View Full Version : Can't help until May 5th!
My uncle is currently having a problem with his Virgin Cable Modem, and has been told by customer services that there's nothing they can do until the 5th of May!
Apparently their systems are read only until this time, and so they can't help. They're unwilling to do absolutely anything.
Apparently his ready light went off for the day yesterday, and is now flashing, but he has no connection at all.
Thankfully, I'm not with Virgin. I can't imagine anything more frustrating than being told by my service provider that nobody can do anything for a week!
Any ideas from helpful forumites?
the-cable-guy
28-04-2008, 11:13
from what other ppl have been saying on these forums its cuz VM are updating their computer systems.
MovedGoalPosts
28-04-2008, 11:15
Certain things like package changes and new connections can't be dealt with while the billing computer systems are migrated. But existing service faults should be resolveable. Did he call customer services, or did he call faults. They are two different things.
whydoIneedatech
28-04-2008, 11:15
My uncle is currently having a problem with his Virgin Cable Modem, and has been told by customer services that there's nothing they can do until the 5th of May!
Apparently their systems are read only until this time, and so they can't help. They're unwilling to do absolutely anything.
Apparently his ready light went off for the day yesterday, and is now flashing, but he has no connection at all.
Thankfully, I'm not with Virgin. I can't imagine anything more frustrating than being told by my service provider that nobody can do anything for a week!
Any ideas from helpful forumites?
Its true if you are on the EX-NTL side then the is a mass migration of all systems onto one joint System, which finishes on the 5 of May when all systems are to be as one on both EX-NTL and EX-Telewest.
So you and many others have to wait till then.:)
the-cable-guy
28-04-2008, 11:20
Certain things like package changes and new connections can't be dealt with while the billing computer systems are migrated. But existing service faults should be resolveable. Did he call customer services, or did he call faults. They are two different things.
yeah thats what others have been saying.
Bluffdemon
28-04-2008, 11:28
and to add to this story i cant get into my email i cant view it online or manage my email accounts via the virgin media website till 5th of may ? this aint on at all , i cant view it either via vista email program
Tech_Boy
28-04-2008, 11:37
and to add to this story i cant get into my email i cant view it online or manage my email accounts via the virgin media website till 5th of may ? this aint on at all , i cant view it either via vista email program
you should be able to access your emails, just not able to change the accounts via the homepage till the 5th.
I can still log in to the webmail.
mrsnooch
28-04-2008, 11:52
Hi Dan,
Welcome to the forums!
VM are currently upgrading their billing system amongst other things. Has your uncle just joined Virgin? As far as I know it's only affecting new customers who are trying to register their modems. If this is the case, then yes he will have to wait until the 5th May I'm afraid.
If hes been a customer, and has been given a new modem, ask him to use his old modem as this will still be registered under his details.
Untill then, he'll have to sit tight!
Nope, he's been a customer for well over a year.
He phoned both Customer Services, and Tech support.
Initially he was told it was either a DNS issue, or a billing issue. Tech support ruled out DNS, and concluded it had to be billing. He phoned customer services again, and they said they couldn't do anything.
After his ready light started to blink, he called again, and was told that his router had caused the problem (the same router he's had since day one). The last thing he was told is that the modem needs to be reset from their end, but that they can't do it until after the 5th of May.
Wicked_and_Crazy
28-04-2008, 12:50
Its true if you are on the EX-NTL side then the is a mass migration of all systems onto one joint System, which finishes on the 5 of May when all systems are to be as one on both EX-NTL and EX-Telewest.
So you and many others have to wait till then.:)
A migration of a billing system cant take that long surely!!
---------- Post added at 12:50 ---------- Previous post was at 12:48 ----------
Nope, he's been a customer for well over a year.
He phoned both Customer Services, and Tech support.
Initially he was told it was either a DNS issue, or a billing issue. Tech support ruled out DNS, and concluded it had to be billing. He phoned customer services again, and they said they couldn't do anything.
After his ready light started to blink, he called again, and was told that his router had caused the problem (the same router he's had since day one). The last thing he was told is that the modem needs to be reset from their end, but that they can't do it until after the 5th of May.
