Broadband issues for 10+ years

[Damianp]

I've had issues with my broadband ever since it was installed over 10 years ago.

For the first few years, we had fairly frequent issues which turned out to be that our cable was being moved to a lower signal strength output in the hub. The engineers who came out often said that the install team had used the lower grade 6? cable when they should really have used the 11? cable because of our distance from the hub. They explained that any less than the highest strength output at the hub would cause us issues.

We've had engineers out quite a few times over the years and they've all mentioned that the signal even at the front of the house is weak and is too steep and that this is because the lower quality cable has been used. Nothing has ever been done about this though and they've always fobbed by installing signal boosters etc.

They eventually put a note on our cable in the hub saying "do not move" after it got so bad that I threatened to leave.

The broadband has been ok since then for the most part but we still have occasional issues with intermittent signal issues, low broadband speeds, packet loss etc. My friend who also has Virgin Media never has any issues and is surprised at how bad my broadband is compared to his. Recently things have started to  get really bad again so I did the online checks which resulted in an engineer being booked.

When the engineer came out a few weeks ago he said that the signal drop-off between the front and back of the house where the cable enters my living room is more than he expected and this is due to the cable that goes over my house being damaged. He again mentioned the lower grade cable from the hub and at one point was saying that this was the issue but then decided it was the cable over the house. He booked another engineer to replace this cable with another which goes around my house instead.

So this engineer arrived today and checked the signals again before installing the new cable. He said that he thought that the issue was more to do with the cable from the hub but said he'd replace the roof cable anyway.

After he'd done this he checked the signal again and said it had made no difference and that the cable he'd just removed was armoured or something and would have been fine.

He's now booked a cable pull to replace the 6 cable with 11 cable and said that this should sort out the issues.

What really annoys me about this is that I've been paying for over 10 years for broadband that I've frequently had issues with and that the engineers who've come out have been aware of what the underlying issue was but have not addressed it.

I've been trying to find my old posts on here asking the forum for help but think they've been deleted because they're from so long ago.

I feel like leaving and going to BT Infinity even if this issue gets sorted. Do Virgin Media care about things like this?

[Roger_Gooner]

The RG11 cable can be fixed around an exterior side wall if you have one, otherwise the cable will have to be routed internally.

As for the drop equaliser: it compensates for differential frequency losses across a length of cable by attenuating signal levels of lower frequencies until they equal signal levels of higher frequencies, and may well not be necessary with the RG11.

[Damianp]

Hi Roger,

Thanks for the help with this.

They've already installed the cable that goes around my house when they replaced the cable which went over the roof. When he was doing this I asked whether I needed the higher grade cable to go around the house and he said no, so as far as I'm aware, it's the RG6 which is on the external wall around the house.

This means that when they do the cable pull, it'll be RG11 from the junction box to the front of the house, and then RG6 from the front of the house, around to the back of this house.

Is this how it should be? Does have RG11 to RG6 cause any issues?

Many thanks, Damian

[Roger_Gooner]

I'm expecting RG11 externally, then connected to a different type of coax internally (either RG6 or the lighter AWG RG59).

[Damianp]

Another update to this.

The fourth team came yesterday evening and asked me what needed doing. I explained that the first three teams had been out and found that the route to the junction box was blocked and that the pavement would need to be dug up. They said that they weren't the team to dig up the pavement but they'd go and check for themselves anyway.

They came back a while later and said that the third team had managed to clear the blockage and had roped the entire route but had not updated the system to show this. They said that they'd be back this morning to pull the cable.

So just now the fifth team (not the same people as last night) pulled up outside and then started to drive away after a few minutes. I flagged them down and asked them what was happening and they said that they'd been sent to pull the cable, but the job had just been cancelled and that they'd been sent somewhere else. They didn't know when the next team would be out.

I've asked each team if the RG6 cable which goes around my house will be replaced with RG11 and they said no - it will be RG11 to the front of my house and then RG6 around the house and that this would be ok.

This is getting ridiculous.

[Ashleigh_C]

Hi there @Damianp 

Thank you so much for popping back to us and updating the forum and I am so sorry that this issue has been on going. I think it would be bets for me to pop you a Private message so we can take a closer look into this together. 

I'll pop one across now, please keep an eye out for the purple envelope in the top right corner of your screen alerting you to a new message. 

[Damianp]

Yet another update to this, the saga continues.

The RG11 cable was pulled last week and at first things seemed to be much better. A few days ago we started to get the same issues again with intermittent loss of broadband. I did the online tests and after this continued for a few days, this flagged for a technician to come out.

The technician arrived this evening and initially found that our cable had been moved to a lower power output in the junction box, he said that this was probably the cause of the issues. This may explain why things seemed ok at first.

He moved the cable in the junction box to a higher output but still found that there was an issue with the signal. He found that there was a severe twist in the new RG11 cable which was installed last week and which is most likely causing the issues. Another team is coming out to fix the cable. I won't get my hopes up.

Despite all of this, I do not qualify for automatic compensation because as far as I remember, I haven't had complete loss of service for over 48 hours. This is the threshold which Virgin Media use, so no matter how appalling their service is beneath this threshold, you pay the full price anyway.

[Roger_Gooner]

You are not entitled to automatic compensation but there are a few cases of people getting partial refunds for poor service over a long period of time. Be prepared to fight for this.

[Damianp]

Another team came out on Saturday and re-pulled the new cable. Before they did this, they checked the signal and said that they'd replace the cable but that they did not think that the twisted cable was causing my issues anyway. They also said that an RG11 cable should have been used from the start due to the distance my house is from the hub. They said that the issues were being caused by the hub which services my address being completely over-loaded. They said that there were splitters coming off the ports in the hub because there was no room for new connections so a signal which was intended for one household was being split for multiple households.

They said that many of the cables still attached in the hub are probably dead but that when someone leaves VM, their cables are not always disconnected so the hub gradually becomes more and more of a mess. They've put my cable in a stronger signal strength port and put a label on it saying do not move, but also that this doesn't always work. So for now, everything seems ok but I am expecting that there will be issues again at some point in the future.

What a disgraceful service.

[Robert_P]

Thank you for the update Damianp, monitor this and let us know if you need any further assistance regarding this or any other problems.

Rob

[Damianp]

My issues are still ongoing despite the second RG11 cable being pulled. I lose signal completely for a few seconds to minutes multiple times a day.

Technicians have just left and found that there is a large amount of noise on my signal. He initially thought that this was coming from the internal wiring but after he'd done the full inspection said that the issues are due to the cabinet.

He said that the cabinet is the worst he has seen since working in London many years ago. He said that he tried to find a port that didn't have as much signal noise, but mine was already on one of the better ones and that there are others which are much worse than mine.

He said that there are many cables which are from customers who have now left VM - my old RG5 cable was apparently still connected, and that all of these are pumping noise back into the cabinet. There are apparently splitters on some of the ports and some of these have broken, again causing noise. He said that there is no point in me requesting technician visits because this is the root cause of the issue and the technicians cannot do anything about it.

He said that in the past a Cabinet Clean Up would have been triggered once a few people in the same area complained about their signal but that this doesn't happen now. He said that everyone being serviced from this cabinet will be having the same or worse issues than I am.

He said that he will raise this with his manager and put in a request for a Cabinet Clean up but that this isn't guaranteed to happen and can take from 3 to 6 months if it does.

I will soon be putting in a formal complaint about this requesting a significant refund on the defective service which I have been paying for and will take this to the ombudsman if this is not dealt with satisfactorily. I am also going to contact my neighbours to tell them that they are also paying for a defective service.

Kind regards,

Damian