]

We have already got a backup FTTC connection, but wanted to use the VM connection mainly for our online classes.

[Andruser]

If you've already arrange and intend to keep it, maybe commit to nothing yet and see how the FTTC connection performs?  Doesn't stop you exploring the VM option, but if your concern is running video-call types of content, then there's little to choose between a good FTTC connection and cable, because you're only going to need around 5 Mbps max per user.  If that's the two of you, then a VDSL2 line will probably have ample spare upstream capacity, and it will usually have better latency performance than that inherent in a cable connection.

The only point you actually have to worry about choosing is if and when VM present you with a fully priced offer of connection, I'm sure they will, but that could take a while.  If the FTTC line is actually doing everything you need, then you have to think about VM's only real USP, which is higher speeds, or possibly you're attracted by the content bundles..