VM Billing, a disgrace.

[slowcoach]

I don't believe VM, I have been trying to get my bills sorted for the past few months.
I got 3 £2 Tickles and my bill went up £6, on checking back through my previous bills I had been consistently overcharged £3 each month, Retentions sorted it all out with Credits and told me that the 100 Meg Broadband was being reduced to £25.50 from the beginning of April, which I already knew about.
Today I get notice of my next bill and they have charged me £27.25 for 100 Meg. Rang Billing and explained the problem whereupon I was told that £27.25 was correct, I guided Rasheed to the Broadband Prices page on the website and showed him that it was listed at £25.50, “that's for new customers” he said, “I pay the same as new customers” I told him, “not a penny more”, he goes off to talk to his Supervisor, comes back and says I am right and that he has changed my account accordingly.
A word of advice, Check your VM bills all the time.

[slowcoach]

So I thought that finally I had got my account sorted ...... wrong!
Earlier this week my correct upload speed came back and I thought at last everything was perfect then yesterday a new contract drops through the door and my package prices have gone down, they are now charging me less than the published prices, at least they aren't overcharging me this time.

During the last month VM have changed the prices of my package three times, each time I have had to call and get the charges corrected and now they have changed it again on the new contract, I am beginning to think that my account is being used for training purposes.
Thankfully I only have Unlimited Phone and Broadband with them, why they seem incapable of adding three prices together and producing the correct total I can't figure, bloody glad I don't have a complicated set of packages with them.

Forget the Banking and Euro crisis, the UK has more fundamental problems which need sorting.
At the next assessment day for new recruits it may be an idea to test if they can do simple maths rather than tasking them to drop an egg without breaking it......

[BenMcr]

I would point out that technically you weren't being overcharged in the first post

When the reduction to 100Mbit was made, it was to £27.50, at the same time XXL 50 for those customers already on it rose to £27.50

£25.50 is the price when part of the new bundles that only became available in April, so you have to change your package to get it.

[carlwaring]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

I would point out that technically you weren't being overcharged in the first post.

Not a huge surprise, to be fair

[TbGbe]

Originally Posted by slowcoach

... why they seem incapable of adding three prices together and producing the correct total I can't figure, bloody glad I don't have a complicated set of packages with them.

Forget the Banking and Euro crisis, the UK has more fundamental problems which need sorting.
At the next assessment day for new recruits it may be an idea to test if they can do simple maths rather than tasking them to drop an egg without breaking it......

To be fair, they aren't doing any addition - it is all priced up "by the computer screen", unless you barter with retentions for discounts etc.

[slowcoach]

Originally Posted by TbGbe

To be fair, they aren't doing any addition - it is all priced up "by the computer screen", unless you barter with retentions for discounts etc.

I am happy to pay the advertised price, I have never phoned Retentions with the aim of getting anything cheaper than list. The problem arose when I checked my bill and found that for almost 12 Months I had been charged an extra £3 a month, and no one could explain why, then a couple of months later an extra £1.85 was added until I spotted it.
The thing is, these “extra charges” don't relate to anything tangible, they are just amounts selected from thin air.

---------- Post added at 19:02 ---------- Previous post was at 18:59 ----------

Originally Posted by BenMcr

I would point out that technically you weren't being overcharged in the first post

When the reduction to 100Mbit was made, it was to £27.50, at the same time XXL 50 for those customers already on it rose to £27.50

£25.50 is the price when part of the new bundles that only became available in April, so you have to change your package to get it.

I was sent a letter earlier this year from VM about the speed doubling, the letter went on to say that as I was already on the fastest speed they couldn't increase mine so instead they would reduce the price to £25 early in April, which is almost what Retentions told me later, they stated £25.50 actually..

When trying to check my monthly bill I can't see any mention of a price list showing Broadband costing £27.50 so if anyone can point me to the screen showing that price I would be most grateful, there again they have just sent me a new contract priced lower than the published and unpublished prices so the £27.50 price would also be irrelevant for me checking for price creep in the future.

