Virgin media alternatives

[Sortingfinances2]

My monthly bill for their basic TV, broadband and phone is now £74.

Has anyone got a sensible and reliable alternative they have switched to?
I could ditch the phone, need reliable broadband, like recording TV series and rarely watch live TV. Only watch the basic channels. Reception via aerial on our smart TV is poor.

Thanks for any advice!

Give them a call and say you are leaving and they will reduce it

Do you have fibre in your area? We were paying that and have just gone from Virgin to Cityfibre. Now paying half the price and receiving about five times the broadband speed.

There isn't any here yet. Virgin is the fastest speed by a long way 🙄

If you have the signal, EE and 3 5G broadband is fast and cheap. They supply the equipment and it's got a SIM card inside like a phone, no wired connection needed, just plug it into the mains and connect.

Negotiate them down- if they won't cancel- they will be in touch within a few days
Ours went from 120 odd to 36!
We have lost some channels but that's ok- I think it is the £74 offer

We ditched the TV and phone and just stream on the tv now. If you've got a Smart tv you should be able to use your broadband to watch all the catch up channels, Netflix, Prime etc

Baffles me how people get to this point of paying so much, have you never renegotiated with them?

There's no need for a phone line you won't use and if you only ever record television, why not just stream it?

We pay virgin £32 a month for 500mb broadband and stream everything. Our contract is up for renewal and even online I can get the same for the next 18 months so I'm sure I can negotiate down/get more for the money on the phone.

Phone and negotiate. They do good deals when you do that.

@CaramelicedLatte Not renegotiated for a good few years.
Why? Time.
All other bills, insurance etc are changed annually but they are much simpler. This needs more research. My aerial signal is bad so Freeview isn't good. We like to record and occasionally watch live. Too many variables and I can't risk rubbish broadband.
Price creeps up but has just tipped £70 hence the question.
I'll call them tomorrow if I can price up alternatives this evening.

Thanks for the suggestions.

We have full fibre from BT. It appears to be perfectly good (and a lot better than Virgin that we moved away from because it dropped out all the time).

We have that and usually one of the streaming services, eg Netflix - we rotate round watch what we want to then switch to something else. That's a real advantage to not being in a contract, you can get something for a month and binge the one thing you want to watch.

Or if you want to stay with Virgin, phone and say you will leave if they don't offer a deal to stay. Moneysaving Expert keeps doing polls on this and they report that about 80% of people who asked got a good discount with minimal haggling.

Definitely call them. I got our bill halved, with a better package than I'd had previously when I threatened to leave!

Sky or BT

I switched from VM to EE yesterday as EE were offering a cheaper package and I also have my mobile with them.
My dilemma is this; i still have to give VM 30 days notice and will be billed £150 (which is what i have been paying for last 2 months due to being out of contract) in July, disconnection won't happen until 26th July and apparently will receive £50 refund in August. I don't know how they've worked this out but £50 refund seems very low to me. I feel like I've been duped by VM.
Also, my connection date with EE has been booked in for 6th July but I guess I could change that date.
Can anyone help me understand how they've worked this out. Are they right?
TIA

@Sortingfinances2 VM were offering me a basic package of £59 for TV and broadband but j decided to switch to EE as they were doing a special deal for £44 a month. I don't trust VM anymore hence why I'm leaving. Poor Customer Service is shocking, kept putting the prices up and never informed me when I was coming out of contract. I hope EE treat me better than they did.

Yes I am just about to leave virgin. Absolutely ridiculous! Not offering good prices at all. And I have called. It seems you have to actually cancel before they will try to retain you. I am not cancelling without a new contract so they are just messing everyone about. Fuck it I am off to BT

@Kitchen12345 do you mind me asking how much you were paying with Virgin? I had a missed call from them this evening so I'm thinking it's the Retention team trying to keep my husiness. I still have a 14 day cooling off period with EE but I don't want to give VM tge satisfaction that I'll return but this £50 refund is crap!

I was a sky person until I realised I was paying £90 a month to watch about 2 shows. Cancelled TV, now I pay 35 a month for Internet, nobody including me whatches TV. Just watch things on catch up. You can ditch the TV licence too.

Why do you have to record things when pretty much everything is on catch up?

I will be honest and say, I "pirate" anything I don't pay for. I don't feel a shred of guilt, most of its crap.

I am currently paying about 70 but for the lowest speed no extras out of contract. It’s ridiculous. I think it was c. 40 or maybe 35 they would let it go to. But I have been overpaying for near a year. And also have to run additional 4G home broadband because we can’t risk an outage. So that’s £30 too.

With BT you can get unbreakable broadband whole package for about £40. So that’s a huge saving. Plus BT aren’t idiots. I actually waited on the phone for over an hour to talk to them. Finally get through. Going through security and guy knows I have been waiting for an hour. I say oh I don’t know that question, errr, let me go downstairs. Not once did he say if I got it wrong I would have to call back and start again. Then half way down the stairs I say oh maybe it’s this. Then he says well that’s it. Your locked out. I was like what! Seriously? He was like yes, and then to top it all off he goes ‘I didn’t know you were that busy’. Like what!!! Too busy to spend the entirety of my evening on the phone to virgin on an absolutely pointless call. Wtf are you on about!!!

Honestly complete dickheads. They need to sort it out. Should be offer online or letter, very simple here’s your new BETTER deal for existing customers. They just shit on you when your an actual customer.

I’m on the bt social tarriff. £20 pm for broadband.

I have a firestick and pay £8 per month for prime video and £10 pm for netflix.

I have an ariel that looks like a slip of cardboard that is amazing for a tv signal.

was previously on ee paying £30 pm.

Just to update.
It's taken forever for me to sort, but called today for the second time to arrange disconnection.
They offered £41/month for 18 months so I've accepted. £9 more than my other options, but keeps the benefits of the tivo box which we do use (but could live without).
£32 less than before so a big saving.

No point switching as BT and Sky are just as bad. I know, I'm looking after three different properties (our own, MILs and now our son's). None of the 3 come out smelling of roses after exceptionally long waits on the phone and live chat, then their advisers not doing what they said they would (contracts emailed through completely different to what we'd agreed), then you have to wait another hour on the phone/live chat to speak to someone else, and so it goes on. BT have been the worst, followed by Sky, and actually Virgin turned out to be the least hassle in the end (still a pain, but not so bad!).