To think Virgin media are utter bastards!

[Buddah101]

We have been with virgin media since last september in a 12 month contract, only having the phoneline and broadband with them, the internet in our area has been awful so we've always thought come the contract ending we would be leaving them.

Around the beginning of june we had a phone call from virgin, asking how our internet was as we had called so many times regarding it not working, on that phone call dp was asked how we were getting on with it and would he like them to bump up the speed of of our internet to see if that would resolve any problems - so he said yes, and actually wondered why we weren't on a better speed in the first place.

Queue us calling yesterday to give our 30 day notice only to find out that by him saying yes to faster speed we have verbally agreed to a new contract which now runs out next June. They are saying they also sent out a contract which we never recieved and believe me if we had wouldn't have got this far!

Now for the past 3 years dp has been recovering from a breakdown, he still suffers from depression & anxiety, he is not in a position to sign any contract or agree to anything. he is On medication daily and needs to be supervised when on them - not the behaviour of someone sound of mind. put together with yesterday his father went into a hospice so he is even more stressed than usual and this has caused him to be awake all night. The lady on the phone was so awful yesterday, talking over him and shouting at him - he doesnt get angry or raise his voice but he ended up crying and she still carried on regardless talking over him, saying on repeat i will not disconnect you until you have paid your contract off.

I feel they are utter bastards! weve put a complaint in but im asking for help is there anything else we can do, we really dont need this right now. It might not be much to any of you but right now this is the straw that broke the camels back.

They are terrible. I've had virgin mobile for 14 years (ish....) last time I was missing sold a phone when I was having an upgrade. I've complained, it's not fit for purpose. No joy. I agreed to the phone on the advice of the Virgin rep and it absolutely does not function properly (it has SO little internal memory that it actually can't update itself) there appears to be no way to solve this. No help from them at all and I'm stuck with the frankly useless phone.

Did you get this resolved OP?

I'm new here, so don't know if this will post in the thread or not (check me out with the lingo!)

Ok, Here's a little known bit of info that might be of use to anyone in this situation again. If your service provider has failed to provide you with the correct/suitable/usable service for which they are contractually obliged to provide for a period of in excess of (I think but please check) 28days, then they are unable to claim that you're locked into a contract.

ie. they fail to provide you with what they've previously agreed to provide for a period of (I think) 28days or more, then you're no longer locked into a contract and are free to leave without penalty.

I'm guessing the essence of this is that they're in breach of contract by not doing what they said they would have failed to fix it, and therefore the law states (I guess) that the contract no longer exists.

I hope this helps those caught up in a similar position.

I had some issues w/signal on virgin mobile, and cancelled due to this. They incorrectly billed me and I complained and they then refunded me (they agreed to cancel with no penalty due to the issues). 2 months later I start being debt collection calls, and notice my credit record shows a debt to them!
One ombudsman complaint later, and they've had to pay compensation of £350.