Feb 13
Virgin Media is Virgin by numbers
I moaned, a couple of days ago, about how the NTL:Telewest to Virgin Media rebrand seems to be less about the substance of the brand and more a quick paintjob.
Virgin Enterprises is famous for successfully applying its brand to disparate products and services. While not every product is a roaring success - e.g. Virgin Cola - Branson’s team has previously molded the brand to the relevant segments’ needs and expectations. While Virgin Money is clearly targeted at above average earners 25 - 45, Virgin Trains and Virgin Atlantic are sufficiently broad not to alienate any of their massive potential customer-bases.
So, it’s a surprise that the Virgin Media brand is so poorly targeted. Visit the website. It’s all 19 year old models in heavy eye make-up, with ridiculous hair-dos and a “look more weird than handsome/pretty” smugness. Since launch, they have thrown in a couple of stock photos of perfect families staring glibly at laptops, but their jarring presence only highlights how poorly the Virgin Media marcomms reflect the incredibly broad range of people whose house is passed by cable.
The worst offences lie in the copy: it patronises the hell out of the reader, its saccharine chumminess is likely to alienate rather than make people think they’ve found a friend and, oddly for a company so keen on ramping up average revenue per customer, it relentlessly makes references that would have been embarrassing in student-targeted ads.
“Hello you…” is how the rebrand announcement greeted existing NTL:Telewest customers. Phone deals talk about calling Aunty Doris in Australia. The website offers to help you “tell your ADSL from your ELBO”; every copywriter has come up with something equally as ridiculous, spent ten minutes trying to convince themselves that it can work, then given up and got back to work.
The problems, I think, are that Virgin Mobile people have no doubt been heavily involved in the rebrand. Virgin Mobile has always been about teenagers, and as a MVNO with no network investment and a saturated market, it’s okay to be that specific. Virgin Media, though, has to squeeze every last penny out of the network that costs billions of pounds to build and resulted in previous incarnations going down the pan.
But this clearly is just old NTL, with some Telewest influence, cracking through a Virgin gloss. The Virgin brand doesn’t yet fit and it shows.
The logo, the copy, the colours are all meant to be evidence of the true brand - i.e. the philosophy that informs everything the company does. Once the NTL:Telewest people start living the Virgin brand (sorry, horrible phrase), then perhaps it’ll come together a little more and, instead of appearing like Virgin by numbers, the company will work out who it’s talking to and what it’s trying to do for them.
February 13th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
I found out it odd that they were proud that they wouldn’t bamboozle you with figures, i.e. they wouldn’t tell you how much bandwidth/speed you were getting; they instead just said something like “a lot: good for downloading lots of video”. I found this a bit patronising. Although in reality I would probably use those kind of descriptions to make a final decision, I would rather be given a reasonable amount of information and have it explained.
Figures are also useful for comparison: if Orange said their medium package was “Quite fast, not a little monthly download allowance” and Virgin said their medium package was “Fairly quick, really quite a bit of monthly download allowance” then we are getting into the realms of anti-ageing cream advertising.
February 20th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
Well they have kept the superfast mirror http://gentoo.virginmedia.com/ and they have not blocked any ports yet, so their website can be black on white for all I care.
February 20th, 2007 at 3:02 pm
They have kept the other one too http://mirrors.virginmedia.com/ so I am happy so far.
March 2nd, 2007 at 10:58 pm
My virgin broadband was supposed to be activated on the 13th February, and as of today i am still without internet access. I sent virgin a MAC code from my previous provider Tiscali which was accepted and an activation date arranged. The 13th came and went and I contacted Virgin to see what the problem was but they said they didn’t receive a MAC code and do not appear to have any details of my application. If they had no details of my application why all the emails and how come they managed to send me a modem? Anyway, I got so fed up with their customer service, being pushed from person to person that I cancelled the account. Now they have put a marker on my telephone line even though my broadband was never activated so i can’t even transfer to another provider. They refuse to acknowledge that they have a marker on my phone line even though BT wholesale say they have. I must have spent about ?30 quid on phone calls to their 25p/min customer services / technical support both of whom seem to have absolutely no record of any previous conversations or any idea about the status of my account. I have been without internet at home now for going on three weeks. I wish i had never heard of Virgin Media. Im going to BT when i get this mess sorted out.
