TiVo Breaking your contract with VM. - Page 6

**Hugh** · 30-10-2016, 08:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

Because they are in business to make money and customer retention is an important tool to achieve this.

I'll be speaking to a friend from my University days about this tomorrow at a charity function tomorrow (he's a manager at VM).

Thank you

Chad has had repeated deals from Sky since leaving VM and has now received an email saying that he can have 50% off for five years with no contract. He doesn't even have to call up to take the offer, they will assume he wants it unless he says otherwise.

What a stark contrast to my call to VM call earlier. I wasn't offered anything to reflect the unusable TiVo, no workarounds were offered and they didn't even mention that a new box was 'coming Soon'.

But the customer has to be profitable - if the only way to keep a customer is to lose money on the transaction, that is not a sustainable business option.

spiderplant · 30-10-2016, 08:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

no workarounds were offered

That's because you called Customer Services, not Faults. They are different teams that do different jobs.

Inactive Digital · 30-10-2016, 08:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

Thank you

Chad has had repeated deals from Sky since leaving VM and has now received an email saying that he can have 50% off for five years with no contract. He doesn't even have to call up to take the offer, they will assume he wants it unless he says otherwise.

What a stark contrast to my call to VM call earlier. I wasn't offered anything to reflect the unusable TiVo, no workarounds were offered and they didn't even mention that a new box was 'coming Soon'.

No problem. I always found retentons drove a much harder bargain during price rises compared to calling outside of the minimum term - probably a combination of the volume of calls meaning fewer deals around (staff have a limited number of 'credits' they can offer per month) and a consensus most customers will be happy to accept a six month discount to counter just the price rise.

RichardCoulter · 30-10-2016, 14:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hugh

But the customer has to be profitable - if the only way to keep a customer is to lose money on the transaction, that is not a sustainable business option.

I'm currently on XL triple play, so I'd assume that was profitable.

A reduced profit is better than receiving nothing and helps to reduce the churn rate.

Sky look to be happy to think long term and keep customers at any cost ie 50%, 60% off for up to five years!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Inactive Digital

No problem. I always found retentons drove a much harder bargain during price rises compared to calling outside of the minimum term - probably a combination of the volume of calls meaning fewer deals around (staff have a limited number of 'credits' they can offer per month) and a consensus most customers will be happy to accept a six month discount to counter just the price rise.

Cheers, that could be it then.

I'll run it by my friend this evening as I'm not happy that after 17 years of business (and putting business their way in the properties that I control or have a say in) that their response was essentially "ok, fine, bye".

The member of staff was also slurring their words...

OLD BOY · 30-10-2016, 15:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

I'm currently on XL triple play, so I'd assume that was profitable.

A reduced profit is better than receiving nothing and helps to reduce the churn rate.

Sky look to be happy to think long term and keep customers at any cost ie 50%, 60% off for up to five years!

Cheers, that could be it then.

I'll run it by my friend this evening as I'm not happy that after 17 years of business (and putting business their way in the properties that I control or have a say in) that their response was essentially "ok, fine, bye".

I really don't understand your concern, Richard. If you changed your energy supplier, the existing provider would not offer you a 'special deal'. If you get some sort of deal out of VM to keep you, fine, but you almost make it sound as though they have a legal obligation!

nfs6600 · 30-10-2016, 15:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

I'll run it by my friend this evening as I'm not happy that after 17 years of business (and putting business their way in the properties that I control or have a say in) that their response was essentially "ok, fine, bye".

The member of staff was also slurring their words...

Your control over properties has nothing to do with it. You called about your account, not the others. They have nothing to do with your account

Did it also occur to you that the staff member may have had a speech impediment?

RichardCoulter · 30-10-2016, 16:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

I really don't understand your concern, Richard. If you changed your energy supplier, the existing provider would not offer you a 'special deal'. If you get some sort of deal out of VM to keep you, fine, but you almost make it sound as though they have a legal obligation!

They don't have any legal obligation, but this does not make sound business sense.

At this rate, they won't have any customers left to sell their new box to!

Looking at Cableforum alone, there are members who have been VM customers for as long as 20 years who have had enough and gone to Sky.

If this attitude towards their service and customer retention continues, I can see more redundancies.

Its worth pointing out that VM are the only TV provider losing customers.

TV customers who leave will generally also cancel broadband & phone as it's more cost effective to take all services from the same supplier.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nfs6600

Your control over properties has nothing to do with it. You called about your account, not the others. They have nothing to do with your account

Did it also occur to you that the staff member may have had a speech impediment?

