Loyalty Doesn't Count

[Paulch]

Virgin Media does not like old customers, a £37 a month package jumps to £60 a month.

Virgin rely on the fact it is too much hassle for you to remove the boxes and setup you have.

Why do they dislike loyalty ? I don't understand the management at Virgin ?

[Taf]

Loyalty bonuses vanished years ago AFAIC. From everything I could name that takes my money.

[spiderplant]

Originally Posted by Paulch

Virgin Media does not like old customers, a £37 a month package jumps to £60 a month.

I'd say that means they like them a lot.

Originally Posted by Taf

Loyalty bonuses vanished years ago AFAIC. From everything I could name that takes my money.

Some businesses do actually reward loyalty. For example airlines, hotels, and banks and supermarkets to some extent. But in the communications market, it's all about attracting new customers from competitors.

[richard s]

Keeping your loyal customers happy is a good business practice... word of mouth goes a long way e.g. excellent service or don't touch them.

[jb66]

Making money goes a longer way

[Paulch]

Virgin is owned by Liberty Global an American company.
If you look at a BASIC

---------- Post added at 16:56 ---------- Previous post was at 16:48 ----------

VIRGIN MEDIA is owned by Liberty Global an American company. It seems that Liberty Global think that they can gouge the British market with their prices.

200 HD channels
10,000 on demand choices
60 meg broadband
UNLIMITED local and long distance phone calls

all of this for LOW LOW price of $49 this is = to £37.31

So now the VIRGIN name = Gouge the British people, think we should all write to Richard Branson and ask why he lends the VIRGIN franchise name to a company that is quite happy to RIP the British people off.
Ask the question or we will all be ripped off

The US market is completely different from the UK market, so you're not comparing like for like.

My Bro-in-law in Connecticut pays a lot more than I do for BB, phone, and TV, and for slower BB.

Compare it with Sky or BT for a valid comparison.

I understand your annoyance, but if you were on a loyalty discount which has now ended, why not move elsewhere, as Sky have some good introductory deals.

[Paulch]

On a continuation of this thread....

Virgin Media DO NOT follow the 'Brand Values' set by VIRGIN. Virgin Media constantly flout these rules set via VIRGIN.
Initially the company did follow these values but no longer.
I had a conversation with a rep and asked to be passed to a supervisor, a person by the name of David (full name withheld) came on the line claiming to be a manager, today I find out he lied, his position within Virgin Media was a supervisor (do Virgin Media think that their customers are thick ?)
When I made a complaint I was told there would be no call backs by his real manager to apologise, so in reality if the manager doesn't care about customers it is two fingers up to me.
All of this leaves a bitter taste.

Please contact VIRGIN brand holders on 'contactus@virgin.com' and tell them how you feel, they will be able to FORCE Virgin Media into following the brand values, if they don't they will more than likely be financially penalised, it's worth an email!

If you are not being listened to by Virgin Media, get your point across to someone that can MAKE them listen!

[Paulch]

Originally Posted by Hugh

The US market is completely different from the UK market, so you're not comparing like for like.

My Bro-in-law in Connecticut pays a lot more than I do for BB, phone, and TV, and for slower BB.

Compare it with Sky or BT for a valid comparison.

I understand your annoyance, but if you were on a loyalty discount which has now ended, why not move elsewhere, as Sky have some good introductory deals.

I was looking purely at websites in the US and what they are offering, having been with Eurobell that was bought by Telewest that was then merged with another company then renamed Virgin then bought by a US company, I thought some loyalty would count.....

---------- Post added at 19:55 ---------- Previous post was at 18:41 ----------

Originally Posted by Paulch

On a continuation of this thread....