Get put through to retentions and talk about cancelling the service, see what happens then. Its not acceptable for a company not to be able to service a customer for such a long period of time
whydoIneedatech
28-04-2008, 13:05
[QUOTE=Wicked_and_Crazy;34540131]A migration of a billing system cant take that long surely!!
---------- Post added at 12:50 ---------- Previous post was at 12:48 ----------
Afraid so because the is a lot of work involved.:)
Wicked_and_Crazy
28-04-2008, 13:09
[quote=Wicked_and_Crazy;34540131]A migration of a billing system cant take that long surely!!
---------- Post added at 12:50 ---------- Previous post was at 12:48 ----------
Afraid so because the is a lot of work involved.:)
Rubbish, i've worked on migration projects moving far more customers than VM have and there was no disruption to any service provided to the customer.
It all depends on what you decide is important to you when you plan your approach. Or maybe VM did and customers arent important at all :rolleyes:
Get put through to retentions and talk about cancelling the service, see what happens then. Its not acceptable for a company not to be able to service a customer for such a long period of time
I'd love to see you try and combine the account details of several million customers any quicker.
Customer Relations can't force a change on any of the systems either.
Rubbish, i've worked on migration projects moving far more customers than VM have and there was no disruption to any service provided to the customer.
There isn't, there's disruption to the service provided to the customer support people, since they actually have to change things in the system to do the job. One of the first things you do in a migration is stop changing data in the system so you can take a backup and then migrate the data without it changing while you're doing it. Customer service should be unaffected.
If you can find the modem's MAC address I can take a look, since my diagnostic tools are (deliberately) totally separate from billing. If it's something related to the connection rather than the billing system I might be able to help.
Thanks BBKing - I'll get hold of the MAC address for you.
I agree regarding the outage - being told "sorry, it's saturday, and the techies have taken the system offline for the weekend to migrate" is acceptable, to an extent. Being told "sorry, call back in over a week and we might be able to do something" is not.
I appreciate all the responses. I'll get the MAC code asap.
whydoIneedatech
28-04-2008, 14:06
Thanks BBKing - I'll get hold of the MAC address for you.
I agree regarding the outage - being told "sorry, it's saturday, and the techies have taken the system offline for the weekend to migrate" is acceptable, to an extent. Being told "sorry, call back in over a week and we might be able to do something" is not.
I appreciate all the responses. I'll get the MAC code asap.
Remember to PM the MAC do not post it here;)
Florence
28-04-2008, 14:38
BBKing is the best man for the job should have him for CEO then VM would be a much better comapny...
the-cable-guy
28-04-2008, 14:45
defo dont post ya MAC number on here or someone will clone ya modem.
joglynne
28-04-2008, 15:13
BBKing is the best man for the job should have him for CEO then VM would be a much better comapny...
I second that motion Florence. it's a pity more of our members can't take over the running of the organizations that employ them. We would certainly sort out a fair few problem areas in this country of ours if were possible.:D
BBKing is the best man for the job should have him for CEO then VM would be a much better comapny...
I'm a grungy techie with dandruff. Don't overpromote me.
Mind you, I like the idea of worker's co-operatives, old leftie that I am.
Florence
28-04-2008, 18:34
I'm a grungy techie with dandruff. Don't overpromote me.
Mind you, I like the idea of worker's co-operatives, old leftie that I am.
Everyone has to start att he bottom trouble with VM is the ones at the top didn't start at the bottom so they didn't gain any experience on how it works, what is needed for it to work just know how to count beans and negotiate high bonuses for themselves.
broadbandbug
28-04-2008, 18:56
Everyone has to start att he bottom trouble with VM is the ones at the top didn't start at the bottom so they didn't gain any experience on how it works, what is needed for it to work just know how to count beans and negotiate high bonuses for themselves.
Depends who you are talking about.. The CTIO's CV looks pretty darn Techy to me:D
The CTIO's CV looks pretty darn Techy to me
I can vouch for this - as senior manglement go he's pretty hard to BS*
* Anyone from the Hook Dark Towers reading: this is meant as a compliment.
"After his ready light started to blink, he called again, and was told that his router had caused the problem"
If its a Belkin or Dynamode router make sure you update the firmware or the modem will be deactvated again!
I've found the issue, but it's going to have to stay on PM.
