What a waste of money
 

Virgin charge me £1.50 to have a paper bill, then they go and send me a letter telling me about doubling my broadband. How much has it cost them to send these out?
And before you ask it was address to me, not a circular.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Yep I've had a similar letter. But no doubt it's a marketing thing, so a different budget to billing.

Re: What a waste of money
 

FFS

Re: What a waste of money
 

One gets them new money hence it's free, the other is just a demand for monies owing hence they charge.. Usual business practice..

Re: What a waste of money
 

It's totally out of order to charge £1.50 for a bill imo. It can't be costing them more than 50p, probably a lot less. If they want to push people to online billing why can't they offer to reduce their bill by £1 instead of just not charging them. Being charged to receive your charge isn't on. Seems like they're just taking easy money from people they know haven't got a choice, is this SKY or VM?

Re: What a waste of money
 

Most utility companies and banks do this nowadays mainly to get you onto online billing or banking.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Yeah but it just doesn't seem fair, if it's so important to get customers to use online billing why don't they just pass on their savings to the customer or offer incentives rather than charging at least 300% of what is costs them? It seems opportunistic knowing that some people won't have the choice.

Re: What a waste of money
 

You do realise that processing paper bills does cost money and probably close to the amount they charge as you have to consider the overheads incurred plus the cost of the postage.

If you accept paperless billing it saves you money so great incentive to go paperless.

Re: What a waste of money
 

BT have just raised the cost of 'paperless billing' by removing the discount so in that respect it isn't a saving anymore and i strongly suspect that Sky and VM will follow suit shortly .

Re: What a waste of money
 

Virgin Media removed the discount a long while back and the was a massive
thread all about it.

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/34...ng-way-vm.html

Re: What a waste of money
 

Life isn't fair. It's just fairer than death, that's all. (William Goldman) :dozey:

Re: What a waste of money
 

no incentive there then ,they are charging for e billing and charging extra on top for paper bills.Basically it was a back door price rise

Re: What a waste of money
 

Think of all the trees they've saved for someone else to use for paper.

Re: What a waste of money
 

The vast majority of companies all do exactly the same nowadays.

Re: What a waste of money
 

The vast majority of companies are finding things hard and get the customer to contribute to as much of their profits as possible.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Oh i know that ,just saying it's a back door price rise ,they are charging an extra £1-1.50 for e billing

Re: What a waste of money
 

They offer paper billing as a cost cutting incentive to the customer such as free online or a £1 per month for paper bills.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Death hits everyone. As such, it is fair, just not nice.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Costs me £4.50 for a crappy 50p cheeseburger at 3am on a Saturday night, sure costs more than it cost them but if punters are willing to pay...

Re: What a waste of money
 

Technically it's 3am on a Sunday morning. just incase Hugh spots it.

Re: What a waste of money
 

I've had cheeseburgers on several different nights... :P

Re: What a waste of money
 

You can opt out of marketing communications from Virgin Media if you prefer.

Re: What a waste of money
 

You obviously have internet so what's your issue with online billing? The bills are no different & you have the option to print a hard copy.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Exactly, the is no real issue just a moan.

Re: What a waste of money
 

I guess its the fact that simply something we used to get for free is now being charged for.

Re: What a waste of money
 

Sky send me a two sided glossy leaflet with my Sunday newspaper every week. That's a waste...
;)

Re: What a waste of money
 

If you notice it is not about being charged for the paper bill, it's about sending me a letter about something they could have emailed me about. It's not as if I could have missed this with the TV ad and every time you log in to VM's web site it's plastered every where. And the postage for that size of letter. I know to send a letter that size is 58p second class. I know they would not pay that amount, but paying out for thousands of letters isn't cheap.

Re: What a waste of money
 

You are aware that your paper bill will be rising to £1.75 as well , I know this as I was informed by post yesterday that my overall bill was rising by 30p.

As for your comment about them informing you via email, how can they be certain that the email address on your account is correct but they do know that your address is correct hence you will receive notification by post.

Re: What a waste of money
 

I went over to online billing when they first started to use it, but they were both confusing and not always correct, plus the fact they got quite shirty when I complained about it.

The end result I told them I wanted a paper bill and have used that ever since.

At least when you get that bill in the post each month you do read and check it, where as online you have to physically make the effort go there log on, read it and possibly print it off so that it is available in front of you when you phone them.

Re: What a waste of money
 

But it does save you £1.75 a month which is £21 per year quite a saving for a few seconds on your keyboard.:)

Re: What a waste of money
 

Given my weight, walking to the door, bending over, picking up the letter, and standing back up takes far more energy and physical effort than clicking my mouse a few times, especially given I spend most of my time at a computer and very little of it at the door.