off-it.org

Due to recent problems with the ISP, i am having to blog form the library. Not exactly ideal but hey. At least i manage to make it online.

The reason the ISP (Virgin Media) disconnested us, was due to an ongoing problem for numerous years where we paid. But they couldn’t provide the service. Sucks i know but this is just the tip of how they treat loyal customers who neevr get behind on their bill and make issues known to them.

After numerous promised call backs and being guaranteed that our services would be fixed. It seems the easiest way for Virgin Media to deal witht their customers is to simply disconnect them.  Not just the internet. But every service we had with them.

Now it’s just a case of waiting for BT to be installed and then no more Virgin Media and no more shoddy customer service.   If BT customer service turnsout to be that shoddy, then i guess we’ll be moving yet again.

Time will tell and then we’ll see.

Soon to come is a comparison post for anyone wondering who else to switchto sign up other than the dreaded Virgin Media.

Lesson learnt, Virgin Media sucks.

ISP,Internet,Virgin Media,UK,Europe

Technorati Tags: ISP, Internet, Virgin Media, UK, Europe

So today i was just sat here listening to good old Sascha Brooks on Galaxy, when suddenly there was no sound.  Thinking it was just a temporary glitch in the matrix system i let it play out for a while.

After about 10 minutes of total silence i tried the other channels and surprise surprise, there was nothing, Nudda,zip,zilch.  Not a single channel was working!  The first thing i tried was rebooting the box. Any Virgin Media customer will tell ya that rebooting the box usually does the trick. If it doesn’t at least you know you tried.

After plugging the box in, it just sat there showing me a stupid Virgin Media logo that i wasn’t the slightest bit interested in, i wanted Sascha Brooks and i wanted to listen to it NOW!!!!

After 2 hours of calling their magic 150,151 and another 0845 number. I finally got through.  Only to be hung up on by a member of staff. Another 20 minutes later i got through to a helpful brainiac sarcastic member of staff named Sarah.

Not of much help with regards to when the services would be coming back, or what the problem even was. She just knew that her system was down and didn’t appear to care about the customers.

At this moment in time, i’m unsure if Virgin Media have actually been bought out by Disney. As this is one hell of a Mickey Mouse operation their running.

OK rant over and i feel better…….. I think.

This post is continued from the previous post Named Yet Another Day…35 Hours Wasted On The Phone With Virgin Media

It appears that if the net speed EVER reaches over at least 10mbps/ Then that’s your 20MBPS. It doesn’t matter if it never reaches that speed again. The point is that it has reached that speed at least once in its lifetime.

So although Virgin Media may advertise a 20mbps connection. You will never actually achieve it. I was told this by Michael Bradley at the broadband support.

The fastest connection i have had which lasted for a total of 25 seconds. was approximately 1400 kps Which by the maths of Michael Bradley is 14MBPS. Far from 20MBPS. But hey. Virgin Media don’t actually state you will ever get 20MBPS. They just say you can get ‘up to’ this speed. They also don’t tell you, that if your speed is below this on any other website/gaming/whatever. It doesn’t matter. As they say you will get these speeds form the Virgin Media network. A network which to be quite honest doesn’t interest me in the slightest.

Michael Bradley was supposed to call me back right away with his manager to speak to me. Which didn’t happen (Why doesn’t this surprise me in the slightest?) I called back 11:33 and spoke to a guy named Ian.

Now Ian seems quite smart. He explained to me that my speed is actually slower than it should be. And that there is a fault in my area. Not on my cable. But it is in my area. SO although it shouldn’t be affecting me. It might be. He raised a complaint to his managers and i should receive a call back from them with in 5 working days (Will it happen? I doubt it)

Ian was pretty pissed off with the whole thing. As he says it makes his job harder. He then advised me to call 150 and get the lack of customer support dealt with. Read the rest of this entry »

If you didn’t believe me the first time when i said Virgin Media Sucks. You might just change your mind after reading this latest post.

This whole event took place over a 35 hour period. It started on the 11th of March at 9am. And ended at 8pm on the 12th of March.

I called up regarding my slow Internet on the 11th of march quite early in the day. Me and a guy named Dan ran through some tests and both of us agreed that my speeds weren’t right. He promptly booked a Virgin Media engineer to come round and take a look. The Engineer arrived the same day. At around 3pm.

Again we ran through tests and he called his boss and got his boss to help him through yet more test procedures on the computer.

After about 30 Min’s running these tests with the engineer, he told me there was nothing else he could do. Said he needed his manager to come round with a laptop that can test all kinds of funky stuff. I was asked when i would like the manager to call me back as he was unavailable at that time. Read the rest of this entry »

This is my experience with EDF Energy as a new customer.  If your thinking about switching to EDF Energy. Then you’d probably be best choosing a different energy supplier and save yourself the time and hassle that comes with using EDF Energy.

Today i Spent over an hour on the phone to EDF Energy. They weren’t helpful at all as i was told i had made mistakes, i wasn’t hung up on. And my girlfriend didn’t ask me to be put on the account.

However, my girlfriend did ask for me to be put on the account. ( I was stood next to her when she asked.) They also told me i wasn’t hung up on. Well i guess that’s just another thing i got wrong.

I was also informed that they didn’t arrange to call me back on the morning of the 22nd of this month. Which they did as they told my girlfriend who is the account holder that they would be calling me regarding the electric.

On the 22nd when i spoke to someone who told me their name was Emma. She apologized and told me about the electric which is all about the meter needing to be replaced as they don’t tokens for this area. Only those key type token chargers.

I asked for a list to be mailed out of the nearest agents that can charge the key for us. As we didn’t want to be travelling across town just to get our electric topped up. Especially when its raining (It always rains in the UK).

It now seems that the girl i spoke to didn’t send out the list of nearby shops. In fact they can’t trace her as surprisingly she didn’t put her name on the account or in any notes on the account.I was told that the procedure to complain which is listed on their website is wrong. All it does is put you through to customer services who are certainly no help at all.

The notes on the account say ‘There’s no evidence to suggest that Mr [My Name removed] was hung up on. (Obviously i made it up) Also there is no evidence to suggest that EDF Energy would be contacting me on the 22nd of February.’

These notes are wrong and the company has a seriously hard time admitting it. Instead they say that they can’t speak to me because of data protection and my name isn’t on the account. (Please see note above as i was put on the account.) SO unless they are suggesting that my own girlfriend likes to waste my time and hers. They are just dodging the blame. Not exactly professional from a large company.

After lodging a complaint with EDF i was called back with in the hour by a manager Named Alex Smith. Once again i was apologized too and told that they would search phone records. This kind of surprised me as earlier i was told that phone records cannot be searched and that i was basically shit out of luck. The only problem with this is that the phone records system is currently down and of course they don’t know when it will be back up. It could be a couple of hours. It could be a few days.

The reason they are searching the phone records is to try and find out who and when my girlfriend was told that EDF Energy would be calling me back.  But even if they find the guy who told my girlfriend that. All they intend to do it put it down to a training issue and send the guy/gal off for some more training.

My overall satisfaction with EDF – ZERO
Would i recommend them? – Hell No!