OK, no problem. I'll keep an eye on my inbox. Thanks BBKing.
---------- Post added at 21:39 ---------- Previous post was at 21:17 ----------
"After his ready light started to blink, he called again, and was told that his router had caused the problem"
If its a Belkin or Dynamode router make sure you update the firmware or the modem will be deactvated again!
The router connected to the Cable Modem is a Belkin F5D7230 running the latest available firmware. He's got another router on the network as an access point. Could the firmware on that cause a problem?
Wicked_and_Crazy
28-04-2008, 21:44
I'd love to see you try and combine the account details of several million customers any quicker.
Customer Relations can't force a change on any of the systems either.
Sorry didnt realise VM are using a ZX81
Company im working for at the moment moved 8+ million customers from a mainframe applcation to a unix application in one weekend and didnt impact the call centre at all :confused:
---------- Post added at 21:44 ---------- Previous post was at 21:41 ----------
There isn't, there's disruption to the service provided to the customer support people, since they actually have to change things in the system to do the job. One of the first things you do in a migration is stop changing data in the system so you can take a backup and then migrate the data without it changing while you're doing it. Customer service should be unaffected.
Totally agree
Company im working for at the moment moved 8+ million customers from a mainframe applcation to a unix application in one weekend and didnt impact the call centre at all
We're migrating from, er, Windows. This may or may not colour your judgement of how long it should take...
(also, the main difference is that we're also migrating tools as well, in that part of the point of the whole migration is to consolidate the tools people use for things like email and provisioning. Given that the new ones are running already and need to keep working but the old ones need to stop at some point, there isn't really a way of migrating completely seamlessly. We could have kept the old tools on, but that would defeat the object of consolidation).
whydoIneedatech
28-04-2008, 22:39
[QUOTE=Wicked_and_Crazy;34540606]Sorry didnt realise VM are using a ZX81
Company im working for at the moment moved 8+ million customers from a mainframe applcation to a unix application in one weekend and didnt impact the call centre at all :confused:
---------- Post added at 21:44 ---------- Previous post was at 21:41 ----------
Your scenario involves one company moving its Data onto another system within that companies systems.
The Virginmedia migration involves the migration and alignment of NTL systems and Telewest systems and another inherited system onto one platform so the will no longer be the distinction of EX-NTL or EX-Telewest, as they will be all one combined system.
How you can criticise a system you have no knowledge of is beyond me, if you actually knew how many completely separate systems and tools this involves you would have an idea of why it will require this timescale.
Company im working for at the moment moved 8+ million customers from a mainframe applcation to a unix application in one weekend and didnt impact the call centre at all :confused:
And Virgin managed an in place upgrade of existing records on the new billing system in one night, with no impact.
Your point is?
Just because one transfer of data is simple, doesn't mean that all of them are.
My flatmate had enough trouble transferring his phone contacts from a Nokia to a Sony Ericsson without it going horribly wrong (duplication, first name and surname the wrong way round etc), and that was only about 50 records
Hi,
My Virign Media Broadband has been down since Saturday afternoon. I use a cable modem, but the middle light on my Pace stb has been blinking since then.
I assumed it was a weekend problem, would fix itself by Monday (that's been known to happen several times before), but it wasn't working last night, so I phoned up customer services, and the call centre lady said it was a problem with my modem, but she couldn't access my account details so wouldn't be able to help, and asked me to phone back tomorrow.
I'm an ex NTL region,
modem is NTL:home 200
yesterday
pwr light was on
rdy is off
sync was on
d/s blinking
enet on
now when I plug it in
pwr is on
rdy is blinking
sync is on
enet on
Any ideas?
thanks
Al
I've got the blinking Ready light too.
I rang CS who couldn't tell me what the problem was, initially I thought it might be because of the bill but I'm sure it's all paid up to date.
whydoIneedatech
29-04-2008, 13:34
I've got the blinking Ready light too.
I rang CS who couldn't tell me what the problem was, initially I thought it might be because of the bill but I'm sure it's all paid up to date.
You need to call Tech Support, and it sounds like a VM fault so call charges will be refunded.
