Re: Price rises this year.
 

Phoned retentions yesterday, 20 mins on hold, got through to UK call centre. I'm on Volt and contract ends in June. Got £21.50 bill credit for the next 3 months and was advised to call again in May to see what they could offer.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

What time of day did you call?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

What time do retentions close on weekends? I've just tried and they're shut

Re: Price rises this year.
 

3.15 pm

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Anyone know what the purpose of introduing these barcoded stamps is?

Perhaps it's an anti fraud/counterfeiting measure or they want to track where stamps are purchased or where they're used to send letters for future changes??

Re: Price rises this year.
 

No idea but I know when I use some old stamps I have, the letters now never get delivered. These stamps I purchased at much cheaper prices a few years back and they seemingly are refusing them now.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Re: Price rises this year.
 

The switch to barcoded stamps has been delayed to July, so that isn't the cause.
https://www.royalmail.com/sending/barcoded-stamps

Even if you don't put enough stamps on a letter, it still gets delivered but the recipient has to pay a surcharge.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I changed quite few old style stamps, mainly 1st class (ordinary and large) and some quite old, they were all replaced like for like in under a week at no charge.

I still have a few 2nd class Christmas stamps but not enough to cover my needs so I am planning to buy a load before the price goes up which will save enough money to satisfy my efforts to keep as much in my bank account as possible over the coming months. I'll put a Christmas sticker on the backs of the envelopes of my Christmas letters/cards to keep then looking a tad festive.

Worth sending in any stamps that are due to be relaced by the barcode versions as they will return any that aren't accepted. I don'r think there were any restrictions when I changed mine in early Februrary but at least you will have tried and not just thrown your money away.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Guess the title is open to this discussion, however as it's virgin media news , guess it's a bit of a stretch :p:

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I think Richard’s post was probably intended for this thread:
https://www.cableforum.uk/board/show...710461&page=50

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I will do this with the ones I have left, thanks.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

It was, yes :)

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Had an email the other day, £7 a month increase to £40 a month (pay £33 at the moment) for 350meg bb & phone, a nice 21% increase......

We have an altnet building around here at the moment, so come September when my contract is up its time to say goodbye to VM

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Well we got our letter.

Our contract offer ends in September the full price of £69 would rise to £116 but now it'll go up an extra £21.50 so £137.50 seems a bit steep. Finally FTTP + streaming sports separately looks more attractive.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Purely out of curiosity, I went on VM to see what upgrade they’d offer me online.

I could have Volt M500 for £91/mth, rising to £210 after 18mths, or an extra £6 for Gig1.

Over two hundred quid a month? Does anyone actually pay that?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I bet there are peolpe who pay that for just mobiles never mind TV and Broadband.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Ring up and do a deal.ATM they seem willing to give you a discount of the same amounty as the price rise without a new contract. You just have to talk to someone, stick to your guns and then cancel at contract end if the AltNet deal is better.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I got my price rise letter this morning so I've called to cancel all services. I was on the phone for half an hour, explained that I can't afford the price rise or accept the new T&Cs (which mean ongoing inflation-busting annual rises). I was put on hold only for the operator at the other end to return and say that "our systems are down so we can't process your request". She asks if she can call me back later. It sounds to me like I'm going to be passed to a different team. If I don't get a call back (and I'm not holding my breath) I'll phone again tomorrow.

Has anyone else had this "systems down" excuse for not processing a clear cancellation request?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

You can terminate by letter.

Send your, recorded delivery, termination letter to Virgin Media Sunderland SR43 4AA, make sure you provide your Account No, Name, Address and a list of all the service you wish to cancel.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

The industry is in cartel mode with BT, VM and TT in union on the inflation busting rises, but hopefully Ofcom will see that as market failure and step in, it is going to be reviewed soon.

Not VM related, but I am moving my EE mobile service to 1 pence mobile because of the greed.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Thanks, but ideally I want VM to confirm my cancellation date and equipment collection arrangement before signing up with another provider

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Think i will move to vodafone for home phone & BB ( 145meg / min phone ) 27.00 per month . been with virginmedia for 16 years but what they are doing is impossible for most customers !

Re: Price rises this year.
 

That's exactly what I did when Virgin Mobile tried to charge me £7 a extra per month two years ago.

Their own attempted greed led to them making nothing from me .

Haven't looked back since moving to 1p mobile. Their customer service is good too, unlike that dreadful offshore place that Virgin Mobile used. They were ignorant on every level.

