Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

New customers of cable operator Virgin Media (Liberty Global) look set to face higher prices to be announced on Monday 24th November 2014.

Most Virgin Media customers will see their bills increase by 5.9% on average from February 2015.

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php...ne-prices.html

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Another inflation busting rise. Inflation is 1.3% at the moment, and earnings less than that. Surely turning red to purple can't cost that much ? Any 'free' change or 'upgrade' from VM is soon followed by a price rise, getting a bit predictable. If they'd managed to invest in their network and fix the congestion causing iPlayer issues, but they haven't and it doesn't work. Where's the money going? It isn't into the network, but going to shareholders. Cheeky doesn't begin to describe it.

(Line Saver rental is up 14 % ! Hardly worth doing any longer - time to take it out or renew if you can be bothered to stay with them)

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Line Rental at £16.99 a month is shocking.:td:

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

yeah it is sky's is only £16.40 what a rip off

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

It's interesting to see how the Big Four line up in annual line rental costs, assuming line rental saver is used:
1. VM £164.00
2. BT £169.90
3. TalkTalk £172.20
4. Sky £196.80 (line saver rental not available)
If you step outside the Big Four, the Post Office charges just £120 per year.

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

on the sky one just call after the install and you can get it at £9.99

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Sadly, only until January. See:

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/6...increases.html

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

BT raise their line rental price to £16.99, the rest pile in.

It's about the only way of hiding increased costs and loss of call revenue in a way that will be relatively unnoticed.

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I really can't wait until my BT contract is up so I can get shot of her land line and just have a cable modem.

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

l wish we could get rid of our landline Dilli but my ICD monitoring machine has to regularly send back info to the hospital so there is no chance of us getting rid of our landline.

re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Do we need our land lines anymore?

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Amended title to reflect correct dates.

Changes to be made

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Would it work through a Vonage box or other Voip adapter - looks like with Voipfone you can have a free 056 number and can pay as you go, using a SIP compatible adapter

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

My Line Rental Saver ends next week, paid £120 last year.

I haven't renewed this year as I'm thinking of dropping at least the landline, and maybe the TV too.
Just need to find a PVR and a good streaming box, that's the future.

We never use the landline, and £203 a year is far too much to waste on something we don't use anymore.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

it will never end going up and up getting very close to quitting with prise rises now

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

l might look into that as we will be paying £16.99 for a phone that we never use ourselves but obviously the machine uses it even though it does not cost much for the info to be sent to the hospital.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Give it 3 or 4 years and I can see the line rentals costing £20 a month before much longer people will be ditching line rental and just using mobiles

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

The future seems to be to get your mobile from your TV/broadband provider so there are some good savings to be made here.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Broadband prices will have to go up if line rental goes down.

Blame Sky / Talk Talk primarily for this effect.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I asked about dropping the landline and was told that if I did, I would pay more overall as it would change my package. :(

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I'd rather the price of my broadband be slapped on my bill as a charge for broadband than some arbitrary cross-subsidized other service that I do not want or use. If only for the psychological factor. I'd rather pay £45 for broadband than £30 for broadband and £15 for phone. Yet ironically if you take into consideration introductory discounts, two years of broadband and phone is still cheaper than broadband alone wherever you go.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Ditto; sadly Sky / TalkTalk changed people's expectations, especially TalkTalk, by bundling broadband free or near-free with other things.

price increase in feb 2015
 

Hi,just had notice of a £6.64p price increase from feb 2015.this amounts to an approximate 10% increase on my average £60 bill which is way above inflation.now i would not mind so much if i knew which new channels we may get ( why no universal hd yet?)so i could decide whether to accept this increase or cancel.but virgin seem to want our money upfront then they may or may not let us know what channels we may get.if it was not for a few people on this forum informing us of channel rumours we would all be in the dark if we had to rely on virgin.why virgin don't e- mail us to tell us of forthcoming new channel launches is beyond me.cheers john

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Did the notice break down what's going up in price?

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

No breakdown.just a blanket £6.64 increase.what a strange figure.will be interested in everybody else's figure.john

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

£4.45 for me

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

i dont know how they can justify these increases?? Far too high and nothing extra has arrived really. I dont know how i can keep justifying what we have to my mum unless something nice arrives pronto...