Tech Support 0906 212 1111
poppyjoey
29-04-2008, 16:22
I lost my internet access on 24.4.08 and was told there was an outage in my area, and again on 25.4.08. On 26.4.08 they told me my set top box was faulty and they would send a technician out on 28.4.08. I hastily arranged to take leave from work on 28.4.08 as I was anxious to regain internet access. The technician came on 28.4.08 and replaced my set top box, but only afterwards did I discover there is no chance of me getting the internet back until 6.5.08. I wish the person who arranged for the technician appointment l had warned me I would probably lose the internet, as I would have arranged for the technician to call at a more convenient time. As it was I wasted a day's holiday from work, and still do not have my internet! I have also lost a lot of myTV channels too, no doubt these will not come back until 6.5.08 either.
I guess the man who switches things back on is in today after a long weekend off ;)
Just got in from work, and thought I may as well give it one last go before I ring them again, and it's working again!
Cheers
Al
OldGeezer
30-04-2008, 07:51
I moved house on 25th April and reconnection was scheduled for 6th May, after the billing system migration. They just rang yesterday and told me they now can't do it till 13th!
Nearly three weeks without any service - it's not as if they didn't have notice of the move.
I lost Internet and the Web at 11 am yesterday and it wasn't until the late afternoon that I contacted Customer Services only to be advised that this had been caused by the 'updating processess' on-going until next Monday. I checked with a couple of friends only to find that they were normal ! I checked with Technical Services' who more or less repeated CS but also added there there was always a chance that there might be a 'local outage'. My friends were unaffected by an outage ?
By 6.30 pm I had resigned myself to the frustration of almost a week's 'computer deprivation' when quite abruptly an e-mail downloaded and a waiting e-mail went out - and lo ! - I was, and still am, back to normal.
Could somebody explain this turn of events to me ???
HaroldT
Wicked_and_Crazy
30-04-2008, 12:59
My flatmate had enough trouble transferring his phone contacts from a Nokia to a Sony Ericsson without it going horribly wrong (duplication, first name and surname the wrong way round etc), and that was only about 50 records
Your point is?
All i was saying is that the work should be managed in a way that it doesnt affect the consumer
whydoIneedatech
30-04-2008, 13:11
I lost Internet and the Web at 11 am yesterday and it wasn't until the late afternoon that I contacted Customer Services only to be advised that this had been caused by the 'updating processess' on-going until next Monday. I checked with a couple of friends only to find that they were normal ! I checked with Technical Services' who more or less repeated CS but also added there there was always a chance that there might be a 'local outage'. My friends were unaffected by an outage ?
By 6.30 pm I had resigned myself to the frustration of almost a week's 'computer deprivation' when quite abruptly an e-mail downloaded and a waiting e-mail went out - and lo ! - I was, and still am, back to normal.
Could somebody explain this turn of events to me ???
HaroldT
Your friends probably are not connected to the same Node as yourself, so they would not be affected by the fault.
This is, of course, a possiblity - both friends are several miles away - so an ordinary 'outage' would have to be very local to me.
If it was the 'updating process' however, then they should have been affected.
HaroldT
"After his ready light started to blink, he called again, and was told that his router had caused the problem"
If its a Belkin or Dynamode router make sure you update the firmware or the modem will be deactvated again!
I was always under the impression that any problems to do with the sync or RDY lights were due to problems with the cable input side, rather than the ethernet output side.
Uptownbob
30-04-2008, 16:33
I have been unable to access my Virgin/Ntlworld email account for a few days now and was not sure what the problem was until today when I contacted them via a premium rate telephone number apparently it's all due to an internal update. I explained to advisor that it was important that I have access to my email account daily and that the service was now unreliable unbelievably the response was "NO we are reliable? but we have to switch off/shut down this service for over a week" can someone pinch me because there is something not quite right with Virgin Media's advisor's statement it makes no sense but why should that surprise me. In addition for month's and month's now I have been getting the Page Not Available and Not Responding Message almost everytime I access my PC sometimes if I shut down and re-boot it's OK curiously however it's absolutely fine at say 3am/4am in the morning so it seems like a "volume of traffic problem" to me but who knows.... Do You? Probably a good time to migrate to another provider but as I live many miles from a BT exchange who do I migrate to. Bob.
whydoIneedatech
30-04-2008, 16:37
This is, of course, a possiblity - both friends are several miles away - so an ordinary 'outage' would have to be very local to me.