I accept that the person I spoke to may not have the information to hand to take a holistic view which is something I aim to remedy tonight.

The person may indeed have a speech impediment, in which case they have nothing to worry about.

However, I had to keep telling them to slow down, speak clearly and repeat themselves. I am all for disabled people being given opportunities to do any job, as long as they are able to do the job to a satisfactory standard (even if they need extra support).

This does not appear to be the case here; but ultimately it will be up to VM management what action to take after hearing the recording.

Anypermitedroute · 30-10-2016, 17:12

I do not get this at all

You phone to cancel and now your upset that they are actioning what you requested!!!

RobboEdin · 30-10-2016, 17:37

Me too. I'm sick and tired of people complaining that they have quickly had actioned what they requested.

GrimUpNorth · 30-10-2016, 17:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

Chad has had repeated deals from Sky since leaving VM and has now received an email saying that he can have 50% off for five years with no contract. He doesn't even have to call up to take the offer, they will assume he wants it unless he says otherwise.

What a stark contrast to my call to VM call earlier. I wasn't offered anything to reflect the unusable TiVo, no workarounds were offered and they didn't even mention that a new box was 'coming Soon'.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

Still no word about the new TiVo, so decided to cancel as the deadline approaches.

When asked why I was cancelling, I said "what do you think?"

He said "because it's slow". I replied that this was the case as well as the price rise.

We went through the farce of "have you had an engineer out", so I explained that there was nothing that an engineer could do.

He then put it through, no attempt was made to persuade me to stay after 17 years, no offers were made to entice me to stay, just utter indifference.

They. Couldn't. Care. Less.

Does anybody know the best offer for Sky Q?

Looks very like they wanted to send an engineer to see if there was a problem they could sort. It might not have worked but as you refused the offer of help what other option did you leave the person on the other end of the phone? For you to jump straight in to 'they didn't bend over backwards' complaints sound a bit harsh on VM.

As others have said you asked to cancel and they said yes (called your bluff). Seems pretty good customer service to me.

Cheers

Grim

RichardCoulter · 30-10-2016, 18:13

Well, let's leave it to VM management to decide.

If the new TiVo works properly I may consider going back if enough incentive is offered.

I guess if you can be bothered, it's more cost effective to flip flop between the two, but there again Sky appear to be doing all they can to keep their customers once you're with them.

I need my satellite wiring replacing anyway, so can get Sky to replace that for free, but I must remember to say that I want a hybrid LNB to future proof myself should I want Freesat in the future.

I dislike Sky with a passion, but I cannot argue that they are taking a sensible long term view with regards to customer attraction and retention.

I wasn't "calling their bluff", but did expect even a token attempt to retain my custom.

If the directors of VM aren't aware of what staff are doing, they need to be made aware, if staff are doing this as official company policy, they also need to be made aware of the short & long term consequences.

I think that the only good thing that I can take from this experience was that they didn't keep me on the phone for hours trying to persuade me to stay like Sky have been known to do.

That's going too far the other way!

Anypermitedroute · 30-10-2016, 18:23

Leave what? You said you want to leave, they actioned it, end of.

RichardCoulter · 30-10-2016, 18:34

You are totally missing the point and wouldn't last five minutes in business with that attitude.

toady · 30-10-2016, 18:54

Retaining a customer that costs you money won't keep you in business either unless you have very big pockets and are looking very long term

I'm glad that VM have stood up to the small bunch of customers that expect a discount every year

RichardCoulter · 30-10-2016, 18:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by toady

Retaining a customer that costs you money won't keep you in business either unless you have very big pockets and are looking very long term

I'm glad that VM have stood up to the small bunch of customers that expect a discount every year

Personally, i've never received a discount by calling up every year.

As I said earlier, a reduced profit is better than nothing and losing the revenue from the BB & phone services.

They really don't appear to have a long or even short term strategy for their continuing loss of TV customers.

If they aren't going to be proactive in stemming the flow, they might as well pull out of pay TV altogether and only have the cost neutral channels along with the channels that provide an income stream such as the shopping channels etc available to record on the TiVo.

They could make money from commission by putting Now TV, Amazon etc apps onto the TiVo to allow their customers to continue to access pay TV channels.

No more carriage costs, any complaints about missing channels could be batted away to the app providers etc etc.

They did say that they were moving towards providing access to services as opposed to providing them themselves, so maybe this is the long term plan??