2nd time lucky...

[hatbeard]

Hello all... I've recently tried to purchase VM tv and 50mb broadband for my house in SE10 but the first order the installation team kept cancelling the install.

the first time I was told they came along and said that as I needed a new cable they'd need to dig up the road and they'd need a special permit from the council and it'd take a week or two to sort so they pushed the install back 2 weeks.

Then I got a call a day or two before the new install saying that the engineers need to pull the cable through to the property but they can't do it as I'm on a residential section of a red route (A2) and they'd need a special parking permit to pull up and do the work or have to arrange a special sunday install. they would re-arrange the install and let me know the date.

I then missed a call on the day of my planned install so I phoned the customer services line and they told me there was a note on the system that my order had been cancelled and the reason given was that they need to lay 100m worth of cable to reach the property and due to construction work taking place in the area there was no way for them to do this in the forseeable future.

the problem I have with this is three fold.

1) there is NO construction in my area whatsoever. since last weekend I have walked down every street in a 400 yard radius of my house and there is no sign of any current construction or any recently finished construction

2) ok I live on a red route, any engineer who had come out to my property and done anything more than a cursory drive past at 30mph would have seen that I am 4 doors along from a side road that has public parking spaces right next to the main road.

and finally

3) the guy in the basement flat of my building received a welcome pack in the post the same week I got mine only now he has also received his tv guide welcoming him to his newly installed tv service. I can also clearly see the new cable come out of the pavement loop over the front garden wall, run along the side wall of the garden and into his property. so yes his installation went ahead just fine.

the only advice the customer service agent could give me was to resubmit the order and hope for the best. so I spent 45 minutes on my mobile going over all the details and I got them to specifically note on the order that there is parking available next to the house.

my install is on saturday next week (4th sept) but I'm worried it will just suffer the same fate as before I know there is a wealth of wisdom relating to this topic on here so I was hoping people may be able to rationalise what has already been said and maybe reason what is really the cause for the cancelled installs and also offer some tips on how to handle any issues should they crop up between now and then.

cheers

[weesteev]

Hi Hatbeard, if you want then please PM me your address and postcode and I can have a look at this for you?

[weesteev]

Have just replied to your message Hatbeard.

[hatbeard]

Well I managed to get all the way to my new install date without anyone calling me to cancel but sadly it's got to 6pm and it looks like the installers going to be a no-show.

[weesteev]

Still nothing? Have you called in to see what happened?

[hatbeard]

I tried calling but got the india call centre and they just read me the old notes from the previous cancelled installs.

is there a number I can direct dial to get the installations team?

[hatbeard]

well I tried calling again to see if i could get through to the install team to find out why they hadn't shown up and while I was told they are closed I found out that apparently the survey team had cancelled the install (without notifying me so I've spent the whole day sitting at home for nothing).

He then goes on to tell me that the property has been marked as unserviceable. so despite the fact that every single house along the street (except mine where there is a cable coming out of the concrete but I'll come back to that in a second) has a catv point outside and the big catv manhole cover is 4 doors along so roughly 20m away max) and the flat in the basement flat of this property has virgin. but the excuse I keep being given is there's a requirement for 100m of trunking to be installed. I'm at a complete loss to reconcile this with what I'm seeing on my street.

The only reason I can come up with that explains why all these problems are occurring is the fact there's no proper junction at the property boundary which I'm guess may be because there's a pedestrian crossing outside.

Attached are two photos showing the cable which is fed into the basement flat and the crossing.

As I'm not getting any straight answers from the support line does this look like it is a massive amount of work to get the property to be serviceable?

[hatbeard]

and to help clarify what i've said attached is a googlemaps screenshot on which i've highlight just how close everything is...

[weesteev]

Hi Hatbeard

This is what I was thinking when we spoke via PM before. The distance from your house to the nearest pit is quite extensive and the architecture of the network in this area has a requirement for a new duct to be fitted from your home all the way back to the closest pit.

While in theory this should be possible, the area is traffic sensitive and the footpath looks quite congested with other utilities so this would be a major effort to get service to your flat. Having said that, there appears to be a number of properties on this street in the same situation, It may be worth dropping an email to cablemystreet@virginmedia.co.uk with your address and contact details and the team can look into this for you.

Hope this helps and hopefully you can get service in future!

[hatbeard]

ok that sounds a lot more reasonable when you put it that way.

I've pinged the cablemystreet team an email.

thanks for all your help with this!