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Exactly as inflation is just over one per cent so there is no justification for another inflation busting rise.:(

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Ouch, time to shop around...

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Or time to cut the fat off those big all in package's and make it slimmer.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

It's confirmed Line Rental is increasing by £1 to £16.99pcm. Line Rental saver goes up £20 a year to £164. Big bundles also going up:

http://recombu.com/digital/news/virg...l-bundles-2015

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

50% off Sky TV for VM customers :)

http://www.sky.com/shop/offers/switch-to-sky/

For years i would never contemplate giving Murdoch any of my money, now though the expenditure is becoming a joke.

I was going to go Freeview but that's a very tempting offer with only a 12 month contract.
There's someone over on MSE who has only paid half price for 3 years running, he may have had to lose the TV for a week or two but sounds like a plan to me.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Even the Post Office are hikeing their prices after New Year. Line Rental up £2 to £15. Line Rental saver up £24 to £144.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Content is getting more expensive and customers are using more and more bandwidth.

Their costs to preserve your existing packages are higher than they were a year ago.

I called retentions today, for information on price increases.
I currently have a £11 discount which runs out in May.
I was told that new discounts are only £7 on bundles, and the most they can do is £10 but that has to be signed off my a manager.

Line Rental Saver is going up December 1st, so I have till then to decide what to drop or keep

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

December 1st for the Line Rental Saver 14% increase ? That's very sneaky, giving the punters no time to react.

I'd be interested to know exactly what increases people do get. Last time they only included line rental when quoting the 'average' headline rise in their press release, a lot of increases were a lot more for overall packages. So do the sums when you get your letter and see if it is more than 5.9%, then we can estimate the true average rise.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I have all three not TiVo just standard STB and Email said £3:99, friends Email said just £3:00 only difference is they have TiVo, so why the difference in price rise?

Actually the only other difference is they have Evenings and Weekends package.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Am I correct in thinking that you can cancel if in contract or during a loyalty discount due to the price rise?

I hate to jump to the darkside but current bill stands at £122 a month before the price rise. It's getting rather silly now.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Yes, price change is a valid reason to cancel with no cancellation fees.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

So like last year will they be coming out with new bundles shortly after the price rises that in effect drop your prices back to pre-price rise levels?

They rely on people not to notice they could be getting a better deal, but they also have to keep attracting new customers by having competitive prices. Still a pretty awful practice.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

£7.45 extra for me, wow! That is unbelievably ridiculous and no breakdown, £1, £2 ok, but £7.45 is unacceptable will now phone up once I confirm my contract renewal on the flat

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

£7.45 :shocked: is frankly taking the mick out of the customer and to not have a breakdown of it in 2014 is just not good enough.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

What percentage rise is that ? Bet its not 5.9%, I suspect they've done creative accountancy like last year. Posters on MSE are reporting rises of a lot more than 5.9%. http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....php?t=5117311

There wasn't a breakdown last year either, again to make it difficult for customers to work what exactly had risen or compare with each other.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

£7.39 more for us on: BB L (up to 20mb), TV XL Talk Unlimited & itemised paper billing.

Given the rate of inflation and the last increase, not all that long ago, this is outrageous. It really ought to be explained on an itemised basis.

I'll be complaining about this loudly.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Correct, I'm looking at around 7.5% increase and wasn't in any loyalty discount period either

Thanks for the link

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Not had an email or letter yet, but looks like my Big Kahuna bundle will be going up by £4.50 a month. Considering ditching TV and Phone and just keeping 152Mb BB for £39 a month. Then getting a Freeview PVR and Now TV. I can't remember the last time I watched a channel that isn't offered by either of them services.

I assume I can just cancel some services due to the increase even though I am still in contract. I know they would let me cancel everything due to the increase.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I bet nobody from VM can, or is willing to explain the logic behind some of these price rises which is probably why it's not explained on any of the letters.

There's going to be a call first thing Monday to instruct them to insert TV + phone line into nearest convenient orifice.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Does anyone know what the Vip package is going up by ?

