After 20 Years with Sky & 11 Years with Freeserve Im a Virgin

[DSLiverpool]

Sky TV, Orange broadband and a BT phone line all costing £135 a month

Now £99 a month and we (should have) mega fast broadband

I got cheesed off paying Orange £25 a month for 3 MB tops and would happily pay more but they cant do anything so right outside the gate is a cabinet - a cable one I discovered - and I have done the deed on the basis that if its cack I can swap back within 28 days

The TV is pricey as we have two separate systems with separate cards in the lounge and bedroom plus every channel available apart from CFCTV and MUFCTV and the ethnic stuff.

Any Virgin convertors that are happy ? have I made a mistake ?

 

[A210AMG]

I have been with sky for a fair bit now, have the phone, broadband, HD, films, TV etc with them.

Only last Friday I rang up and went from to retentions...


Acted a little vague saying I'm thinking of getting oe of those HD freesat boxes as the bill seem to be rising..

After a few minuites I now have 50% off my bill for 6 months and they even said ring back at the end of that period and they will see what they can do.

I only use the internet for this site, pistonheads and general surfing and the speed I have is fine...For down loads 'cough' pleanty of colleagues have 50megs or what ever and I just pass over a hard drive Anything I have plays on my Western Digita box anyway.


So all in for a 5 minuite call a great saving and the fact even Mrs A210 can use sky means its better I don't change

 

[Spinal]

I've been on cable since the Blueyonder days. The service has consistently gone downhill, from Blueyonder to NTL then finally to Virgin. Their two problems are customer service and tampering with your packets.

That said, as the only cable providers in the UK, they do have a monopoly on broadband. I would term the copper wire providers "midband" really... BT can't offer more than 1-2mbps in my area (samknows).

Virgin have their issues, their customer support is non-existent and they can be downright rude at times. That said, an email to Virgin Media's CEO gets a response by his PA, and you get a very friendly and helpfull call back (on a Sunday) and a techie (in a suit saying he normally doesn't do house calls as he's the manager of the regional support team) at your house replacing the faulty box.

So really, my only real gripe is how they tamper with your packets, filtering and slowing down as they see fit. Their claim for "unlimited" broadband is borderline fraudulent, but they have made the way they restrict speeds and connections so complex that most people cannot work it out. Oh, and they don't publish most of it.

So... in response... Virgin is great... until another cable provider comes along and I'll be jumping ship the very same day!

M.

 

[C43AMG]

ME to !!!!

 

[DSLiverpool]

Well I get 3Mb tops off orange for £25 a month so it MUST be better than that (or I can cancel) - even 6MB will be huge to me - decent iPlayer and faster downloads

 

[Sp!ke]

I'm a reasonably happy virgin customer.

I've been with them for 12 years or something back when they were telewest.

I get get TVXL with an HD Tivo type box plus a Medium Broadband package which is usually over 5mb/s as well as a landline and a Virgin mobile for about £60 a month.

It have been very reliable for the last four or so years, less so when it was in the hands of Blueyonder.

Customer service has always been OK for me. Just make sure you call in UK hours and you'll usually get a UK call centre. If you're patched through to Bangalore then you may as well just slit your wrists immediately as opposed to doing it at the end of your wasted call.

 

[Mr E]

Inspired by the comments posted here, I phoned Sky this afternoon.

Currently a full non-HD package, now HD, new box, install, etc, for 50% off. Call again after 6 months to possibly extend too...

Worth making the call, no effort at all

 

[Deleted member 6183]

I've been on cable since the Blueyonder days. The service has consistently gone downhill, from Blueyonder to NTL then finally to Virgin. Their two problems are customer service and tampering with your packets.

That said, as the only cable providers in the UK, they do have a monopoly on broadband. I would term the copper wire providers "midband" really... BT can't offer more than 1-2mbps in my area (samknows).

Virgin have their issues, their customer support is non-existent and they can be downright rude at times. That said, an email to Virgin Media's CEO gets a response by his PA, and you get a very friendly and helpfull call back (on a Sunday) and a techie (in a suit saying he normally doesn't do house calls as he's the manager of the regional support team) at your house replacing the faulty box.

So really, my only real gripe is how they tamper with your packets, filtering and slowing down as they see fit. Their claim for "unlimited" broadband is borderline fraudulent, but they have made the way they restrict speeds and connections so complex that most people cannot work it out. Oh, and they don't publish most of it.

So... in response... Virgin is great... until another cable provider comes along and I'll be jumping ship the very same day!

M.

Funny.

No disrespect meant but you've had outstanding service and will leave asap.

I would expect Virgin to be delighted when the day comes.

 

[bulldoze]

We have had Virgin for a year now, initially disappointed as I thought the V+ service had a clunky interface, but it has been surprisingly good, Catchup services like iplayer, 4od work really well, really fast and in HD too - the SD upscaling is better than SKYs as well.
I do not need to rent the latest DVDs either as I can rent them at a push of a button and again in HD.

Broadband is as advertised except if you do a big download then it will traffic shape but I rarely do big downloads so no problem for me.

We have just moved house this week so we phoned to extend/move house and then yesterday I found out about the new TIVO box that is due out - this looks fantastic and knocks spots of SKYs box. modern UI, internet apps, 1TB of hard disk, intelligent programming.

Virgin Media TV powered by TiVo


I am annoyed they did not offer it to me - I shall be on the phone to them soonest!

 

[npuk]

Virgin are only offering Tivo to S1 TiVo owners and VIP customers who registered interest, installs just started recently. It will then be offered to exisitng customers, and then will be open to new customers.

 

[moonloops]

With virgin expect to be packet shaped to hell. Also heard that their equipment in the exchange gets overloaded quite often (not sure this is 100% right to be honest!)

 

[npuk]

It doesnt apply to 50MB and 100MB, I think the OP for the price stated will be on 50MB. Our traffic management policy

I am on a good UBR and my speeds are quite consistent 50MB pretty much day and night but some areas are heavily over subscribed and the speed drops alot at peak times.

 

[Spinal]

Funny.

No disrespect meant but you've had outstanding service and will leave asap.

I would expect Virgin to be delighted when the day comes.

That's precisely the point, I didn't get an outstanding service... I had to email the CEO of the company to get an issue fixed... that's not outstanding service in my eyes.

The reason I would leave them on the blink of an eye if there was an alternative is their traffic shaping. They have started shaping even their 50mb customers now from 3pm-8pm...

What's worst is that while they tell you the speed reduction in percent, they don't tell you that they will also limit the number of active connections you can have, which makes the service practically unusable if you are using iplayer or cod (which make a lot of connections)

M/.

 

[Rory]

That's precisely the point, I didn't get an outstanding service... I had to email the CEO of the company to get an issue fixed... that's not outstanding service in my eyes.

Totally agree with that. I feel it makes a company look even worse when they refuse to help and then suddenly back down when you escalate the issue.

 

[MercFanUk]

I'm with Virgin. I adore them - I'm dreading the day I move out of this place to a non cable area :/

For 114 a month, I get V+ HD box in one room, standard box in bedroom, all calls free except mobiles (inc 0845 free too), sky sports, sky movies (all in HD too), 100mb cable broadband. Badger them for discounts, you'll get them.