Have you been charged for premium calls that you didnt make?

[Scattermole]

Hello there

I found this forum when I recently realised that I too had fallen foul of the Virgin Media sex line scam. So I wrote a complaint which I posted this morning. I've also put it on my blog <edit Rob - link deleted, content unsuitable> with a lovely picture of Richard Branson violating a Virgin Media user.

Here's the letter here.

Dear Sir/Madam

On April 9, according to the bill I received from Virgin Media dated 11 May, I spoke for 14 minutes to what I can only presume was a member of the opposite sex, employed by cruel swine to talk dirty to lonely idiots. Explicit in your accusation is the further presumption that whilst talking to this woman, I manipulated myself to emission. Or at least tried to.

I find all of this extremely offensive.

I am not a proud man. On the contrary, I am on occasion deeply ashamed of many of the acts I commit on a regular basis, and many of the things which ooze unbidden, unpunished through my mind.

You know in The Information, where Martin Amis describes a couple’s bed as having ‘the towelly smell of marriage’? I always found this rather charming. Awww, I thought, marriage. All comfy and safe and warm and fluffy. Maybe not massively sexy, but still, I always rather fancied the idea that one day my own bed would have a towelly smell of its own. Instead, to my eternal shame, my bed has a bowelly smell. The bowelly smell of desperation. And I’m here to tell you, it isn’t pleasant. My whole room smells like the inside of an acutely irritated bowel, tempered, nay, chastened with the toffee-like tinge of freshly congealed manseed.

Do you see where I’m coming from?

What I’m saying to you is that my life, like my bed, is a fairly unspeakable combination of gastric mayhem and – not to put too fine a point on it – cock-toffee. It wouldn’t be so bad if the self-abuse to which I subtly allude actually brought with it any pleasure, but really, in the cold light of my overflowing navel, it doesn’t. Rarely. Rather, sometime it feels like I’m enslaved to this rather soulless instinct to just hammer out the desire. It’s really unpleasant if you think about it in a dark light, and sometimes, frequently, it makes me feel ashamed.

But the important thing is that deep deep down, I also have some pride mixed in with the shame and there are some things that I would never ever do. One of those things is that I would never ever pay damn fine money to an unscrupulous reptile house of low rent pimps, in order that they might then pay paltry peanuts to a woman who despises me, so that she, in turn, might then spit bald and lazy, vagina-heavy platitudes – or, if you will, ****itudes – into my plump, unlovely ear.

I would never do that. And I’ll tell you why.

For the simple if not sole reason that there now exists a tool which renders such venal pursuits wholly obsolete. That thing, my Virgin Media friends, is the internet. I know you’ve heard of it because you serve it to me by the month – occasionally uninterrupted for an entire month at a time! – for an obscenely inflated sum; a sum which, like a loose-cheeked imbecile pleasuring a dandy highwayman, I pay with nothing more than muffled imprecations.

And I pay it because my life without the internet would be worse than useless. Unlike the TV – which I also rent from you – the internet offers a good deal more than large bald men yelling at yokels, and disabled women parading their broken bodies before weak-willed homosexuals (although the internet has these things too, and in spades). The internet also offers 24-hour free and uncensored footage of everything from able-bodied lesbians French-kissing one another’s anuses, to webcammed conversation with damaged middle-aged women in Asshat, Arkansas, getting wasted with their tops off and oiling their bacon.

More than that however – as if anyone, in an ideal world, would ever really need any more than that – the internet also offers a veritable myriad of opportunities for ordinary consumers to share information.

For example, if I type the number of the sex line I am accused of calling – 09090271146 – into Google, it delivers me, in a chillingly efficient 0.11 of a second to a website called http://www.cableforum.co.uk, and more specifically, a discussion entitled 'Have you been charged for premium calls that you didn’t make?'

This discussion begins with the words ‘I am a Virgin Media customer…’, followed by four pages of anecdote – or evidence – from various Virgin Media customers who have been falsely billed for ringing sex lines. Some of them paid up to £400, and are still fighting to be reimbursed. Evidently then, I am far from the first Virgin Media customer to have fallen foul of this nasty scam.

Therefore, under the circumstances, it really peeves me that I have had to write this letter. I was already on the phone to one of your employees when I was originally informed that I had been panting away on a sex line. I pointed out that I do not use ‘adult services’ over the telephone. Then I asked her what she was wearing. I’m joking of course. Rather, I asked how this might have occurred. What was afoot? I asked. In response, I was treated to an almost amusingly high level of ignorance – especially considering that this scam is already well-known to at least some members of Virgin Media’s customer service department.

So, clearly, it doesn’t take a man in a canoe to figure out some kind of system to deal with this known problem. That’s all I’m saying.

