Delayed Installation

[OakleyJude]

So… I had a gentleman who was going door to door, sign me up for Virgin, having told me it was available on my estate.

I had told him that I was looking at moving so wasn’t sure about signing up and he assured me it would be fine.

He told me to sign up quickly as not to miss the good offer and that I could change the install date/bring it forwards when I knew of a suitable date. The date we went for initially, was the 10th of December and he said he’d come back the next day, to speak to my current provider about ending my current contract.

This guy was then unable to come back for over a week as he had trouble with his car and for the inconvenience caused he said he’d try and get me a better offer.

When he did finally come to my property and spoke to my current provider, to terminate my contract early, he then had to go and said he would get back to me with details of a new offer and confirmation of the date change (bearing in mind, he’d cancelled my current provider, around this date change).

As he didn’t get in touch with me, I contacted him and asked about the deal and date change, to which he said that the deal I was on was the best and my date could not be changed.

I have now been without internet, for a week, as he cancelled my previous connection and I have made a complaint and nobody has gotten back to me. I’ve spent this last week with no internet, trying to work from home by tethering.

My install should have been tomorrow, having had this confirmed by virgin via text. I then received a text later on today informing me that more work needs doing outside and that my install date is now the 14th of January 23?!

How can I be expected to work from home with no internet, when I had a perfectly good provision, that one of your employees cancelled, under false pretences, whilst also pretending to be my partner?!

I really need someone to get back to me with some kind of solution, even if it’s a data sim in order for me to work from home whilst this saga continues.

I can’t believe that you feel that this is acceptable and that you don’t act on complaints/issues raised.

[Andrew-G · Accepted solution]

Take a look in this forum, and you'll find that delays on new installations are normal with VM.  Lack of information and poor customer service are normal with VM.  Ignored or poorly handled complaints are normal with VM.  Poor, even illegal sales practices are normal with VM.  

You mention terminating the previous contract early.  That usually involves paying early termination charges that can be expensive, and I'm guessing that the salesman told you that VM would pay those?  In which case he was lying, as it is VM's policy not to pay those charges.  Having said that, since (a) there's no logic for you terminate an existing contract early if you did have to pay these, that's strong circumstantial evidence that would support your case if he now denies this, and (b) if he promised this and you relied upon that information, then it becomes legally binding on VM whether they like it or not.

Now, the bad news is that years of horror stories about delayed VM installations persuades me that there's little or no chance of VM bring forward your planned connection, and a very good chance that they'll miss the planned date.  Read this or this, or this, or this, or any of the many other similar posts in this forum to set your expectations, and be aware that the longest delayed installation of which this forum knows was thirteen months.  Your options here are to throw yourself on Virgin Media's mercy and goodwill (hahahahhaa!) and hope and believe they'll sort this mess out - I'd call this plan Z, because you really should try alternatives that involve not giving this rubbish company your business.  So plan A is to try phoning your previous ISP, explain that you'd been mis-sold and can you retract your contract cancellation please?  They may or may not be obliging.  If they aren't then you've probably permanently lost any landline number you had, and plan B is to contact another ISP who use Openreach infrastructure and order a new connection with them - that's still likely to be quicker than waiting for VM to install.

That's not the end of things.  Write to VM at their Sunderland address cancelling the VM installation under you legal cooling off rights.  No point phoning, you'll encounter the appalling service that VM pride themselves on, and hear lying charlatans staff promising on their granny's life that your installation will be treated as a priority, or passing you from agent to agent rather than just cancel.  Believe nothing you are told on the phone by VM staff.

And that's still not the end of things.  You've got a complaint in (with a reference?  No reference number, no complaint!) but that's about the delays and will be fobbed off.  On the assumption that Plan A or B are the route you've gone down, you need to raise a formal written, posted complaint with VM, using a recorded delivery service asking for compensation for the appalling behaviours on display here.  This should include the full cost of any early termination charge from the previous ISP, PLUS compensation for the very serious inconvenience of the salesman cancelling your existing provider (with extra if you fall into any vulnerable customer category), and compensation for the delay in the installation causing you to have to find another provider, which should be claimed as £8.40 per day based on regulatory guidance for loss of connection.  I'd think that your situation is at the most extreme end of inconvenience that can be encountered, and therefore you should be looking for around £200 in compensation, plus £8.40 per day from the day your previous connection was stopped to the date you get a connection restored (I'd hazard a guess of £180 or so), plus any early termination costs.

Chances are VM will fob the complaint off (another thing performed to their world famous standards of quality), offering either derisory compensation or some garbled "resolution" letter that fixes nothing.  But in that case you reply by rejecting the resolution and ask for what is called a "deadlock letter", and with the deadlock letter you involve the industry complaints adjudicator CISAS.  They work much like the better known Energy Ombudsman.

This is long and involved, and I'm sorry for that, and that sorting this out isn't going to be quick.  Unfortunately the only person who will sort this out is you.  Virgin Media will not take ownership, will not willingly, fairly and generously resolve the multiple failings they made.  Forum staff will offer to help - whether they'll get a good outcome for you I can't say, and I suspect they'll not be able to break through the company's bureaucratic processes, miserly compensation offers, and the "do what we please, when we please" installation process.   

I'd also strongly suggest you speak to Citizens Advice as soon as possible to understand your legal rights.