---------- Post added at 21:37 ---------- Previous post was at 21:29 ----------

Could be a stalling tactic to make you stay for longer or in the hope that you can't be botheted/forget to try again.

I would argue that your 30 days notice should start from the date of this call.

You can be sure that there won't be any 'system problems' when it comes to processing these price increases.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Virgin now offering me £10 a month price drop for 6 months then price freeze for 18 months.
Will call VM again tomorrow. I’m sure they’ll improve their offer but the change to T&Cs really angers me and I’m thinking they don’t deserve my custom now. “Never reward bad supplier behaviour” was my motto in business.
25 years a NTL/VM customer - I’ve never been a Sky customer but I am impressed by a friend’s Glass (after refusing Virgin’s ugly Horizon/360 “upgrade”), so is it time to Believe In Better?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

It does sound like cobblers. The support forum is full of folks finding it impossible to cancel. The goto advice seems to be to write a letter to Sunderland (recorded delivery), but why the heck should you have to do that in the 21st century? (no guarantee that works either). A click of a button is all it takes to upgrade services, why not a click to downgrade/cancel?

The regulator needs to take VM to the cleaners. The company is the pits customer service wise.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

The termination letter maybe a little old fashioned but it does leave the person canceling the service with some control, if the cancelation is over the phone it may not be actioned and the phone call recording the termination may not be available at a later date!!!!!!

The letter does provide proof that that the service has been canceled, the termination period kicks in from the day that VM receives the letter, see VM T&Cs, hence the recorded delivery.

I do agree that the customer shouldnt have to resort to a formal cancelation letter but its probably the best way if you want to cancel with as little fuss as possible.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I was talking to Retentions yesterday. They called me back today (!) and offered me a discount on my current cost until the end of my contract (June 2023). I accepted and got an email from them a few hours later confirming my new price until the end of my contract. Can’t complain about them today.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I excepted an offer from retentions today, a £21.50 discount (price rise amount) until July when my contract runs out. April and May's bills will be around £54 then back up to £76.

I'm still on a Sky Stream trail for another week or so, I'm pretty impressed with it and the picture quality is brilliant, especially on the SD channels (MTV 80's etc) I will see what July brings.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I think two chances when i phone them and they saying the system is down on the second attempt of phoning them & no joy then i will cancel my dd as i am out of contract in July i will tell them this & see what happens they cannot hold customers to ransom last resort is to consult citizens advise get them to help .

Re: Price rises this year.
 

My new YouFibre 150mbs Broadband is being installed early next month at £21.99 a month for 2years, with no “in contract prices rises” guaranteed I consider it a very good deal.

I have still not had any notification from Virgin!!!

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Yea this one seems easy to dodge. Rang up today and got the £21.50 increase nullified til end of contract. Keeping the ultimate volt for £44 bargain.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I negotiated yesterday. I told them what to do with their £19 price increase. Then we agreed

Your new monthly bundle cost is: £28.00

What am I getting?

Still £3 more than Toob

Re: Price rises this year.
 

VM pricing is a joke, I'm paying £35/month for just 250 Broadband.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Still waiting to be contacted about this price rise

Re: Price rises this year.
 

It is ridiculous. It is like some in some countries you go the Bazaar and they tell you a carpet costs £2000, and you leave the shop paying just 10 quid for the carpet... I do not want to do that with broadband, gas and electricity etc.

I pay 6p per unit for gas and the rest of the country (with government support) 10p. Why?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Either you are on a fixed rate at the moment or your gas is supplied by a company other the Northern/Southern gas which may be charged at a different price.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

No, I am on an Octopus tracker. The price fluctuates between 5.6p-6.6p. My question was rhetoric: there should be one price.

I am also on Agile Octopus lecky: at 10pm tonite the price will be 8p per unit, washing machine, dishwasher dryer etc will all go on at 10pm. Compare this with 34p at 4-7pm.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Tracker tariffs buy on the daily markets, the normal SVR I think is purchased on year ahead prices so different costs.

Also ofgem cap is time lagged and has stuff built in to allow recoveries of previous losses which bumps up the SVR further.

I am also on gas tracker and its amazing as you said. I think back in November was down to 3p unit with SVR at 10p unit.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Back to the subject!