Actually that’s not all I’m saying. I’m also saying that, if you have any claims to being a respectable and law-abiding company and any idea whatsoever about decent customer service, then I would ask you please to deal with the following glaringly obvious problems immediately.

1. Please pay me back the money you have taken from me. Immediately. It’s theft, and I really don’t care for it at all.

2. Also, please reimburse all the other people you’ve taken money from too. God knows how many complaints you’ve received and casually fobbed off. Stop pretending you don’t know what’s going on and play fair. For the sake of common decency. The fact is, whether deliberately, with malice aforethought or merely through sloppiness, you have taken money which doesn’t belong to you and you really ought to give it back.

3. Also, while you’re about it, please offer me a refund for the extended periods of internet outage which occurred last some time month. One of your customer service staff said that if I asked for compensation, I would get it. So I’m asking. Please don’t ask me to call your helpline again. I will implode.

4. Also, please learn to use email. I mean, come on. In this day and age. It’s embarrassing. Anyone would think you’re deliberately making it difficult for disgruntled customers to make you accountable for not doing your job very well.

5. And please show the last two seasons of Six Feet Under on TV Choice On Demand. I choose it. I demand it. And The Wire too. And Dexter.

Thank you.

I would appreciate a prompt and considered response, if not from you, then from your superior.

I will not hesitate to take the matter further if you do not at least have the courtesy to grant me a decent reply. (I will be using the aforementioned internet as the chief tool in my 'taking the matter further'. Please do not cut me off.) (I will implode.)

Yours in keen anticipation of some semblance of humanity,



Etc.

Now I wait and see.

[chuzzlemonkey]

Originally Posted by Scattermole

Hello there

I found this forum when I recently realised that I too had fallen foul of the Virgin Media sex line scam. So I wrote a complaint which I posted this morning. I've also put it on my blog <edit Rob - link deleted, content unsuitable> with a lovely picture of Richard Branson violating a Virgin Media user.

Here's the letter here.



Now I wait and see.

You do realise 1 paragraph stating...'been charged for these calls i didn't make' would have had the same impact?

Did you include a copy of the bill or a list of the disputed calls? They will need those...

[Ginaapple]

Hi

Glad to hear but sorry for you that it has happened to someone else it has been happening to me for months. I managed to pay a bill £300 because I thought perhaps my son had made the calls although he promised he had not! So I put barring on and kept number totally secret. Low and behold I have a £96 bill this month and sat in tears! I rang them up and asked them to disconnect my services as I just cannot afford this anymore. My son has his own mobile phone on contract and so do I so the house phone is very rarely used! Also I have not been receiving my bills. I therefore decided to have ebills. This is when I saw this bill tonight I nearly had a break down. Anyone else out there having this problem.

Thanks

Gina

[Scattermole]

Originally Posted by Haggis23

You do realise 1 paragraph stating...'been charged for these calls i didn't make' would have had the same impact?

Do you think? I really don't agree. Anyway, why should I do that? I was angry and I wanted to have my say.

Originally Posted by Haggis23

Did you include a copy of the bill or a list of the disputed calls? They will need those...

I included a reference number. They have a list of all the calls they charged to me. Their customer services people are able to access them.

[chuzzlemonkey]

Originally Posted by eyeofthetiger

I managed to get the number from virgin media, rang it from my mobile and it wasnt a number in use! it makes no sense. i havent got any other pieces of equipment attached to my pc, no other modem, just the equipment provided by virgin which has been broadband from the start

Hi...if you definately, definately haven't dialled these numbers then you are well within your rights to ask VM for an investigation. It usually takes around 7-10 days to complete. But bare in mind if a technician discovers that these calls were made you are likely to be charged for the tech call. £75 standard.

www.phonepayplus.org.uk <<useful for checking on numbers

[Yvonne Farrell]

Originally Posted by eyeofthetiger

Hi everyone

i am a virgin media customer who is trying to get a list of customers who have been charged for premium rate calls they have not made from their phone and they do not have a dial up modem connection (to rule out a rogue dialler). I have recently come back from holiday to discover I have a £400 bill from calling premium rate numbers, calls were made whilst the house was empty.
The customer service I have received is shocking, and Virgin media are adament that I have made the calls. I have asked Virgin Media whether this is a common fault and they are saying that they have not come across anything like this before which is a lie as i have been reading other peoples threads on other sites.
I am writing to Ofcom, Watchdog and Virgin Media in the hope that they stop denying what is happening and charging customers huge amounts of money for calls they have not made.
Please leave your comments should a situation like this have affected you. The more comments I receive, the better the argument to stop this from happening again and getting something done about it.
Thank you

I too had these on my bill when returning from holiday. Not as many as you though!