I've also discovered today that when I complained because I was being charged £6 a month for three Tickles, Retentions actually removed the Tickles completely rather than just removing the charges.

Smoke and bloody Mirrors.

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by slowcoach

I was sent a letter earlier this year from VM about the speed doubling, the letter went on to say that as I was already on the fastest speed they couldn't increase mine so instead they would reduce the price to £25 early in April, which is almost what Retentions told me later, they stated £25.50 actually..

This is what the 100Mbit reduction letters said:

We recently wrote to tell you that we'll be doubling our Virgin Media customers' broadband speeds. However, as your current speed is already the UK's fastest available, we'll be lowering the price of your broadband package instead to match the price of our Broadband XXL 50Mb package.

Unfortunately, we are having to change some of your other bundle charges. However from 1st April 2012, the total cost of your bnudle will still be going down by £xx a month.

The only price mentioned in the letters was the total change amount.

[slowcoach]

I'm not sure at which point in the saga the letter actually arrived, Retentions sorted out months of overcharging, and not for the first time, then next months bill arrived with an arbitrary amount added, then the Tickles appeared on the bill, then another arbitrary amount.

The only way I can check my bill is to go to the website and see what VM are charging others for the same package.
With the arrival of the new contract I have been given yet another price, whether this is the new Collections price I don't know because last time I checked, my particular package wasn't listed anywhere as far as I could see.

To top it all we now have a fault recorded, upload is faster than download, I am presuming that this is due to to work being carried out and is not due to a total meltdown of the network, or global warming.

[nelbb9]

Sorry to hijack this but I'm getting nowhere fast with VM and losing patience. Paying £30 a month BB only and the nearest I can get to that on the price page on there website is 60Mb and even that's priced at £27.50. With the new superhub installed my max download speed is 26.75Mb/s which would indicate I'm on the 30Mb option or £22.50 pm. I have ebilling and pay via dd so I'm cluless as to what I'm paying for and the call centre staff aren't much help at all

[BenMcr]

What tier does it say you are on in My Virgin Media?

[nelbb9]

Hi Ben my tier is XL and I understand that to mean up to 30Mb?

[RobboEdin]

Originally Posted by nelbb9

Hi Ben my tier is XL and I understand that to mean up to 30Mb?

This means that you are on the old 30MB XL tier which will be upgraded to 60Mb in due course.

As you say, this costs £27.50 so you are paying a little bit too much.

Go via the 'leaving us' option and explain that you would:

a) Like your monthly charge reduced to at most £27.50;
b) Like your free upgrade to 60Mb now if possible.

[nelbb9]

Nothing I can do at the moment because the call person I phoned had no idea what was happening (I don't think he could understand my strong Lancashire accent) and booked an engineer for Monday. There's no point of course because I know I'm on 30Mb but paying somewhere between 60Mb and 100Mb prices. Just wish I could actually talk to somebody in the UK about it who might better understand me

[BenMcr]

To be honest, the easiest path will be an upgrade to XXL 100Mbit for £34.75

You may be able to get reduction down to £27.50 for your existing tier, but it will likely involve recontracting your service

[nelbb9]

Thanks for the reply Ben, good to know somebody at VM listens.

My problem is that I upgraded to 30Mb and was told it was £30 which I agreed to verbally. I've since learned that the NTL 250 can only handle a max of 20Mb so I've been paying for a service that VM couldn't possibly provide. When I looked online (I trusted the phone advice) I should have only been paying £22.50. I logged onto my My Virgin Media account today and sure enough, £30 for XL BB.

I've launched a complaint about this because I fell it was fraudulent and a breach of contract. I hope they act sensibly upon it because I've been a customer for over 20 years beginning with NyNex but I do feel that they have taken money without providing the service I was paying for over the odds