100M : Why all the hate?

[broadbandking]

I had brillaint service from them, but my 100Mb is up and down alot now but as for the TV the service is great and the phone well it calls people and I can hear them so I am happy.

[Tuvoc]

Originally Posted by geon106

Just curious as to whether there is anyone on here who actually like VM as an ISP?

Yep, I was with them for 3 yrs at a previous address, and have been with them for 4 years at my current address. Apart from a couple of outages, I'm perfectly happy with them as a company, and the service. In both cases the alternatives were (and still are) ADSL with an actual speed of 6Mb.

[kwikbreaks]

Originally Posted by geon106

I don't understand why there is so much anger directed at Virgin Media online. Where ever you go people are always saying how bad VM is..

Not all that many are saying that here it seems.

For the most part VM deliver a decent product. When it does fail though it can fail big time.

Some support is pretty abysmal so that can generate bad comments.

Pricing policy attracts some venom when somebody finds they have been paying over the odds for years and needed to call and haggle every year to get the best deal.

As mentioned many people only visit forums when things go badly wrong. Then maybe the local smarty pants/fan boy makes some comment or other which sparks off a tirade of abuse.

[Efour]

On average over ten years my area has grinded to a halt every 2-3 years and i have to put up with a terrible service for 3 months waiting for the stupidly slow planning phases and re-segmentation.

Other than that its fine. Hopefully the latest set of large upgrade work that comes to my area at the end of this year finally breaks this ridiculous cycle for 5+ years.

[kwikbreaks]

Infinity in the area would help with that in two ways IMO....

Deserters.
Competition at last.

My area went bad and stayed that way for months. BT have installed Infinity all over town now. Suddenly the local VM network has got much better. I just noticed today that I'm now on a new upstream - I'm pretty much certain we only had the one until very recently. Coincidence? The doubling upgrades? Maybe but I doubt it as doubling isn't due here til next year.

[Sephiroth]

I'm a happy customer. But there is something about VM that I hate. In fact two things:

1/
Dishonest advertising - see their website and what they say about that wretched superhub's wireless capabilities

2/
No public acknowledgement whatsoever as to just how wretched that SH is as regards wireless.

My SH is in modem mode and everything works perfectly.

[kwikbreaks]

The Superhub has certainly caused a lot of ill feeling IMO.

It is possible to get it right with free hubs but it can take time. The original BT Home Hub on ADSL was abysmal in that it couldn't hold on to the connections well and given the BT DLM routines that was very bad news. After several years it seems they may have eventually got it right as the HomeHub 3 has a good reputation from what I've seen although I've never used one.

[tweetiepooh]

I work for VM so am not expected to complain too much am I?

That said the service normally works as intended with few faults. When I do have issues they are sorted, usually rapidly.

I think the nature of forums is that unless there is a real interest in the topic people come there because they have a problem hence there is a bias towards "complaint" rather than praising. Once here though it would be good to see more "well done" type messages - this would apply to forums on other topics too.

[carlwaring]

Originally Posted by tweetiepooh

I think the nature of forums is that unless there is a real interest in the topic people come there because they have a problem hence there is a bias towards "complaint" rather than praising.

Indeed. It's called "Negativity Bias" and is something I have been "shouted down" for mentioning in the past by certain people. Usually the ones who complain the most about VM

[denphone]

l cannot complain about my service as apart from the odd blip its been A1.

[lightboy]

I have always had nothing but excellent connection and service from VM .. connection has always been rock solid for last 11 years ..
Only slight probs we've had have been with phone or tv box ..
I think it does depend on where in the country you are .. certain areas are perhaps a little oversubscribed .. maybe we are lucky here as we live near a BT exchange so a lot of people in our area dont have virgin .. dunno just a thought ...

[InsaneNutter]

Been with NTL / Virgin Since 2000 and had broadband since 2001 with them. I have never personally had any real problems with them, I could always connect to the dial up internet back in the day, something that couldn't be said for Freeserve.

With regards to broadband the connection has always been solid, right from 512k all the way up to 100mbit, always got the speed I have paid for. I only remember it been down for a random day twice in the last however many years.

Service has always been second to none around here, my only complaint would be there customer service department. The foreign call centres are terrible and dont really understand you. The UK based ones don't speak to each other and generally say anything to get rid of you.

Customer service aside the actual product you pay for is great.

Solid 100mbit cable with Virgin or 2mbit ADSL2 with BT... no contest.

[yorkshireborn]

Never had a problem with virgin but since the speed upgrade my ping and line quality have not been is normal best.

[roughbeast]

Apart from one blip a few weeks back I have always had an excellent, trouble-free service from VM. Even with their 10Mb service over 5 years ago I got the speed it said on the box. Naturally I am disturbed by all the poor reports about the SH, but since my router is better than the SH I have always used modem only mode.

Customer services have generally been adequate, in my case, although I have trouble understanding some off-shore operatives. Problems have been dealt with, eventually, and by friendly helpful operatives.

[AndyCalling]

I've been generally happy with them. The few account and delivery issues have been sorted out with persistance on both my part and that of VM employees.

Currently, since the 100meg upgrade I have noticed massive speed drops in the evenings back down to 50meg. They seem to have improved a bit, lately, now dropping to around 60. This will be capacity issues as my power levels etc. are excellent and it works fine most of the day (when I'm at work...) and late evening (on the run up to midnight). I would complain, but since we still have only 4 channels down in this area and have only had the speed doubles for just over a month I expect VM are still working on enabling further channels and capacity in my area.

Doubtless speeds will improve soon, as there were no capacity issues on 50meg so this is doubtless all about bedding in the new speed doubles.