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

That is tempting, so thanks for the heads up - I hadn't found that and I've been looking non-stop this weekend - but the fibre broadband is an 18 month contract, meaning you'd face a price hike for the tv but not be in a position to take a bundle deal elsewhere. Obviously that's to head off what might happen when BT start their Champion's League coverage.

I'm going to have a think about that because I'd probably be prepared to let the tv go after 12 months anyway, and Sky broadband is better priced than Virgin so it wouldn't be the end of the world to be tied in to them for a further 6 months on top.

Food for thought, cheers.

---------- Post added at 11:44 ---------- Previous post was at 11:38 ----------

Needless to say Virgin aren't picking up!

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Sky's a bit misleading with this comparison:
"All 7 Sky Sports channels in HD and access to BT Sport. Sky Tick [yes] VM Cross [no]" Yes, Sky Sports News is not in HD on VM yet but you can get BT Sport via VM.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

The sky chat fella has just quoted me £70.90 for 12 months and £111.40 after that for a similar package that I`m on now, which is the Vip package, which I`m paying £114 for with Virgin. The main difference being the broadband. I`m on 152 now and they can give me 40.
He said 12 month contract as well

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

It's 12months for the tv, but 18 for the broadband.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

I'm thinking the same as you Andy, the Sky offer is excellent. I can't get fibre BB with Sky but the ADSL is quoted at 10-15Mb which would probably suffice for the browsing and bit of streaming my wife and I do (although a bit reluctant to go back to ADSL). All in for the Family Pack, Sports, Movies, HD, Unlimited BB & Phone it'd be £53.65 with Sky for 12 months.

I'll stick it out with VM until May as I've paid for the Sky Sports season ticket until then but once that's expired, I'll seriously shop around. Maybe even look at keeping the BB & phone with VM and TV with Sky as that may even work out cheaper than I currently pay and still have fibre BB.

You'll have to let us know how you get on with retentions as last time I spoke to them, they said their loyalty discounts had all reduced since the launch of the Big Bundles due to them being quite heavily discounted already. Good luck :)

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

• Ofcom is likely to regard any increase3 to the recurring monthly subscription charge4 in a fixed-term contract as ‘materially detrimental’ to consumers;

• providers should therefore give consumers at least 30 days’ notice of any such price rise and allow them to exit their contract without penalty; and

• any changes to contract terms, pricing or otherwise, must be communicated clearly and transparently to consumers.
• http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/news/p...t-price-rises/

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Another one here who's increase is nothing like 5.9%, over 10% just like last time and no breakdown of increase <grrr>

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

New bundle prices on VM website - http://store.virginmedia.com/big-bundles.html

Looks like Big Kahuna sees a £5 (8.2%) rise with £4 on the bundle and £1 on the LR :omg:

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

It is a huge increase, considering other providers are offering the same or more for cheaper.
I suppose Liberty Cable have to pay for their purchase some how

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Well the phone price rise doesn't matter to me. I live on the first floor of a tenement flat in Glasgow and get little or no mobile signal. So I need to have a landline phone.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

So the question is how have they 'arrived' at this average 5.9% for their press release? Given that line rental, bundle prices and those with their own ad hoc packages are getting increases bigger than this.

I'd really like to see the workings out. Mind you I asked last year and they didn't get an answer. Perhaps they hope the punters don't know how to do percentages.......

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I believe it is the average of all the increases. Mine is well over 10%!

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Interesting, and a bit sad.

I haven't received any e-mail detailing any price rise as yet. I signed up just before the "Big Bundles" and signed up for 12 months at £41.99 including line rental (100mb, XL TV and basic phone). Would that price be protected until next May as promised or will the increase hit me too?

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I asked that question. No, they will give you a credit for £4.50 until then!!!:mad:

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Thanks for that, will keep an eye on the bills and get that credit sorted if they try to chuck the increase on.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Well I haven't heard of anybody getting an increase of less than 5.9%, only more. Given that the line rental itself has increased by 6.2%, it's difficult to know how they've fiddled it.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Maybe they used the same methods the people who do the crime figures employ...