VM are still calling me, but I miss the calls. They must be desperate.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Government claiming inflation be 2.9% by end of year, not sure what planet they on honestly.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

From of all newspapers the Guardian.
Investment bank Citi said the CPI was likely to fall to 2.3% in November, below the Bank of England’s estimate of a 4% inflation rate the fourth quarter of the year. Fund manager Investec said it could slide to 1.6% by December.

Inflation has remained in double digits since last July – barring a brief drop to 9.9% in August – triggering a wave of pay demands to compensate workers for the loss of spending power.

Most of the increase was due to rising energy and food prices, which Citi’s chief UK economist, Benjamin Nabarro, said were now falling at a faster rate than had been expected at the beginning of the year.

Interest rate rises by the Bank of England are also expected to have a dampening effect on consumer spending, further reducing the pressure on prices.

A slide in inflation to 2% would allow the prime minister to more than fulfil his pledge to halve inflation by the end of the year and make it easier to resolve a wave of public sector strikes over pay.

“The faster reduction in inflation [this year] primarily reflects an easing in pricing pressures, particularly in energy,” Nabarro said, adding that inflation could be as low as 5% by July.

Philip Shaw, chief UK economist at Investec, has forecast a fall in inflation to 1.6% by the fourth quarter, driven by falling energy prices and a squeeze from higher lending rates for 1.5m households that must remortgage this year

Re: Price rises this year.
 

So thats their basis, the problem is much of the inflation is on essential goods. Just cant see it unless they manipulate the inflation basket to achieve it.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Earth ?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

But an alternative reality 😂

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Let’s not forget that the inflation has occurred. Low inflation in the future just means the prices stay at the same high level and don’t get higher. With energy prices set to go down, it’s not hard to see that inflation will easily go down to low levels.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Exactly. Isn't it also because the high price rises that have already taken place will start to work their way out of the figures too?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Well I could explain my rationale a bit more.

The £400 rebate is been removed. This is far more than the the drop expected in July.

Housing mortgage/rent costs as well as debt costs will continue to rise rapidly this year. (I think government doesnt recognise this though)

There is no signs of supermarket price increases slowing down.

A site some of you might find interesting is trueflation, its formula is devised to more realistic with daily expenses rather than the somewhat artificially tweaked CPI.

https://truflation.com/ (remember to select UK, it defaults to USA)

However the government may be accounting for its newly announced childcare costs subsidy in the budget which would impact inflation. That got announced after I made the previous post.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Got my letter yesterday and I must be one of the May people as it stated that from May mine was going up by £7. I did ring them up and they`ve reduced my package price by £7 until the end of my contract, which is March 2024. So, no new contract and paying the same as I am now until next March.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Got my letter this morning I shall be posting off my "price rise" termination letter once my new provider has installed and everything is up and working, just 2 weeks to go now.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I had my letter last week saying my price would increase by £15 from 1st of May. I've ordered my new broadband and will be installed on Thursday. After the install i'll call up Virgin to cancel my contract and i'll port my landline number to a VOIP provider

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Ask them to confirm the cancellation by email, I know a couple of people who cancelled, by phone, and it was never actioned, it leaves the person cancelling in a difficult position, hence my written cancellation.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I never thought of that, i'll do that. Thank you

If i were to send in a written letter to cancel my contract do you know how long it would take for me to get a confirmation of cancellation request from Virgin?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Well now the dust has settled on the VM price rise is the customers going to just pay up or get a deal or cancel their account for me i will phone them to cancel see what they say i will tell them if any delaying tactics then i will cancel my dd .

Re: Price rises this year.
 

The benefit of the written termination is you send it recorded "signed for" delivery if there is any dispute about your cancellation you have proof that it was sent and the date Virgin signed for it. The written notice removes the burden of proof, from you, to prove that you did cancel the service. In my letter I have included my email address and have requested confirmation of my cancellation!!!!! Dont forget to include your account number etc.

Written termination does take a little more time but I would rather invest that time to avoid a dispute and issue later, I find it odd that if you ever have a dispute the recording of your original conversation is missing, which leaves you with a problem.

Send the letter to
Virgin Media
Sunderland
SR43 4AA

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Oddly, my folks haven't had a price rise notification and their most recent bill covers the period into the first week in May. No sign of an increase.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I have yet to get any sort of notification, my contract expires in August.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Interesting more and more are reporting been notified by letter now, did VM abandon sending the emails? For reference I got my letter over a week ago, maybe even 2 weeks forgot the date, and still no email.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

They'll only accept letter back too if you're cheeky enough to cancel.
It has to written with a quill on parchment, and personally delivered to a goblin under a bridge in Sunderland but he's not always there and may ignore you... (beware the backstabbing midget if you are foolhardy enough to take this arduous journey...)

