An open letter to Virgin Media

[HEXUS]

Dear Virgin Media,

This week I received an e-mail from the Telewest arm of your technical support group, offering up help and advice to try to solve a packet loss and throughput issue I was having. It was very nice of you to offer to help. Problem is, I reported the issue some nineteen days prior.

Read more.

[-=BigD=-]

I signed up to Virgin Media after getting a flyer through the post. I’d arranged for my BT line to get cut off (I can only get ½ a Mb so was looking for something faster) after I’d signed up on line for the full works (Broadband, phone, tv) and booked my installation date. I was told I’d be contacted with 24hrs to confirm (by email I think). 4 days later and 2 days before I’d lose my BT phone/broadband I rang up to find out what was going on. I spoke to some chap how started apologising as someone should have rung me to tell me I’m in a Cable Restricted area and would be unable to get cable! Frantic calls to BT got the phone stepped back but had to re-sign to their broadband.
Not greatly impressed with Virgin, flyers saying I’m in luck, a website site saying I’ll get super fast connection, a sign up process that confirmed this and took my financial details, and then no one tells me I’m not actually that going to get it? Wonder if they’d ever have called?

[Sim0n]

I *TOTALLY* agree with the letter, and your distaste for Virgin's "Technical Support".

Issue 1 :

When the 20Mbit service was initially rolled out in Nottingham, i jumped at the chance, and phoned up customer services (*CS) to change my billing. Interestingly enuff, the "want to upgrade your account" phone line at CS gets picked up without even ringing, unlike their support, or complains dept.

Anyway, after sorting out the money side of the account, i was told the change would take 5-10 minutes, my service would drop out, the modem would reboot, then i'd be live.
I sat at my PC, with a constant ping running, and without 2 minutes, it was rebooted, and i was running at 20mbit, or so i thought.

I ran a few speed tests, all were hitting exactly 10Mbit (950kb > 1040kb), and not any faster. So i rang CS, who suggested it was a line fault, and i was to ring their tech support (*TS). After over an HOUR on the phone with TS, they suggested my network card was faulty, and i should swap it. I duely ran off and plugged in a laptop and the same thing happened.
It took *me* to actually look at the modem and realise it had a 10baseT network point, and realise that this would be the issue, i was paying for 20Mbit on a modem only capable of 10Mbit.

Issue 2 :
Just last week, the internet slowed to a crawl, in a similar fashion to your Letter, packet loss, traceroutes going astray.

Phoning TS again, i had clear undenyable prove. I still had to sit thru 10 minutes (at 25p a minute), of what could only have been a pre-doctored script that Virgin had given its TS agents ;
1. Are the lights on on the modem. ?
2. Do you have a cable from the modem to your computer. ?
3. Are there little lights flashing on the computer, where the cable goes. ?

Considering i mentioned i had failing traceroutes, and packet loss, would suggest i was alittle more technical than Joe Bloggs, and to skip the obviously crap questioning policy, that seems to place the customer at fault from the initial "hello".

Again, after 50mins on the phone, the agent suggested it was a problem with my PC, and that should get it inspected, suggesting PC-World.

5 minutes of ranting on the phone to him, and several modem reboots later, that i wasnt told was going to happen, and the problem resolved itself. The problem, as i had told him when he first accepted the call, was that their transparent proxy in Leicster was not working properly, as thats where 90% of the traceroutes were failing.

In total, 1hr40 on the phone, or £25, for some indian to deny a fault on Virgins network AND fix it, all while trying to suggest my network card was at fault.....

After complaining to the relevent dept, i was refunded £30, and offered half price service for 2 months. After the 2 months half price is up, unless im offered discounted 50Mbit (as i have always been on NTL/Virgins top teir packages) i will be looking elsewhere.

One VERY moody, if not pissed off NTL/Virgin Customer.

----
Edit : I've never openly voiced my opinions on a forum about this before, as i thought doing so on "NT-HELL World" or similar was just petty, and nobody would take it seriously. But with a respectable website like Hexus, Virgin might take note.

[Gunbuster]

Big D, if you look up you exchange here Samknows you should be able to find availability and any scheduled upgrades in your area.

[-=BigD=-]

Big D, if you look up you exchange here Samknows you should be able to find availability and any scheduled upgrades in your area.

Wow, thanks a lot Gunbuster!
I've been looking for someting like that for a while now, thanks!

[DR]

I think the issue is with the fact we are paying so little for these services, since, in a competitive market how is a company to make money to improve technical support and services when they are all too busy fighting to gain new customers.

It is a nasty situation for us all to be in, and I understand the frustration. I'm with Pipex (at the moment) and the few run in's I've had with them are proving painful at times.

David

[Sim0n]

DR,
Do you have to pay 25p a minute for Pipex to ask you lame questions tho.

I bet pipex would assume you had the common sense to check cables, and not waste £1 finding out

[kst1973]

Good letter, I couldn't agree more.

Thing that annoys me is prior to Virgin taking over, Telewest provided good customer service.

Richard Branson should go fly his baloon somewhere!

[leepen@scan]

Agree with all points by original poster. Currently paying for 4mb service, which due to housesharing with friends, we always exceed the puny 750mb limit between 4pm and midnight. 2mb internet in 2007 is laughable. Either way, the service is awful to use between the "capped" hours and as soon as 1am rolls around, it's 1200kbps down all night long.