Our services cost £62.54 so an extra £7.39 represents an 11.8% increase - double VM's 'average' figure. :mad:

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

it is the classic ploy used by rail firms all around the country, they raise the little used or not used at all products and packages by 0.1% say, this brings the average tumbling for all packages.

Time to look at what we actually watch and record (don't think we watch anything live anymore). Freeview and NowTV maybe the order of the ay, and as for the line rental, just pure greed, they should install IP phones instead of landlines these days.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Agreed, I think it's zero rises on things like phone calls, 1471, 1571 etc that enable the average to be so low.

I agree that the landline price rise is a rip-off. However, that cost doesn't disappear if you don't use your phone. It would be more appropriate to include it in the cost of broadband but no one's going to do that; in fact the trend at the moment from ADSL providers seems to be to whack up the cost of the landline to keep the headline broadband offers looking very cheap.
I get the impression that on this occasion, the price rises are really making people think. Previous comments on price rises have been along the lines it's only a few quid a month, I can afford it, look at all the new channels we have (forgetting to multiply that rise by 12 months or several years) but this time around I detect a more rebellious approach kicking in. Are people not swayed by the exclusive offering of ITV Be in HD? :D

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

l think more people will run away rather then watch that rubbish Andrew.:D

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

I don't understand your reluctance if you only do small amounts of internet browsing 10-15mb is more than enough , in fact its more than enough for Sky On Demand usage also.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

My parents had ADSL and the signal was pretty bad with the broadband and On demand constantly being affected with a poor signal MM so l can understand peoples reluctance.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

The difference being as you told us your parents were on a long line , the estimates given now have to fall within the range ie 10-15mb or your allowed to cancel without penalty.

My line on ADSL was around 8-10mb and fault free we only upgraded due to the fact more of us were using the internet at once , if my line was running at nearer 15mb I'd have never upgraded to fibre at least short term.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

I think it's worth checking with others in the area to see their experience. Presumably Sky, TalkTalk, PlusNet etc would let you upgrade to fibre if ADSL was unreliable.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Cheeky.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

This is how this will work

Price increase - *FREE SPEED UPGRADE*

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

I can understand his reluctance. ADSL is notoriously flaky. I think you got lucky with your line. I had an ADSL line that occasionally sync'd at the full 24Mbit as the exchange was right next to my house, yet we had no end of issues with it from constant drop outs every few weeks to needing to reboot the BeBox nearly daily. Buying our own decent ADSL router helped but the line itself was always dodgy, it'd be fine for weeks then suddenly you'd get a load of noise on it and your sync rate would plummet along with constant disconnections.

That would cue the rigmaorole of phoning the ISP, going through the usual BS diagnostics to prove that, yes, the microfilter was changed, yes, we used the original equipment provided, yes we changed the cabling, etc. until they'd reluctantly book an Openreach engineer and then you're faced with the threat of being charged if he decides there's no fault there (Which one tried to do and we had to fight). Then, they'd finally admit there was a problem and disconnect us immediately while we waited about a week for them to fix something in the exchange. Fun.

So yeah, **** ADSL.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

A bad experience scars you for life doesn't it , I had a similar experience with VM a few years back.

Regular outages both TV and BB , months and months of dire internet speeds , latency issues etc with constant fix dates what's always passed with no resolution so I suppose a stable 8-10 mb line on ADSL was a luxury for me , to balance it though my parents are only able to receive around 2mb via ADSL and have a cable connection what's excellent.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Most of us use more bandwidth than we used to. This bandwidth and the hardware serving it has to be paid for. The broadband market is very competitive at retail level so all operators stash price increases elsewhere if at all possible.

The obvious solution to this is to look elsewhere if unhappy.

---------- Post added at 12:11 ---------- Previous post was at 12:08 ----------

Bad experience and not typical. Stability is the one thing I found ADSL superior to cable for. Every time I've had cable I've had at least a few days a year of downtime. ADSL my downtime per year was measured as a matter of hours. At one time I cancelled 50Mb VM and moved to 15Mb ADSL as VM was flaky.

