Virgin Media Community

[tellme]

Hi,

I have been waiting for VM to solve the over subscribed area issue they confirmed over the phone but nothing is happening. I am fed up of calling the help desk and wait and wait (@30p/min) no response.

Hence I am preparing to switch to an alternative ISP FTTC. 

I have >1year left in the contract - what's the process of leaving with no termination fee - how do I have to time it with the new ISP? My old BT line is disconnected outside the property hence the new ISP will have to get Open Reach Technician to come and install.

This requires some coordination / timing on signing the new contract and getting VM's confirmation that they are not charging me for their failure to resolve the speed issue.

Any Advice how to proceed? I cannot afford 1) Get new contract, OR be late because of Covid 2) cancel VM .. and ending up with no internet at all..

[apcyberax]

over utlization is not a fault you can leave because of.
Unless VM agree to let you go fee free then you will have to go through the complaints process and if they can't sort it take it to CISIS and if they rule in your favor and order VM to let you leave then they will have to let you. But that can take 2+ months

[tellme]

.. overutilization causing minimum contractual speed not met is a breach of the contract.. 

[apcyberax]

report it and they have 30 days to fix it. if they can't i guess you can leave

good luck with that though

[Richw1982]

I think you have to be very careful at the moment.  These are unprecedented times at the moment and no ISP is fully equipped for this.  If you look at any other company forum complaints about dropouts/speed and utilisation are m massive complaint.  Are you going to jump ship and be in a worse position with another ISP??

[tellme]

Hi Rich thanks - I know that I am taking a risk here but what else can I do?

The initial oversubscription issue my area was reported on 11 Dec and no solutions so far. I spare you my BQM chart that is awful. 

My upload speed during working time is 0.1Mbs  - which makes it impossible to make VoiP calls (Ms-Teams calls).

I tried to call VM but their call centre but wait and wait - no response.

I am WFH and stressed out I am losing business because ppl cannot hear me talking. MS-Teams only needs 100kb/sec but there is always some background process in my laptop that consume some peaks of broadband to say 300kb/sec - I don't have admin rights on my work pc hence I cannot kill those processes (VPN tunnelling, sys and minor things). Not to mention that my upload should be 5Mbs ..

It's only slightly better when I call EST ppl early afternoon, but then get worse when I call PST ppl.

VM network was designed for cable TV which fits well download speed. It was not designed for make calls - this is the reason why upload speed is so poor.

FTTC internet is based on old telephony with bi-directional voice, that's why upload speed is much better.

[Richw1982]

Virgin uses FTTP on an HFC network.  Have you tried the 'check service status' tab at the top right of this screen?  It used to allow you to book a visit

[apcyberax]

virgin use FTTC not FTTP in most areas

[tellme]

..  I meant FFTC Openreach network ... was designed for voice - hence down/upload ratio is way better (e.g. 65/18 vs VM's 50/5 or VM's 100/10). When VM is oversubscribed, download get affected to 50% because that's the minimum guaranteed speed, but the upload can get down to zero because there is no minimum guarantee attached. That's fine if one only streams video and play games, but if you need to make VoIP calls, minimum upload is essential.. 

[apcyberax]

voip calls use about 64kbps. and you can't have a good download without an upload. if you had 0 uploads you wouldn't have any download