Virgin Media DO NOT follow the 'Brand Values' set by VIRGIN. Virgin Media constantly flout these rules set via VIRGIN.
Initially the company did follow these values but no longer.
I had a conversation with a rep and asked to be passed to a supervisor, a person by the name of David (full name withheld) came on the line claiming to be a manager, today I find out he lied, his position within Virgin Media was a supervisor (do Virgin Media think that their customers are thick ?)
When I made a complaint I was told there would be no call backs by his real manager to apologise, so in reality if the manager doesn't care about customers it is two fingers up to me.
All of this leaves a bitter taste.

Please contact VIRGIN brand holders on 'contactus@virgin.com' and tell them how you feel, they will be able to FORCE Virgin Media into following the brand values, if they don't they will more than likely be financially penalised, it's worth an email!

If you are not being listened to by Virgin Media, get your point across to someone that can MAKE them listen!

My last thoughts on this is.....

As Virgin Media is getting so big maybe as British Telecom was made to open its network to competitors so should Virgin Media be made to open their network to competitors just for good competition practices ?

Don't just seethe at what happens to you, email Virgin, email Virgin Media, they can only not reply to email, but with enough people mailing them they ignore the sentiment at their peril (then they employ PR companies )!

[Darcus22]

I am at my wits end and not really sure what to do. The service i have received defies belief. I have 3 complaints with Virgin at the moment all over 28 days old. Nobody has ever contacted me about them and when i call customer services they state you can't contact the complaints people by phone or email.

It appears they just ignore complaints. Any ideas who i scan turn to please?

[telegramsam]

Originally Posted by richard s

Keeping your loyal customers happy is a good business practice... word of mouth goes a long way e.g. excellent service or don't touch them.

Yes keeping loyal customers happy does go along way which is why this loyal customer is very UNHAPPY today and wont recommend virgin media to anyone who cares to listen! Why am I unhappy? I owe some money from my last bill,the new bill has come in pushing me close to my credit limit,so they`ve restricted my services untill I pay the owed money. I have constantly told virgin that my bills are always generated about a week before I get payed so i can`t pay before then. They have put this on my file but it makes no difference as apparently restricting services are done automatically and can`t be prevented. I told the woman I phoned this morning I get payed on the 18th and will pay the bill then but she couldn`t restore my services until a payment is made.
So anyone reading this and thinking about getting VIRGIN MEDIA in DON`T! Go with SKY is my advice. I wish I hadn`t left SKY now for virgin and unless virgin do something really special for me(which I very much doubt) then once my contract with virgin is up I will be going back to Sky.

[broadbandking]

I do love the old line why don't Virgin reward loyalty, why should they reward you they provide you a service and you pay for that service, it nothing to do with been loyal you just want a cheaper service, do you really think Virgin or any other company for that matter will look at all the long term customers and change there package to make it cheaper automatically NO, as for the comment earlier about making VM open its network, that won't happen as Virgins network was privately funded and BT was publicly fund so they HAD to open its network.

Seriously either pay for the service or ring to cancel and see if you can be given a deal.

[RobboEdin]

Completely agree. What Virgin Media will do is reward your continued loyalty (a new minimum contract period) with a small ongoing discount.

[telegramsam]

Originally Posted by broadbandking

I do love the old line why don't Virgin reward loyalty, why should they reward you they provide you a service and you pay for that service, it nothing to do with been loyal you just want a cheaper service, do you really think Virgin or any other company for that matter will look at all the long term customers and change there package to make it cheaper automatically NO, as for the comment earlier about making VM open its network, that won't happen as Virgins network was privately funded and BT was publicly fund so they HAD to open its network.

Seriously either pay for the service or ring to cancel and see if you can be given a deal.

The thing that really gets my goat (and others too) is that you have to threaten to leave before they will give you a loyalty discount to tempt you to stay!

[broadbandking]

Originally Posted by telegramsam

The thing that really gets my goat (and others too) is that you have to threaten to leave before they will give you a loyalty discount to tempt you to stay!

That's the point NO company would just change your package to be cheaper its down to the customer to decide what they need and when you call to cancel they will give you a discount to keep you as a customer, every company does this they all have a department just to save customers.