YMMV. xDSL is actually fundamentally a more stable technology than cable as it can adapt to line conditions and impairments. Both are hosed however if the access network is very bad.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I do agree that bad experiences can mar your feelings towards a technology and lord knows mine was horrific enough. I've had my fair share of VM issues as well, it's just a case of different experiences which I believe is ultimately why Superblade7 doesn't want to go near ADSL again (Then again he might have entirely different reasons).

I can't agree with this, though. I wouldn't say either technology is "Fundamentally" more stable than the other. Cable/DOCSIS adapts to line conditions in much the same way ADSL does, we just don't see a "Sync" rate that declines, instead we see things like QAM dropping to QPSK and the like. I would even argue that the shielded copper from a cable network is less prone to issues than unshielded copper (or the dreaded aluminium) DSL uses. Virgin seems to have a history of issues but I think that's less to do with the technology and more to do with the lack of investment and maintenance on the network itself.

One thing I will say, though, that very much works in Virgin's favour - it's a lot easier to get a fault tech out for a Virgin fault than it is for a BT fault.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

When was the last time your downstream channels dropped to 64QAM?

If you were to say have a huge burst of noise in the middle of an upstream channel that produced a negative SNR would it be able to adapt?

A single narrowband burst of noise will cause a loss of 50% of the capacity of an upstream channel. On xDSL this would be a far smaller effect as it uses DMT.

Your 'sync rate' declines it just isn't displayed. The added bonus is of course that impediments anywhere on the node can cause it to drop as, while you do have coax not twisted pair, you are also on a shared access segment with however many other hundred people.

Cable has its own set of issues. xDSL was built to run on unshielded twisted pairs in an unpleasant environment. Cable relies on being a closed network with constant maintenance to remove ingress.

Re: price increase in feb 2015
 

Having had excellent service from VM for many years with fibre, just seems a step backwards to go back to ADSL. Plus the BT line in our property has never been connected as we've had VM all the time we've lived there so don't know if the line quality is good or bad.

However, if I'd get 10Mb - 15Mb then I'd agree that I should have no issue with what we use it for. Especially with the cost savings.

Have to see what's on offer next year when the season ticket is up like I said.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

The technical differences between the two doesn't necessarily make one "better" or "worse". Yes, a single fault can affect more customers but likewise that means more customers can be serviced with a single fault tech. I get what you're saying, its resilience isn't quite at the level of ADSL's but even with my super dodgy ADSL line, I rarely seen the sync speeds drop substantially in the name of stability, rather it tended to just die and spend hours rebooting. Then when the fault was actually fixed, convincing it to ramp back up to its ideal sync rate was a nightmare as well.

Certainly, however both technologies spread many customers over shared infrastructure. I'm not really sure what you're trying to say about being on a shared segment, when both do this? Yeah your coax is shared with others whereas (I believe) your BT line goes into a cab by itself but as I mentioned earlier, the pro/con divide there means if there's a fault, it takes longer to get the BT line fixed than the Virgin Coax (or has been in my experience).

I think what I'm trying to understand is why you'd claim that ADSL's technology is better, if that was the case then why wouldn't Virgin just deploy ADSL instead of Cable?

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I was quoted 12 months at £41.99, not "7 months then we chuck the price up"

As it is an above RPI increase too that would mean I could tear up the contract if they didn't honour it. After that, well it's up for negotiation really.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

And they know that, and are just relying on most people not realizing...

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Indeed.

A contract only works if both sides abide by it after all.

Still, will wait to see what happens as I have received nothing as yet so may be moaning for no reason!

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

I said it was more stable, not that it's 'better'. That's an entirely subjective measure.

Virgin didn't deploy ADSL because they'd have had to deploy a similar network to the one BT have built with DSLAMs in cabinets which wasn't feasible. Virgin's telco network is multiplexed in the field so adding xDSL to the mix would require cabinet hardware.

