Business Line - Compensation for 3 week without service
 

We moved from our phone and broadband from Virgin Residential to Virgin Business mid May 2011 as we were using this for primarily business purposes. Initially all seemed OK, but due to a mix up at Virgin, we then discovered the number had changed so were without our business number for about three weeks. Clearly, this is a major issue for a business as we advertise the business number online, its on business cards, flyers, etc... We potentially lost business as a result of the line being down. Does anybody know if there is a compensation procedure to address such issues?

D

Re: Business Line - Compensation for 3 week without service
 

How long was it untill you realised the number was incorrectly allocated. Once realised and reported to Virgin, how long did it take to get the number corrected?

Mistakes happen, but untill someone knows there is a problem, any timescale for resolution can't start. If someone doesn't know they have to fix something, then it's hard to make them responsible. Your post suggests the phone line was working so monitoring tools are unlikely to have seen an issue.

The SLA suggests they will resolve issues within 4 hours? Was that achieved once you reported it?

Most compensation would be for loss of service, i.e. the phone line rental for the period. The Business Code of Practice suggests a months free line rental if you have been without your full level of service (thus not just a number issue) for over 24 hours after a fault report was made.

I doubt there is any compensation for consequential losses, unless that had been specifically contracted. In any case you say you may have lost business, but did you really and how do you prove that value?

Re: Business Line - Compensation for 3 week without service
 

Thanks Rob.

The service transition (Residential to Business) was on 18th May. The original Business Number (that we wanted moving) was operable until ~ 7th June. We discovered there was an issue on the 22nd June when we raised the concern with VM. Service was restored today, after calling everyday to try to get it resolved. So, it took 8 days to fix (six business days).

We did have an out-going line on a 'temporary' number which is why we didn't realise sooner that there was an issue. (Other than realising there were no / few calls, but put this down to holiday season.). Didn't occur to us the incoming number would have changed! We finally logged the call because we lost the service in its entirety (no incoming or outgoing line, Business or temporary.

When they restored the service, they restored the temporary number not the original business number. It has taken a week of complaining to get the business line back up. Virgin stated today that it was "a comedy of errors" on their part that caused this issue; something amiss with the paperwork. Regardless, one really expects more from a Business service. Its probably been some of the poorest customer service I have ever experienced.

Re: Business Line - Compensation for 3 week without service
 

Best thing to do is get on the phone to them and ask if they will compensate you for the error with the numbers. They are usually very helpful.