More Waste Of Money

[Doug P]

It's always been like that. Payments are a separate area....

[kwikbreaks]

Originally Posted by Top banana

that's why all of them do it.

strangely enough the only ISP mailshots I get are from VM.

[howardmicks]

Originally Posted by jb66

I agree, im staff and I got one. Pointless

That's as made me laugh bud

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

You and I obviously have a different understanding of the word "work".

They clearly do have their intended effect. If they didn't, businesses would not use them.

[alanbjames]

They r still sending mail to my parents address in my name even though i have not lived there for over 7 years. I have asked twice to be removed from the mailing list and twice they promised i would and still they keep sending.

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by richard s

I got a Tax rebate from Inland Revenue... The cheque came in one envelope and the explanation for the rebate came in another envelope at the same time and day!!! waste of tax payers money me thinks.

I had the same this week for a tax rebate on my company car

---------- Post added at 06:29 ---------- Previous post was at 06:06 ----------

Originally Posted by alanbjames

They r still sending mail to my parents address in my name even though i have not lived there for over 7 years. I have asked twice to be removed from the mailing list and twice they promised i would and still they keep sending.

I get something similar from Sky.

I asked them not to send me mail as it was getting out of order the amount they send. I then had to tell them a further 4 times and in the end had to raise a formal complaint with them.

Guess what the ***** did, they stopped sending mail to my house with my name on it and instead now send it addressed to the occupier instead. So what I do is wait till there is enough of it to weigh a lot and that means it will cost a lot in postage. I package the whole lot up, pop it in the post box and send it to there office in Braham Street London addressed as PAY AT DESTINATION.

[Gary L]

Originally Posted by Stuart

They clearly do have their intended effect. If they didn't, businesses would not use them.

I don't believe that to be the case with Virgin.
I think they are just desperate. they send people knocking on your door way too often. and they send these letter bombs indiscriminately.

obviously someone will join up. but the majority would probably already have them, or if they wanted them they would be with them by now anyway. so the door knocker would be told yet again "not interested!"

and the mail would go in the bin.

on occasion when I do read their letter bombs. it's always a reduced price to get you to sign up. and goes back up to normal later.

why don't they try another approach of 'no catches' and up front prices for a change?

it's got to be worth a try.

---------- Post added at 10:52 ---------- Previous post was at 10:48 ----------

Originally Posted by Sirius

I get something similar from Sky.

I asked them not to send me mail as it was getting out of order the amount they send. I then had to tell them a further 4 times and in the end had to raise a formal complaint with them.

Guess what the ***** did, they stopped sending mail to my house with my name on it and instead now send it addressed to the occupier instead. So what I do is wait till there is enough of it to weigh a lot and that means it will cost a lot in postage. I package the whole lot up, pop it in the post box and send it to there office in Braham Street London addressed as PAY AT DESTINATION.

I do that with Virgin.
but I put all my junk mail in the package. even the pizza ones.

[BexTech]

Originally Posted by Stephen

Its not being wasted though. Mailshots do work.

They do work yes, but only have a 1% rate.

They annoy me to hell, especially when I'm already with them for everything.

They need to stop sending the junk out to people who are already customers.

I've had them addressed to me.

Also once or twice a week we get various un-addressed VM junk mail.

---------- Post added at 13:46 ---------- Previous post was at 13:43 ----------

Originally Posted by anduin

To be fair it is quite simple, considering vm know the addresses and postcodes of their customers already, and the postcodes of their target punters... They only have to run a simple loop through all postcodes they can supply, and remove the house numbers of known customers in that postcode.

Simple database queries 101

It really is not rocket science.

There's still a lot of addresses around here they can supply, yet their database still says non-cable area, so people can't order online, they have to call up and then get the nonsense of computer says no. You have to tell them well this neighbour the service, that neighbour etc, just send out a spotter. Spotter comes out and as soon as the walk in to talk to you they say, there's no reason why you can't have the service, just the ropey database they have.

[Stephen]

I constantly get mailshots from Sky/Talk Talk and BT. I just bin them, not really too much to get annoyed about. Just a waste of paper.

[solitaire]

If you are no longer with these companies, write to them quoting the Data Protection Act and ask them to remove all your personal details from their written and computer records. They are obliged to act on your request. I've done this with several companies, works every time.

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by solitaire

If you are no longer with these companies, write to them quoting the Data Protection Act and ask them to remove all your personal details from their written and computer records. They are obliged to act on your request. I've done this with several companies, works every time.

But they can still mailshot the house and address it to the occupier

[alanbjames]

The only other ISP i know for doing this kind of thing used to be AOL UK. They were well known for sending out millions upon millions of free trial cds a month to random people.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by richard s

I got a Tax rebate from Inland Revenue... The cheque came in one envelope and the explanation for the rebate came in another envelope at the same time and day!!! waste of tax payers money me thinks.

Not really. For security, the cheques are probably all printed in one place, but it may not be practical to print the letters in the same place.

---------- Post added at 21:12 ---------- Previous post was at 21:08 ----------

Originally Posted by BexTech

They do work yes, but only have a 1% rate.

Send out enough letters and even if only 1% of customers upgrade their packages, or open accounts, then the Mailshot has probably already paid for itself. After all if you are sending out 10s of thousands of letters, you are probably paying less than a normal customer would for each one..

Originally Posted by dilligaf1701

that's ok they keep sending me letters offering me (by name) cable even though the whole village can't get it.

I live in a cable area, but I live in a new (Big Estate) which is surrounded by cable.
But virgin media wont pay to fit the cables on the estate! I get 3 mbps and a person 2/1 minutes down the road and can get 120 mbps (Btw 3mbps is the max I can get!) hate virgin at the moment as they keep sending be broadband letters :@

[qasdfdsaq]

Originally Posted by Stuart

They clearly do have their intended effect. If they didn't, businesses would not use them.

You and I obviously have a different understanding of the word "their intended effect".

The effect they are having according to this thread seems to be ****ing off existing customers and other people who cannot even get cable service.

To be honest though the same could be said of any spam email or even phishing scams. They "work", seemingly according to your definition. Doesn't make them particularly popular or acceptable either.