waiting 2 months for installation

[tanchoo]

I contacted Virgin media on the 15th of January to let them know that we will be moving on the 10th of February. I was told that I should book my move online. Every time I tried to book my move online, I was told by a bot that the replies are not immediate, so I should wait, one hour goes by and the bot pops up again asking the same questions over and over again. I've tried speaking to 2 virgin media employees and was told both times that the move can not be booked over the phone. On the third time, I managed to speak to a woman who was able to book me for 14th of March, which meant that we have to stay without internet for a whole month. I was told that an engineer will be here on the 10th to do some external work, because without it, they can not send engineers. I called today to ask if the external work has been done, so we can move our pre-installation forward and it turns out they have no idea when the engineer will come and it can take till my appointment on 14th of March for him to come. This is outrageous, of course we will not die without internet but my partner needs it for work and my daughter does distance learning, so it is essential. I tried canceling but I have to pay for more than a year worth of interest because they can supply us with internet, it will just take longer. If anyone has been in a similar situation, I'd appreciate some advice on what I could do. Thank you. 

[Steven_L]

Hey tanchoo,

Welcome to the community and thanks for taking the time to post here on the forums.

I'm sorry to hear of your experience in getting services installed at your new home, it is correct that the external work can be carried any time up until 24 hours before your internal and equipment install goes ahead. Have you or would you like to raise a complaint about your experience? The complaints team will be able to investigate this further with the install team and hopefully be able to provide a better date for you but we cannot guarantee that. 

Kind Regards,

Steven_L

[jem101 · Accepted solution]

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@tanchoo wrote:

I contacted Virgin media on the 15th of January to let them know that we will be moving on the 10th of February. I was told that I should book my move online. Every time I tried to book my move online, I was told by a bot that the replies are not immediate, so I should wait, one hour goes by and the bot pops up again asking the same questions over and over again. I've tried speaking to 2 virgin media employees and was told both times that the move can not be booked over the phone. On the third time, I managed to speak to a woman who was able to book me for 14th of March, which meant that we have to stay without internet for a whole month. I was told that an engineer will be here on the 10th to do some external work, because without it, they can not send engineers. I called today to ask if the external work has been done, so we can move our pre-installation forward and it turns out they have no idea when the engineer will come and it can take till my appointment on 14th of March for him to come. This is outrageous, of course we will not die without internet but my partner needs it for work and my daughter does distance learning, so it is essential. I tried canceling but I have to pay for more than a year worth of interest because they can supply us with internet, it will just take longer. If anyone has been in a similar situation, I'd appreciate some advice on what I could do. Thank you. 

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If I may just add one or two observations, from your description of ‘having to pay a years worth of interest’, I take it that you are only some six months into an 18 month minimum term contract? You moved house, was told by VM that they ‘do’ supply your new address and hence, you carry on paying and the ‘supply’ is moved to the new house?

Now it does strike me that this, therefore is a case of ‘complete loss of service’, and you are eligible for compensation to the tune of £8.25 for each and every day past 10th Feb until they actually connect you up. By my calculations that’s around a minimum of £255 they will owe you, but if you read through other posts on this forum, you certainly can’t guarantee that they will even meet the 14th March timescale, some of the stories of delayed installations have run on for months! VM can’t have it both ways, they can either supply your new address, they expect you to carry on paying for it, in which case it is a loss of service and they pay up the compensation, or they can’t provide a service and hence you are free to leave without any penalty.

Now what I would suggest is that you investigate short term alternative providers, especially something like a 4G or 5G home broadband connection from whichever provider has the best signal in your area, these can sometimes be done on a rolling monthly contract, the daily compensation from VM when they do finally pay up* should more than cover the cost plus the money you are paying VM each month for no service!

* note that getting VM to agree to this can be a bit of a battle, it is ‘supposed’ to be automatic and is set out in the OFCOM regulations which VM are obliged to honour. In practice, VM have come up with some ‘creative’ reasons in an attempt to get out of their obligations, they may ‘deny that this is a loss of service’ on the grounds that it was never there and hence can’t be lost, all sorts of excuses, the favoured one being they are waiting for Council permissions, so it’s not their fault guv, may well be trotted out. Ultimately though you’ll probably have to wait for the service to be installed, wait to see if the proper compensation is given, not some insulting, ‘here’s ten quid off for the inconvenience’, when it isn’t, you initiate a formal complaint, wait for that to be fobbed off or ignored and then escalate the whole thing to the industry adjudicator. And if it gets to that, then you add on another £100 or so, for the inconvenience, poor complaint handling, failure to abide by the regulations, etc.

I see that Steven (above) has offered to raise a complaint, I suspect it’s a bit premature right now as technically VM hasn’t done anything wrong - yet! Odd that he didn’t mention the compensation you are owed, or advised on what you could do to tied you over, I’m sure it simply slipped his mind.

[tanchoo]

Good morning, 

Thank you for your reply. Yes, it would be helpful if I could raise a complaint.

Kind regards 

[tanchoo]

Hi Jem,

I can't tell you how much I appreciate your answer. Yes, our contract ends next February, so we have to pay an early disconnection fee. I meant a year worth of internet, sorry for the typo. I wasn't aware that we will be able to claim some compensation eventually. We were offered a portable dongle but that comes up with £80 upfront costs. For now we're managing to stay on our mobile data but my daughter has exams coming up at the end of the week, so having wifi at home will definitely be a big plus. They said someone is coming today to carry out external checks, and I should give them a call tomorrow after 10 am to book an engineer, so we will see what happens. Thank you so much for your advice again, I really appreciate it.

[-tony-]

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@tanchoo wrote:

Good morning, 

Thank you for your reply. Yes, it would be helpful if I could raise a complaint.

Kind regards 

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its worth raising the complaint as it starts the clock ticking to 8 weeks when you can take whats likely to be a fiasco to the arbitrator other than that it will serve no purpose what so ever - VM's dedicated complaints team are as effective as a chocolate teapot - they will either fob it off or give some non sensible answer that has little or no relation to the complaint or ignore you all together

but worry not by doing that and closing the complaint you write and post a registered letter - how quant is that and request a deadlock letter you can then go straight to the arbitrator if you so choose - by past comments on here they will ignore your request for the deadlock letter - which by the way is against the OFCOM code VM signed up to but they break more rules than they observe

if they do ignore you you still go to the arbitrator and add extra of say £100 to any compensation you are due

[Vikki_M]

Hi @tanchoo 

I will send you a private message so we can raise the complaint for you.

Please look out for the purple envelope in the top right of the page and pop me a reply when you can.