Apologies for those who don’t like long posts, but my relationship with VM has become something of a saga.
The main part of this story concerns the ludicrous rigmarole I’ve been subjected to in trying to get a V+ box fitted. However there is a preamble.
Some months ago, I decided to switch from Analogue cable, installed by the desperately missed Telewest, to VM’s Digital service. Unfortunately one of the two boxes I had were either faulty or badly designed, since a pipistrelle bat would have struggled to hear the audio. These shiny new boxes were replaced with an old Pace brand by an engineer possessing all the sunny personality of Dr Mengele with a poker up his a*se, but at least they worked OK. The fact that they looked as though someone had bought them from the local bric-a-brac store was a bit disappointing, but I figured that was a cross I just had to bear.
The VM employees who I hope are reading this thread, will be delighted to know that, barring the VOD service going t*ts up a few times, I sailed along quite happily for the next couple of months. Then I decided to get a V+ box.
(Those of a nervous disposition look away now. I’d strongly advise the rest of you to visit the bathroom if you need to, as this may take some time.)
I booked the initial visit, but had to postpone it due to a conflicting appointment. Hey Presto, about twenty minutes before I had to leave the house the engineer turned up. Apparently it hadn’t occurred to VM Customer Service (doesn’t the use of the word “service” breach the Trades Descriptions Act? ) to let the depot know the appointment had been cancelled. Ah well, no harm done.
The next set of engineers turned up last Friday. With the wrong box. (” Wha?? Nobody told us it was a V+ box.”)
“Never mind sir”, they said, “we’ll do the extra cabling, fit the box we have and someone will fit the correct box on Monday.”
Unfortunately that V-box turned out to be another Lemon. The engineers went out to the van, got a different box and went through the procedure of fiddling about with some sort of diagnostic screen and calling someone on the phone. Unfortunately after a number of fruitless attempts to get the bleddy thing working, they informed me that, because they had come from Bristol, the V-box wasn’t compatible with the Exeter service (apparently it’s some kind of attempt to combat a black market in chipped boxes). Of course this begs the obvious question as to why the bleddy hell Virgin sent someone from Bristol in the first place, but then asking why Virgin don’t do the bleeding obvious, when they can do the infuriatingly over-complicated, is like asking why the sky is blue.
I was told they would contact their depot and get someone to come around that same evening to fit a working V-box, pending installation of the V+ box I had asked for in the first place. They then bid me adieu, leaving me with the dud V-box for some unexplained reason.
By now I was beginning to learn much about the arcane and mysterious ways of VM. Forget the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing; in VM’s case it seems that the thumb has as much difficulty attempting to decipher the actions of the forefinger as your friendly neighbourhood illiterate would have reading hieroglyphics. I therefore decided to try and avoid the Chinese whispers that I suspected would have been the inevitable result of one VM field employee speaking with another and called Mission Control on 150.
Cue nonplussed VM employee.
“I’m sorry sir, we appear to have no record of any appointment for tonight.” (Do I really need to mention that this was a couple of hours later?) After much insistence on my part the lady on the other end of the line told me she would check and call me back. About 40 minutes later she called to tell me that she was terribly sorry, I had been correct and someone would come round – and not only that, but they would try and fit the V+ box I had asked for. Of course no-one turned up.
The next morning I called 150 again and spoke to someone in Airdrie. As had been the case the previous night, I was told that there was no record of any work order and that I would have to make another appointment through the normal channels, which due to the time of year would be after Christmas. Not unnaturally I protested vigorously at this balls-up, upon which the lady told me that she would speak to her supervisor. Unfotunately, when she came back she informed me that her supervisor had said the same thing. Without going into too much detail, all I was getting was a succession of jobsworth replies, so I decided to hang up and redial, in the hope of speaking to someone with half a brain cell.
I then went through a tortuous saga, speaking to something like six different people, some of whom could apparently see on their screens that someone had been booked to come round, some who claimed to have no record of an appointment and one who actually cut me off. When I tell you that I was on the phone for over an hour, I’m speaking literally and not figuratively.
After all this cobblers, I decided I’d had enough of VM to last me a lifetime, so I figured the best thing for my sanity was to cancel my service, pay up the contract, stick with freeview for a bit and then see what Sky are like. When I got through to Cancellations, the lady asked me why I wanted to leave and so I related the sorry tale for the umpteenth time. Miraculously, I was then told that she could contact the depot in person and get someone from there to call me back – an option which had hitherto been unavailable. In due course I got a phone call and arranged another appointment for this morning (Monday 17).