If it was the 'updating process' however, then they should have been affected.
HaroldT
If they are several miles away then it would be unlikely that any outage affecting you would affect them, and is probably nothing to do with the billing migration in progress at the moment.
Just as a quick update: my uncle is now back online as of yesterday. Not sure what NTL have done (they certainly didn't mention what we talked about BBKing) but within a few minutes he was connected again.
Thanks to all who replied.
charlieannear
06-05-2008, 13:01
Sorry to hijack but my problem seems similar, timing-wise.
My internet connection has been getting slower and slower since the start of last week. Sunday night it was taking ages even to download BBC News front page. During the day yesterday it managed to connect to my hotmail to do scheduled send/recieve to Windows Live Mail, but by last night it wouldn't even upload a simple webpage, even though everything indicated I was connected to the internet. I have a Vista sidebar gadget and it shows very slow internet connection. I have rebooted cable modem and router and laptop. Ready light is steady on modem, 'internet' light is on the router and laptop thinks it's connected to internet, but it's so, so, so slow (the circles on the IE7 tabs keep spinning but the webpages don't load).
OK, sorry, question is: Is this likely to be related to Virgin systems changes, the fact that iplayer has come to Virgin TV (connection reasonable in day but unworkable in evening) or something else!
I think I might have to ring Virgin- trouble is I'm not good with the phone and in addition I can't get to the phone until later in the evenings.
So if anyone could give me any pointers before I have to do that, that would be great.
:(
Maybe it will work fine this evening!
Thanks in advance!
C.
Florence
06-05-2008, 13:17
Might be that VM dont want customer using Iplayer on their internet it works perfect on ADSL but then the smaller ADSL suppliers are not trying to make the BBC pay towards the bandwidth like VM.
Just ot add it would never work well on my VM connection all that has changed is a BT line and ADSL.
charlieannear
06-05-2008, 13:32
I'm not trying to use iplayer, I was just wondering if everyone on my street is using it via their V box (my issue has been at it's worst since May 1st, when iplayer went live on V TV) meaning there's no room left in the pipe for me to get on the internet!
Yep, I know internet doesn't come down a pipe, it's just a figure of speech :)
Florence
06-05-2008, 14:03
That would need to be taken up with support but I would gather proof of your loss of speeds. You will have a long wait to get it rememdied I was getting 512k at peak times on cable the date for upgrade was months away I now have 6meg and seldom does it drop below 4meg at peak times..
Maybe it will work fine this evening!
If it's still staggering -- try changing your DNS settings from VM's default servers to OpenDNS ones -- these are normally set within your router's config setup.
You'll find plenty of information and guidance on their website (ww.opendns.com/).
(You may need to reboot your router for the new settings to take effect.)
If it doesn't improve your speed accessing webpages then it's easy enough to reset them back to whatever you've got now.
charlieannear
06-05-2008, 21:35
Well, here I am, logged in on my laptop at home, with all working as it should be.
I am pretty sure I got caught up in some larger scale Virgin shenanigans- wish they'd send out a warning of service outage, would save a lot of headaches...
Uptownbob
07-05-2008, 11:53
Sorry but I am no technophobe but the current VM broadband advertising blurb suggests that even when at peak flow, VM is a No Loss/reduction in quality of service because VM use fibre optic cable is this true or just tish? Considering migrating to another provider however my wife works at home and her company broadband provider is BT which, like VM is not good in fact it's just as awful.
diddy1234
07-05-2008, 16:32
well got no connection here.
Had a snotty letter sent out for a final demand for an account that I did not have.
phoned up and had this account deactivaed (Virgin Media's screw up), only to have lost my internet connection since last Thursday (1st may).
needless to say I have spend over £20 contacting accounts, customer support and Tech support and still do not have an internet connection.
The account's dept state that my account is fine yet the web page for my cable modem states that WAN is denied.
The modem is 4 months old so its not a modem problem.
Spoke yet again to customer (no help) support and they mentioned the last note on my account is for "8th May - missing hardware"
Thoroughly fed up with Virgin.
:-(
still waiting for it to be fixed.
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