I understand the reasons behind their caps and think it is one of the most fair systems out there in terms of bandwidth limits - but still, half the time it doesn't work, with packet loss etc.

OpenDNS is being employed this weekend on our network as Virgin have proven themselves to have done nothing but ruin the good work that Telewest/NTL had done in the past.

[Fraz]

I've heard many many bad things about Virgin Media, but my experience with them has so far been absolutely faultless. If anything, my internet connection runs way better than it's supposed to.

[Sprite]

Good letter, I couldn't agree more.

Thing that annoys me is prior to Virgin taking over, Telewest provided good customer service.

Richard Branson should go fly his baloon somewhere!

Richard Branson doesn't own Virgin media. They are owned by NTL.

And also my connection runs crap, however parents won't change as they want to keep their email addresses and we get a slight discount as my step mum used to work there.

[Mossy]

I signed up to Virgin Media after getting a flyer through the post. I’d arranged for my BT line to get cut off (I can only get ½ a Mb so was looking for something faster) after I’d signed up on line for the full works (Broadband, phone, tv) and booked my installation date. I was told I’d be contacted with 24hrs to confirm (by email I think). 4 days later and 2 days before I’d lose my BT phone/broadband I rang up to find out what was going on. I spoke to some chap how started apologising as someone should have rung me to tell me I’m in a Cable Restricted area and would be unable to get cable! Frantic calls to BT got the phone stepped back but had to re-sign to their broadband.
Not greatly impressed with Virgin, flyers saying I’m in luck, a website site saying I’ll get super fast connection, a sign up process that confirmed this and took my financial details, and then no one tells me I’m not actually that going to get it? Wonder if they’d ever have called?

SNAP

took all my details bank etc... even went trought their postcode checker to see if I was eligable for BB in my area/street setup no responses for weeks rang and got through for them to say we do not support it in your area. Well thanks for wasing my time and even giving me an order number.

[koocha]

I'm in the process of trying to get out of my ADSL with Virgin.

I can't play BF2 anymore as the servers keep kicking me for high pings! Never, EVER had the problem with Plus.net using EXACTLY the same hardware setup. Tried explaining that to them but no, it's a fault at my end. Now they've stopped replying to my emails and there's no way I'm ringing up the tech support line.

VERY disappointed with Virgin Media and most certainly will not be recommending them to ANYONE - not even my enemies - nobody deserves service like this.

[Jay]

I have a couple of issues

1 with VM and one with Telewest / NTL business.

lets start with VM

3 years ago a guy comes to fit our Digital TV and 2mb BB. He spent a very long time messing with the box at the end of the road etc and couldn't get anything to work. Eventually he get the TV on and the BB and runs off. I turn the TV on to find the picture is breaking up and the sound is out of sync. I called VM (Then Telewest) and they send a second guy round. He tells me the single power is to high and the box can't cope so he goes down the road again, messes with box comes back and the TV is fine. Happy with this I then go on the internet only to find packet loss, really bad 1 in every 10 pings to any site is lost and some time up to 5 pings in a row do not make it back.

I call up TW and they say there is nothing wrong. I decide that I will buy a new router to see if its that but guess what.... still getting a lot of packet loss. I call again, they still say there is no fault. After about 2 months of this the packet loss is fixed.

Roll on the 4mb upgrade. I get 4mb and its very very good. Always 4mb always on, no loss top notch so I decide that I will upgrade to 10mb, once again this is really good never 10mb but very close and constant speeds. I was so happy with them that I decided to get TV Drive the Telewest version of Sky+ and this is where things start to go wrong (Again). They guy comes to install the box but tells me my signals are to high again. He goes down to the box messes for a while then comes back. He installs the box goes through some of the menus and goes on his way. From day one the box crashed, did not record, was very very slow in menus and noisy!!.

I call up to complain and they give me the box free of 12 months! I was happy with that until 6 months later the picture starts to break up on Bravo, Discovery etc. I call up and they said it was my box and I would need a new one. When I asked about the recording on my current box they told me that I "Would lose them all". I wasn't happy with that at all so I said I would keep the box. I am stil having these problems now and I know that its a signal issue but they won't check that for me

about 4 months ago I go their 20Mb upgrade. I didn't really need it as I was happy with my 10Mb it was rock solid and if it 'aint broken don't fix it! Since getting the 20Mb I have seen speeds around 6mb constant. Nearly half what I had when I was on 10Mb, nice upgrade that!

Here is an odd thing, If I run 2 speed tests at once and torrent I still get 6Mb on each test.

[TheAnimus]

If you don't like their service, don't buy their product!

I've been using Be for 3 years now, nothing but excellent service, despite the non-uk call center

[Jay]

Onto Telewest Business...

These lot are bad... REALLY bad!

I left 5 answer messages for my account manager with no reply, they charge us £65 a month for 512k ADSL, they insist that we are not in a cable area even though there is a cable grid in the road and a ditch running from it up and down the road. Their sales people know nothing about the area you are in so when they come out to have a meating about your services and you ask a question they just dont know the answers .

and here is the biggest issue

If you order a new service from a company it goes like this

Survey ---order --- install --- payment

with Telewest it goes like this

order --- Payment ---- survey --- install.

You have to pay them before they will even see if they can provide you with a service!

If you don't like their service, don't buy their product!

I've been using Be for 3 years now, nothing but excellent service, despite the non-uk call center

I can't get anything other than 512k ADSL due to my distance from the exchange.