Do you think anyone actually bothered to turn up? Perish the thought.
I contacted Customer “Services” yet again and after a bit more faffing about, (only half-an-hour on the phone this time) was told that the Installations man on the ground would give me a call, “within the hour”. What do you think happened? I’ll give you one guess.
I called Cancellations again, got cut off and redialled. I managed to get through this time, but stupidly allowed myself to be talked into speaking to someone in another department. By now increasingly losing the will to live, I explained my problems yet again. The guy on the other end of the line apologised profusely and told me that he would e-mail the installations manager who had failed to call me earlier.
“Oh no you don’t” said I. ” I want you to call him and actually get a promise to send someone around direct from the horse’s mouth.”
“I’m afraid I can’t sir, I can only e-mail him.”
“Well given the fact that he failed to send someone around and then call when I was told he would, I can only assume he isn’t reading his e-mails. Perhaps he’s gone over his download limit and Virgin’s Traffic Management means that he hasn’t got enough bandwidth. Whatever the problem is, I don’t care, I want someone to actually speak to him and sort this mess out.”
“I’m sorry sir, I can’t. There isn’t actually any way that I can contact him except by e-mail”
“So you mean to tell me that in a company which has a nationwide telephone service as a major part of it’s portfolio, one department of said company is unable to contact another department by telephone?”
*short silence*
“I’m sorry sir, I do understand your frustration, but as I said there’s no way for me to call him”
“OK then, let me speak to your supervisor”
“I’m sorry sir, she’ll just tell you the same thing” (”The Supervisor Will Just Tell You The Same Thing” should be VM’s catchphrase if you ask me. “Why have a bleddy supervisor in the first place”, I ask myself)
“Look, someone must be able to actually speak to this guy. Put me on to your supervisor and if she can’t help I’ll speak to her supervisor – and if that doesn’t work I’ll speak to the supervisor of the supervisor. Whatever; I want to either get this sorted out today or b*gger off to Sky”
“OK Sir, I’ll just be a moment”
The “Line Manager”then comes onto the line and promptly tells me that I’m speaking to the wrong department. Apparently I was speaking to Customer Care when I should have been speaking to Installations. Why the bloke I had just been talking to couldn’t have told me that in the first place is simply another of the Masonic secrets that seem to be VM’s stock-in-trade.
For a brief moment I felt my legs give way, but then – like a miraculous shaft of light breaking through the heavens to give heart to the faithful in an Old Testament story – I found myself suddenly imbued with the strength of the righteous. After I refused point-blank to either get off the phone or be passed onto someone else, the lady agreed to read through the notes on my account. For a brief moment she too tried to convince me that there was no record of any appointments, but after I insisted that she was wrong, she eventually tracked them down.
She explained that she was just about to leave for the day (By now it was late afternoon and I had been waiting for someone to sort me out since 8AM). However she said she would call the Installations manager (who I had been told moments before could not be contacted by telephone) and if I did not receive a call from him, to leave a message on her answerphone and she would chase him up tomorrow morning.
And that is the state of play at the moment as – shock, horror – no-one has called me back.
I don’t hold out much hope of a resolution any time soon, so, after I’ve recovered from the VM-inflicted cardiac arrest that is surely coming, it looks like I’ll be paying up my contract very soon. However I’ll be charging the barstewards £15.00 an hour for my time they’ve wasted, with a nice little premium for the stress and the fact I had to miss a match on Saturday thanks to their nonsense.
I’m sure all the fanboys and VM employees will accuse me of making this all up. For those with an open mind I promise you it’s 1′000% true. I’m sure some people will come on here and tell me they’ve had no problems, but that’s completely beside the point. As far as customer service goes, the proof of the pudding is in how a company responds when things go wrong, or a situation falls slightly outside the norm; by definition those who have little cause to contact VM after installation except to pay their bill, won’t perceive what a behind-the-scenes shambles the service is.
I’m far from a Sky afficionado. In fact I have a major problem with Murdoch as an individual. I’m also unhappy with the way Sky have denied football and other sports to those who can’t afford their high Sports fees and so have decimated the communal experience of many great sporting events that existed when I was young.
On the surface a lot of VMs services seem like a good idea in principle – the V+ box, 50mb broadband etc – but they don’t appear to have the resources to cope with the demand, hence the shambolic service and other irritations like Broadband Traffic Management and so on.
BTW, I used to hear similar horror stories about NTL. Does that explain VM’s service? Is it simply a case that dissatisfied ex-Telewest customers are simply experiencing what NTL customers have been used to?
Telewest, RIP.
Much missed, never forgotten.
