Installation guy cut off sky

[levibeyond]

ok i have a major problem with the installation of my services:

guy in a van turns up with new box etc asks me if my sky is on (yes cant cancel contract for another 3 - 4 months)

how surprised am i about an hour later when i go to plug my sky services back on to find that

1* he has used all of the cables from my sky box for my new virgin box
2* he has actually snipped the cable from my satelite dish to sky box and used
that to install virgin

surely this isnt legal firstly because i own the sky box and all associated cables, secondly i got virgin with minimum tv package as i needed phone/broadband only now 1 week later nothing has been resolved i have a service contract with sky which is for every channel inc movies and sport which is still under contract and i cant watch,

im seriously considering going to a solicitor and instructing him to sue virgin media for willful destruction of property has there anyone else who has experienced this and what they did to resolve the situation

[cnewton2k]

i would contact the police and let them get involved!

[Peter_]

i would contact the police and let them get involved!
Who will just tell you to contact Virginmedia, I think the Police have better things to worry about than a cowboy engineer

Call Customer Relations tomorrow morning on 150 from a Virginmedia phone line or 0845 454 1111 from any other phone line and choose the option "Thinking of leaving us" and explain what the engineer did, no use calling faults as it is an issue with the installation.

[jb66]

LoL

Perhaps there was confusion weather you were keeping sky.

[cnewton2k]

Who will just tell you to contact Virginmedia, I think the Police have better things to worry about than a cowboy engineer

Call Customer Relations tomorrow morning on 150 from a Virginmedia phone line or 0845 454 1111 from any other phone line and choose the option "Thinking of leaving us" and explain what the engineer did, no use calling faults as it is an issue with the installation.

Its criminal damage so i doubt they would

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_damage_in_English_law

I think the police would have duty to investigate it and not just tell you to contact VM. A crime has been committed and as such should be investigated, regardless of how small in your eyes it maybe!

[martyh]

i would contact sky and tell them they may have more clout ,also ,as you say you have the issue of paying for sky and not being able watch it and VM will take their sweet time it rectifying it if not pushed

[jb66]

Is stapling a wire to a wall criminal damage?

[levibeyond]

nope when i say he has cut the cable from my satelite dish i mean he has literally cut it off, completely took off about 25 centimetres worth of cabling and then used that to connect up the virgin services then to add insult has used all my old cables which where connected to my sky box ie power lead and scart lead and just switched them over,

what makes my issue far worse is they cant fix the cable from sky as you guessed it they arent allowed to touch those cables,

i think backing themselves into a corner here as if they arent allowed to repair/touch those cables why did he do it in the first place?

[mig-31]

i would contact the police and let them get involved!

Does the UK Have a Police force... If so point out an officer to take this issue up... (Leans heavily on sarcasm) Err what does a Police officer look like,Its been so long now !

And that comes from some one who lives 250 yards from a police station..

[levibeyond]

oh in the meantime i have had to add all of the tv services to virgin media which i am now being charged for

[jb66]

I'm not sure but it should be as easy as putting an f connector on the shortened cable and making an extension with a barrel.

I don't understand why he didn't just use a new cable. If it were the legnth of the room I could understand why he'd be tempted

[Peter_]

Its criminal damage so i doubt they would

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_damage_in_English_law

I think the police would have duty to investigate it and not just tell you to contact VM. A crime has been committed and as such should be investigated, regardless of how small in your eyes it maybe!
They will just tell you to call Virginmedia for a resolution which will be far quicker than trying to involve the Police who are unlikely to get involved regardless about your criminal damage claim.

Go down that route and it would take months of pointless wrangling even if you actually got a Policeman to turn up as they can do without the paperwork.

Call Customer Relations who will endeavour to get it all repaired as soon as possible.

Also call SKY as well as you are still a customer.

[WooLLsterQ]

If you put a complaint in, it will get dealt with by his TM. We are not allowed to touch anything from any other service provider including sky and BT, trust me when I say this he will be on a disciplinary if you put a complaint in.

Totally unprofessional and unacceptable!!

[levibeyond]

my point being it has been a week already, this engineer had absolutely no right to cut off my own equipment regardless of the fact im still under contract or not, and all i have done for the past week is get on the phone i took the day off work for the install realised about an hour after the guy had left as i was to left to sort out the wireless equipment then had to take the day after off work also as they where due to fix the issue then and didnt bother to show up, i completely refuse to take another day off work after this when frankly i cant be 100% certain that they will actually bother to come why should i continue to lose money because some engineer couldnt be bothered to walk 25 metres from the house to the van and get new cables

[Peter_]

If you put a complaint in, it will get dealt with by his TM. We are not allowed to touch anything from any other service provider including sky and BT, trust me when I say this he will be on a disciplinary if you put a complaint in.

