Virgin Media Community

[mynameislee]

I'm really frustrated by Virgin's upgrade/loyal customer policy. New customers get a V6 right off the bat, but I'm stuck with this slow, old box and you want £64.99 for the privilege of a switch.

What's stopping me cancelling the entire service (my contract expires year ago - I'm month to month now) and signing up again under my partner, and getting it all for free?

The only way you'll listen is if I play cat-and-mouse with your phone team to pretend to cancel per http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/phones/negotiate-with-service-providers and await the obligatory retention marketing call...

Where's the option for people that don't want to waste time playing silly games, and just get the new box without shelling out for it? I'd be happy to sign another contract if I was offered the price of a new customer.

[Parrotperson]

When you first signed up you'll have been the recipient of an advance fee similar to those that new customers are now getting. As an existing customer you'll never get the same offers unless you're out of contract. This applies to any of the big providers VM,Sky to BT

I personally get annoyed that everyone is paying different rates  even when they're on the same packages. The whole industry needs sorting out .  How they can charge me £59pm but someone else on exactly the same package £90 beggars belief  it's the same everywhere, gas, electric, tv, broadband etc  😡

[Princessemma]

I have just looked at upgrading to the V6. On the My upgrades page I'm told activation fee £14.99, through live chat I was told there was a one off cost of £114!! 

[Ernie_C]

The standard price is £99.95 + £14.99 = £114.94.

If you have both Full House TV aka TV XL and 200Mb broadband, you get a £50 discount off the standard price.

[mynameislee]

Thanks for the pricing info. I get that there's a physical cost, but it's super annoying to give it away for free to new customers, and disregard old/loyal ones.

As far as I'm concerned, I'm getting a sub-par service for twice the price - crappier picture quality, slower TV.

I'll probably just leave and then re-sign up under my partner. Just a pain in the arse for no good reason.

[apcyberax]

you got a tivo when you joined i'm assuming. at that time anyone with a V+ box had to pay to upgrade. so you got a better deal then they did. Welcome to the real world. you are not being treating different to new customers, you was a new customer people though the same about you when you joined

[vircom]

My complaint is that VM broke the Tivo box with the so called upgrades, almost all of which I don't need or use. I still have an old V+ box and that works much like it always did. And don't forget that, unlike mobile phones, VM own these boxes.

On this basis I do not think that it would be unreasonable to pay a one off upgrade cost for the V+ to V6 as it would give me extra facilities, but not for replacing a rubbish Tivo that no longer works as originally supplied.

[521003]

> welcome to the real world

Faulty logic. If I paid for the service one-time, fine. But I'm paying monthly for access, at a rate that's twice that of new customers.

The tech to access it should be of equal value, at a minimum. Especially when the price I'm paying since that initial sale has more than doubled.

I'd consider that a fair trade for my signature guaranteeing another 18 months of loyalty.

[apcyberax]

but they are a new customer you are not. The price for the service the new customers get will go up after the contract as well and they wont be able to get the same as new people are getting.

Perfect logic. you will never be a new customer again

[521003]

I'd also argue that this is no different to mobile pricing. Sign a contract, get a phone. When the contract expires, re-commit and get another phone.

Virgin both OWN the boxes and refuse to upgrade. It's literally the worst of both.