Re: Price rises this year.
 

My letter arrived today, £15 extra a month and no right to cancel from next April.

Even at that price, BT or Sky can't beat them around here.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Tried again on chat to discuss increase. This time they decreased by existing contract by £12 a month, so when the price rise gets applied (£15) my increase will effectively be only £3. Shows it's worth persevering.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I received my letter a week or so ago, warning of a price increase on my package of £21.50 per month. I'm currently paying £85 discounted from £135. The letter does state that "the price increase won't affect you until your current price offer ends". In my case that's 14/6/2023.

I called them last week, the guy did some notional calculations and recommended that I call back after 14th May to seek a new contract - he did suggest that there should/would be better offers available then.

I've probably been with Virgin for 20+ years now, 11 at my current address. I've always found them fair and reasonably priced so I'm happy to wait for a couple of months. The main gripe has been the difficulties in dealing with customer services over the phone, but even that seems better now than it was a few years ago ?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

You're in exactly the same position as me with your contract. I too was advised to call back in May - I will, but only to cancel. The price escalator in the new Virgin Terms & Conditions is completely unacceptable and will mean a further 20+% increase next April and every subsequent year.

---------- Post added at 16:13 ---------- Previous post was at 16:10 ----------

https://www.theguardian.com/business...g-unaffordable

The Mail campaign appears to have stalled but The Guardian's picking up the gauntlet of investigating the telco's mid-contract price hikes

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Would have thought it is pointless to worry about this as it is now part of the contract, and therefore nothing can be done. Would be great if it was deemed to be illegal, cant see it though :dozey:

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Still no notification for me. My contract was renewed in December, maybe they're only giving increases to contract of a certain age? It would be pretty hard to argue their costs increased 20% in 3 months.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Does your contract detail an annual increase every April?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I think if you are staying with VM then to keep cost down only have a package you most need . i most likely stay with VM their products are good for the most part i have M250 but never get that speed most i get is around 90 / 100 meg i have the tv going to cancel that i can get all i need from freesat / now tv & home phone evenings / weekends only so re-cap think my new package is M50 & home phone only will do ?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

My landing page to this forum is https://www.nthellworld.uk/home.php

Guess what story a link points to?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I would imagine that your safe as youre not even "mid term".

Re: Price rises this year.
 

4.5% was indeed 'whopping' back then, but what does that make this year's 13.8%?!

Re: Price rises this year.
 

If only it was 13.8%! I suspect that “average” is calculated including the very lowest basic charges and new customers who are exempt. Most rises seem to be 20% or higher. Mine is 25%

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I was just comparing the headline rates but the average will be based on list prices, not our monthly payments. It sucks, but that's VM's business model for you - artificially inflated prices offset by heavy discounting.

My increase is 23% in terms of monthly payment, though my letter said the rise wouldnt apply until the end of my the promotional period (first time I've had a fixed price contract, rather than fixed discount). My current deal ends in August so I'm going to wait until then before deciding what to do next as VM is seemingly not only the most expensive in terms of list prices, it will also have the highest price increases of all from next year. Caveat emptor.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

That seems to be the case but I still expect you would get contacted as for those of us exempt we are still been notified of contract changes to affect us for next year.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I got the email a couple of weeks ago. Called them recently and the would only offer me £57 for 350mb BB+phone or £51 for 350mb BB+TV+phone. I called again the next day and got 350mb BB+phone+tv with two personal picks for £53. I'm only losing BT sport from the channels we watch and have cut the price in more than half of what they were wanting to charge for our previous package.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

What price rise ! Was paying prior to rise around £68* now paying £48 no change to package . * So + around £15 extra ? Would be around £83 I guess , what idiot came up with this plan.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Decided to call retentions today (a whole day before the price change - eek!) - and to my utter astonishment, the chap immediately said he'd wave all price rises without me even threatening to leave. Probably could have haggled, but who has the time?

£38 for 'Maxit', 500meg BB and not forgetting the all-important landline!
I'm happy enough with that.

I mentioned that I didn't want the 'volt' SIM anymore and to my surprise, they said it was only dealt with via O2 and they can't change their packages. Another clal to make...