[chuzzlemonkey]

Originally Posted by Scattermole

Do you think? I really don't agree. Anyway, why should I do that? I was angry and I wanted to have my say.

I included a reference number. They have a list of all the calls they charged to me. Their customer services people are able to access them.

I do think! lol, they read the complaint until they know the issue...then summarise the complaint into a brief few sentences and put it in the queue to be resolved.

A lot of people who deal with these complaints won't even have access to what you wrote. The best way to get your feelings accross is over the phone...but obviously in a polite manner

Having your say is important, though! If you know those calls weren't made you will eventually get that money back...even if it is a bit dragged out

[rob135]

Hi all

Nearly a month on and I give up and today phoned for a disconection. originally told 5-10 days to investigate "rubbish". I've had 2 promises of calls at certain times, and on 1 instance took time off work, no one called. Had major problems getting through from call center to billing, and talk about stalling. At one time when I got through I was on the phone approx 50 minutes, and had all sorts of appology's as I was passed around and my blood pressure went up. I've all sorts of we'll do this and we'll do that but it all seems like a stall. They were willing to concede small amount of mobile numbers made just prior and after the premium numbers, but not premiums themselves, but as I keep telling them I didn't make any of them. Engineer came and says he can't see a problem so what can you do, told them enough is enough. Then because of the stall they now say there is a months notice to cancel. Virgin Media your service really sucks as do your customer services and call center. I have been with NTL ever since it was put into cardiff and it even led to my landline conection with BT being removed when they replaced the poles in the street, so this is not an easy option to disconnect but I'd rather this than to be called a liar and pay whatever and whenever they say I have made calls when I havn't. They concede that there is no history of this anywhere on my account not even ringing mobiles, but if they are willing to lose the long standing account for an increased Approx £30 in one month then I'm willing to go. As I've explained they can give me no guarantee that it won't happen again, and from what I've read in forums call barring doesn't seem to work either. Rant over, but what can I say, hope others get theirs sorted, but don't hold your breath.

Rob

[AngryMan]

I've just got my first bill from VirginMedia. We've never had a phone in our flats (besides mobiles), and have no dial-up modems, or other RJ11-connecting equipment. We use cable broadband, with no VoIP.

Despite this, we have a phone bill for £90. Mostly premium (in the late night/early morning - sex lines?), international (France and Ireland) and lots of calls to an 087* number.
By the length of the 087* calls, I'd assume that they're to a dial-up internet provider - not much use to us since we have 10MB cable broadband! Despite this, VirginMedia were quite rude to us on the phone, putting us on hold again and again; passing us between useless departments, and trying to accuse us of lying, then threatened to charge us extra for their "efforts", etc.

I can only conclude that either our phone line is crossed, or has been tapped/hijacked. As they were unwilling to admit any kind of fault on their end, I'd like to report this to the police.
Does anyone know how to report this kind of thing, or where to?

Also, anyone know any ways to get to a VirginMedia department that listens to its customers and tries to help them? So far, all we've had is nonsense and abuse.

After 35 minutes on the phone from my mobile to their various departments, they apparently couldn't call back, or refund the call. Likewise, they seemed incapable of putting me onto someone who could offer the slightest help.

Cheers,
A very angry Mark

[chickendippers]

AngryMan,
So you have no phone service from Virgin Media, yet they still managed to send you a bill for phone calls? Sounds very peculiar.

[AngryMan]

I have a phone service - it was part of a broadband/tv/phone bundle that I got, as it was cheaper than getting broadband and tv without phone. As such, we've never had a phone plugged into the line before, and we have no dial-up modems or anything else that plugs into the phone sockets. The cable tv box and broadband is via ethernet and wireless connections to a router - which, along with another line from the cable tv box, is plugged into the cable modem.

[Wild Oscar]

I'm not sure what else you can do but keep trying sadly .. and hope you get a more friendly ear somewhere along the line!

I'm probably out of order suggesting this .. but I'd be tempted to cancel your direct debit with VM (if you have one) and refuse to pay the bill until you get satisfaction!

Good luck .. and please let us know how you get on ..

[AngryMan]

Only problem with that is that we'd then get fines for it.

I just want to know how to report a tampered/compromised line to the police. If VM won't move a finger for me, lets see them try to say no to the police

[chickendippers]

If you're concerned about call costs chasing this up, it may be worth investing in a cheap telephone and using your landline to call customer support (as it's free).

[AngryMan]

I don't want to plug anything into the landline for now! Once their engineers have confirmed that we've never used the landline, then I'll be ok to do that.