It was, more than once, considered however it cannot match the access network capacity of a DOCSIS 3 cable network with the current technology available.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Phoned Virgin. They can increase my broadband speed to 152mb and leave me with xl everything plus Sky Sports in hd for £80pm rising to £90pm at some point during the contract. Let's face it, that's not a bad deal, but it's not as good as available elsewhere, and it's a lot more than I need, so I've cancelled. I felt a distinct lack of effort to keep me, which was instrumental in my decision.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

What are you paying ATM? Did you mention the Sky 50% offer for VM customers? I bet they wouldn't have matched it.

I can't wait to see what they come up with for me. I have to get a roof aerial fitted before i phone as i get bad reception on the living room TV.

Although i'm not sure they would be able to compete with free :)

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

If you keep phone and BB with them, and already have a Tivo, normally you will be able to keep the Tivo with M TV (effectively the Freeview channels), so you do get TV with a PVR FOC. In fact, last year when I wanted to cancel the TV service and just keep BB and phone, keeping Tivo with M TV made it cheaper!

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

They're possibly relying on the fact that you can't get 152Mbit elsewhere, you can't even get above 80Mbit elsewhere really and even then only if you're quite lucky.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Yes but 10mb is enough to do browsing/streaming which is all most punters do.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Yeah i get that but i want to ditch the LL as well, it galls me that i pay that much for something and get constant cold calls. Nobody phones me on it as they know i very rarely answer. If i'm sat right next to the phone i'll answer it and say hello, if no-one replys within a second i cut it off. Heck, even my aged parents call my mobile now.

I have some money left over from a bonus at work so i'm going to splash that on a BT/Humax box. I've seen posts where people say they have 30mb BB and basic TV for £25.

I'll see what they say but i'm pretty determined to cut the cord. Shame really as i've been a cable customer for 25 years.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Unless you're one of the lucky few who can get 330Mbit or 1000Mbit.

Then again with BT FTTPoD, far more people can get 330Mbit than VM's 152Mbit, just at higher install cost. Still, if it ended up £30 a month cheaper than VM it'd only take four years to make back the difference!

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Seems Sky have changed their attitude towards retention a bit too.

---------- Post added at 21:02 ---------- Previous post was at 21:00 ----------

The cheapest I've seen FTTPoD / FoD for is £175+VAT / month for a 500GB peak time transfer limit, and 500GB off-peak.

FoD is still not available to as many people as VM's 152Mb yet. It's far from ubiquitous in its coverage of FTTC areas. About 4.7 million premises passed at last announcement of coverage.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Currently £85, due to go up to £99 when half price Sky Sports deal ends, and then obviously the February price rises are due on top of that. I told them about the Sky deal, and I've also been flirting with TalkTalk and reducing my outgoings significantly, but they couldn't come close to matching it. I've read that sometimes customer service agents have quotas of special deals and sometimes it's worth a second or third call back, but I not really interested in chasing them.

---------- Post added at 21:06 ---------- Previous post was at 21:04 ----------

I think they're missing the point for an awful lot of average internet users.

---------- Post added at 21:07 ---------- Previous post was at 21:06 ----------

It's pretty much what I experienced when I left Sky for Virgin 4 years ago to be honest. This is the first year I haven't been impressed with Virgin retentions.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

This isn't free or cheaper. For TVM you have to have an active subscription, and to get TVM with a TiVo you pay an extra £10 for the facility. It doesn't offer all the freeview or freesat channels!

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Then why are we comparing the 152Mbit service to Sky/BT/etc. and not the 50mbit service?

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

The 152 product is what they offered to try and keep me, I'm currently on the 50 and even that is more than I need.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

Did they not even try to offer you a deal with the 50? I'm surprised they'd try to push you onto a higher tier rather than put the effort in to keeping you. Bit odd.

Re: Virgin Media to raise broadband and phone prices in Feb 2015
 

It was for me. I was surprised when they told me it would be cheaper to keep my existing Tivo with M TV, rather than dump TV altogether (I did say "and already have a Tivo" in my original post). I had checked the prices on the web before phoning them and the price I ended up paying was less than the web price for just BB and phone; It was the CS rep that suggested that I keep the Tivo with M TV in order to reduce the price

I know TV M doesn't have all the Freeview channels, but it's close enough for me. especially when you get (in my view) the best PVR around to go with it.