Totally unprofessional and unacceptable!!
A disciplinary or worse I would say.

[WooLLsterQ]

Where do you live?

[speedfreak]

If you put a complaint in, it will get dealt with by his TM. We are not allowed to touch anything from any other service provider including sky and BT, trust me when I say this he will be on a disciplinary if you put a complaint in.

Totally unprofessional and unacceptable!!

Good post mate, I know jb is an installer but theres no excuse for this, never mind being tempted by the length of a room, thats just lazyiness. masque is right though, just ring VM, good luck getting it sorted, bang out of order and leaves you in a mess :td:

[Sirius]

my point being it has been a week already, this engineer had absolutely no right to cut off my own equipment regardless of the fact im still under contract or not, and all i have done for the past week is get on the phone i took the day off work for the install realised about an hour after the guy had left as i was to left to sort out the wireless equipment then had to take the day after off work also as they where due to fix the issue then and didnt bother to show up, i completely refuse to take another day off work after this when frankly i cant be 100% certain that they will actually bother to come why should i continue to lose money because some engineer couldnt be bothered to walk 25 metres from the house to the van and get new cables

Looks to me like you have already made your mind up no matter what we say on here. So go ahead with you call to the police and get it over with. Then when they have given you a crime number phone virgin and sky. Only then will you get any sort of progress going on your problem.

[jb66]

Good post mate, I know jb is an installer but theres no excuse for this, never mind being tempted by the length of a room, thats just lazyiness. masque is right though, just ring VM, good luck getting it sorted, bang out of order and leaves you in a mess :td:


I'm a service technician, but do the odd install

[levibeyond]

live in rochdale have spent pretty much everyday on the phone trying to get it sorted have already raised a complaint did that on first day, comes to something when i have to take my sky card to someone elses house in order to watch a program have now had to add all the channels to my package so am now getting build for both off sky and off virgin

[speedfreak]

I'm a service technician, but do the odd install

Just so we are clear I wasn't having a pop at you mate, just saying theres no excuse :) Get yourself to my house and sort my power levels then please :D

All this talk of police is daft though, really daft. Leave them to deal with proper crimes

[Sirius]

All this talk of police is daft though, really daft. Leave them to deal with proper crimes

:clap:

[zing_deleted]

I would insist VM credit my account the £60 it will cost to get sky out to sort it out

[speedfreak]

I would insist VM credit my account the £60 it will cost to get sky out to sort it out

Would sky sort it though?

And thanks sirius, Ive never had a round of applause before :D

[Ben B]

I would insist VM credit my account the £60 it will cost to get sky out to sort it out
That's a good point, I would do that, write a formal complaint letter and put in that that that's what you want them to do

[zing_deleted]

Would sky sort it though?

And thanks sirius, Ive never had a round of applause before :D

If out of 12 months Sky charge a flat rate £60 fix fee

[jb66]

Or virgin could give you top package until your sky contract runs out, providing you want tv from virgin

---------- Post added at 22:07 ---------- Previous post was at 22:04 ----------

Just so we are clear I wasn't having a pop at you mate, just saying theres no excuse :) Get yourself to my house and sort my power levels then please :D

All this talk of police is daft though, really daft. Leave them to deal with proper crimes

No worries, im the one who is usually sent out to fix these things! I'll pop you an attenuator in the post

[Nedkelly]

There is no excuse for this but why is the customer having such a hard time trying to get this sorted :confused: But in the past i have seen it done the other way where sky has used our cables so it goes both ways :D

[Gary L]

I've read about Virgin cutting the SKY connection before. I'm sure it was deliberate, but can't remember.
even if you were switching from SKY there's no need to 'cut' it. just the same as there's no need to 'cut' your freeview signal.

[jb66]

If the sky cable runs along the skirting and you want virgin, something has to go or you'll have 3 cables running along it. I've been asked many times to cut the cable but unlike this guy I double check :)

[Sirius]

I've read about Virgin cutting the SKY connection before. I'm sure it was deliberate, but can't remember.
even if you were switching from SKY there's no need to 'cut' it. just the same as there's no need to 'cut' your freeview signal.

Thing is i have seen it happen the other way many times

[adzii_nufc]

Can we get an update from the OP of who he has actually been Intouch with recently, Virgin, Sky or even anyone?