Still grates with me that they offer 50% off the price rise, just by calling their automated payment line...

Tom

Re: Price rises this year.
 

These inconsistent pricing plans will be their undoing, people talk and share now. You're paying £3 a month more than me with only 250 BB

VM won't see me for dust this time next year when the competition BB is in place.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I agree.

I think people are smart enough to realise that being offered a large discount from a high list price is not necessarily a good measure of value.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Biggest price rise in history, then 2 major outages in a day. Good to see something's never change

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Still no notification of a price rise

Re: Price rises this year.
 

North Cardiff went down for a third time today ,out at 5.55pm back when I tried again at 6.45pm:erm:

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Left Virgin on Saturday for Sky, best thing I've done in a long time.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Hopefully my last day with Virgin tomorrow, my FTTP is being installed 😊

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I can't move yet as there's no suitable alternative yet. Contract is up in August and therefore price rise will kick in. BRSK are still cabling up the roads so I am hoping this will be done by then.

I did phone up to cancel my 'free' 02 unlimited sim (£25 a month) on Monday due to ridiculous price rise. Told them I was moving to Smarty (which I was - £10 for 60Gb) and they immediately offered me £10 for 70Gb. Ended up sticking with 02 to save the hassle

It will be interesting to see what VM do in August bearing in mind BRSK will be/are offering FTTP for £16.50 a month (12 months / 500Mbs then £33) I'm on ultimate ooomph or whatever it is now and same on Sky (without BB) I would have to lose the movies to get to the same price as I pay on Virgin.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Can someone clarify this on the VM website on the Early Disconnection Fee

"If your current contract with us started prior to 2 April 2023, we currently cap the amount of the Early Disconnection Fee so that you will pay no more than £288 (includes VAT). If you are a new or recontracting customer on or after 2 April 2023, this cap does not apply."

Is this cap only if you have a few months of services remaining or not?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

The cap is the maximum you will pay regardless of how long is left on a contract. That's why its called a cap.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I guess it means you could have any number of months left on your contract and leave for a max of £288 but it is also saying any new contracts no longer have this so they will screw you for the lot.

Anyone contracting after that date needs to factor in up to 2 April price rises with no early exit option. My contract ends end of Jan for me to stay they need to offer me a deal around £20 or I am offsky. If FTTP is available at the time I am offsky anyway

Re: Price rises this year.
 

So I could end my contract which includes Sky Sports HD, M350 Fibre Broadband and Phone Weekend chatter which started early this year for £288?

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Yes, but it begs the question "Why do you want to leave after only a few months?".

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Duct blocked about a meter from the manhole so that has to be cleared before install :grind:

These things happen

Re: Price rises this year.
 

I now have alternative fibre suppliers in my area who offer faster speeds at a fraction of Virgin's price and no mid contract hikes

Re: Price rises this year.
 

A small fraction or a large fraction? ;)

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Things have changed…they’re worse. I never thought I’d consider Sky more reliable and better value than VM but that’s where I am today. After yesterday’s double outage (and the silence from VM as to the cause and how they will ensure it isn’t repeated) I’m counting the days until I can give notice and jump after 27 years as a cable customer. 39 to go…

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Wishful thinking perhaps , if enough people jump ship , virgin might start to offer better deals to existing customers .

Re: Price rises this year.
 

They'll need to do something sooner or later, competiton is catching up fast, they no longer have cable monopoly in many places and that number will only go up.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

In terms of TV, Sky Stream, NOW and even TalkTalk now have better offers. I’d be interested to see the churn figures for VM post-price hike

Re: Price rises this year.
 

They've just made another massive negative change. The cap on cancellation charges has been removed for anyone recontracting after 2nd April. If I hadn't recontracted, I certainly wouldn't do now under those terms, could cost >£1000 to cancel, where currently its a max of £288.

Re: Price rises this year.
 

VM appear to be doing everything in their power to discourage potential and existing customers, a strange business model!!!

Re: Price rises this year.
 

Contacted virgin the other day regarding the price rise letter. I ignored the automatic offer of a discount for 6 months which came up on the call.

On ultimate volt so have an unlimited O2 SIM as well as sport and movies and contract ends in April next year, spoke to a very helpful person who has given me a £21.50 discount till the end of my contract meaning I'm paying £61.49 for gig 1 broadband, landline which isn't used ever, movies and sport with viaplay as an add on for the rugby. Good deal in my opinion