This issue is a serious one and I would have thought it would have been resolved or had some sort of progress by now.

Yes like other have said it is Criminal damage but your p*ssing in the wind phoning the police for something like that, Better off with someone like watchdog and get it shown on TV :p:

Can easily stick the cables for Sky back in if you have a spare tenner for some Coax but thats really not the point as there is still nothing been done about the fool who did it in the first place.

Are you saying he actually chopped the cable instead of simply lifting the plate up on the LNB and unscrewing the cable? If so thats even more stupid!
Even if he was told sky was being cancelled he surely cant just rip out cables without any sort of permission.

Update on this OP plox :)

[SMG]

From reading the OP this seems a clear case of criminal damage to his property. The VM engineer had no right whatsoever to use the OP`s already installed "Sky" cable.

The police would probably laugh though, & tell him to contact VM.

Personally, I would already have spoken to & threatened VM with legal action, if VM did not return immediately & replace both installations. I would not accept a "Splice" or joined cable.

[jb66]

No point going to police, he'd just deny it anyway, one word against another

[ryminister]

**** installer,end of. Should've asked the customer if he was keeping sky(como). I always ask this. But regards to using the existing cables i.e. scart and power,whats the problem. Saves valuable minutes on installing time. You try when confronted with **** loads tangled up wiring,with no room to get your hand in etc etc.

[jb66]

**** installer,end of. Should've asked the customer if he was keeping sky(como). I always ask this. But regards to using the existing cables i.e. scart and power,whats the problem. Saves valuable minutes on installing time. You try when confronted with **** loads tangled up wiring,with no room to get your hand in etc etc.

I'd use skys cables too, better for the enviroment (not the coax)

[adzii_nufc]

Id put your story here and since you have to put a company name they'd love nothing more than it to be a major company :)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/gotastory/

[Sirius]

Id put your story here and since you have to put a company name they'd love nothing more than it to be a major company :)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/gotastory/

Somehow i don't think they will bother as this will be as far as they are concerned a one off. There would be to much work involved to start investigating 100's of people to try and find a story they can use. They would be more interested in people trying to defraud Cable or Sky ;)

[Peter_]

Id put your story here and since you have to put a company name they'd love nothing more than it to be a major company :)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/gotastory/
As Sirius said unless it is rampant and every engineer is doing it then the will little if no interest in this by the likes of Watchdog.;)

[Mr_love_monkey]

And thanks sirius, Ive never had a round of applause before :D
what about the clap? :)

[WooLLsterQ]

It really does not matter if SKY was cancelled or not, we are never touse any other cables other than virgin media supplied for installs. It's gross misconduct, it's experiences like this which people never forget. An install should be a stress free experience for the customer and if they have never had VM before it should be the first opportunity for us (VM) to show how professional and dedicated the staff are, I hope you get it sort to you satisfation :)

[speedfreak]

what about the clap? :)

No thanks, but cheers for the offer :erm:

[Mr_love_monkey]

No thanks, but cheers for the offer :erm:

sure? comes with three free weeping sores?

[levibeyond]

ok now an update i finally managed to get through to somebody who helped a couple of days ago who tried to do something during the week told them they would need to sort it on saturday as i wasnt preapred to take any more time off work unless they where willin gto reimburse me for the day off so they phone field manager who says ok not a problem, now i get this field managers name Adrian Howarth who tells me to phone on saturday to arrange a time for them to come round, so ive thought ok problem solved wait a few days for saturday to come and duely phone to arrange a suitable time now guess what
voicemail message saying hes on annual holiday till 5th august with another number to contact someone else called jason adamson who isnt even bothering to answer the phone. im absolutely fuming firstly because if im going on holiday from work im pretty sure i wouldnt be arranging work calls for while im on holiday, what makes it worse is complaints finally phoned me back yesterday and when i told them i had the field managers no and he was due here tomorrow they thought things had been sorted. well am back on the phone to make yet another complaint and chances are the guy who comes to to fix the problem is going to be taking the vm stuff away cause ive personally had enough of being messed around, how can this be continuing to happen i know im not the first for it to happen to im now going to be back on the phone for i dont know how long trying to get through to someone else.

[NoKnowledge]

I just about managed to read that

[Pauls9]

I just about managed to read thatAgreed, but you can feel the frustration in how it's written. You have my sympathy, levibeyond.

[Digital Fanatic]

yeah, hard to read, but the guy is angry :(