March 4th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
You might also be interested to know that they are suffering from a massive phone service disruption - We have been without a landline for 5 days now. I’m less than impressed with Virgin so far.
March 20th, 2007 at 8:12 pm
Well, I’m 28 minutes into a call to cancel my Virgin Media subscription having been a very contented Telewest customer until the switchover. I find their generalising and chummy IVR menus more than a little irrtating, not to mention patronising as Tom mentions above, plus the contention ratio must have shot up on my Broadband as there’s been a noticeable drop in service since they took over. That was one of the great advantages of Telewest’s broadband service and their promise not to bamboozle me with figures is no doubt indicative of a burning desire not to tell me how many people I’m sharing my connection with.
Also, I’ve just received a letter saying that my phone call charges are to be rounded up to the next minute, even when only 1 second over.
In short, my service has been reduced (SkyOne, broadband contention ratio) and my charges are to be hiked…
…All that said, I just got through (38 minutes) and have been offered an upgrade to their XL package (including all movies) with a reduction in service charges of ?7.00. Add to that the fact that the XL package gives me free phone calls to 01 and 02 numbers 24/7 and I’m willing to give them a bit longer to sort themselves out.
April 12th, 2007 at 8:12 pm
I have yet to find a way to contact them. I refuse to listen to robot voices on a telephone at my expense, it seems impossible to register a complaint on line (I wonder why?) and three snail mail letters have been ignored. Apart from my phone bill being corrupted, my broadband deteriorating and the TV package getting even more desperate, life goes on though.
April 27th, 2007 at 1:05 pm
[…] I’ve written before about being a Virgin Media customer. […]
May 1st, 2007 at 6:29 pm
I called up Virgin Media 2 months ago to ask if there were any deals to upgrade my Broadband from 2 Meg. I was delighted when the lady said she would do it for free - I would be on 4 Meg for the same £18 per month price, no tie in (I can give 1 month’s notice) and it would be a permanent (not just 1 month trial) deal. Beat that
Today I got my bill demanding £58. I called up in anger. They had screwed up and cancelled the direct debit. So they fixed that and sorted out the bill. The guy then said he would have to downgrade my speed to 2 Meg. I explained everything and was told there were “no notes on the account”. So I am back to 2 Meg.
**ck them. I called the cancellation line cos I am not taking this. Could not get through. Will try tommorrow.
May 14th, 2007 at 6:46 pm
the best way to get through to cancellation is pretend you are moving house and just give them an alternative postcode if they want one.
The option you want is number 2 where you are moving house but leaving virgin media.
First guy asked for my postcode and I was it wasnt final yet and he forwarded me to that line which takes more than 30mins to connect to. Second time the guy was very efficient and helpful and didnt demand a postcode.
Back with ntl, I could cancel the account with no problems and they understood that many students dont want a contract for an entire year so when I signed up for another year at a different house I assumed the same customer service. It would cost 69 pounds to cancel. Though this is understandable. What isnt is the 5 pounds admin fee for not using direct debit which was never on the ntl bills.
BT doesnt charge so much for non-direct debit users. Why is Virgin Media that much more inefficient. Or rather are they taking advantage of us.
Overall, I’m very unhappy with this change-over.
May 16th, 2007 at 10:17 pm
As a Virgin Media Tec, i know how bad things are for customers at this time
But it is a long climb to get out of NTLs debt and mistakes.
I also hope that Offcom are correct in stating that all customers have every right to the channels, as they still have remaining months on their contracts, So if everyone writes a letter of complaint to Virgin Media it will support their case in court.
Virgin Media,
PO Box 333,
Matrix Court,
Swansea.
SA7 9BB
Although as a Technician i have to stand up and take abuse from customers for such thing as:
Complaints about cmr services. based in India
We no longer support terrestrial television from our signal
The wait for service appointments
The incompetence of The Install dept
What you don’t realise is i have to put up with:
Customers who Have really appalling living conditions.
Customers who cannot keep pets, let alone their children under control.
Customers who don’t know how to use it, they haven’t read the instructions.
Customers that lie to get new equipment, No Fault, No SWAP!
Cutting cables in lawns and not telling the technician after some time spent looking for the fault.
JUST GET TO THE POINT, WHATS WRONG! sometimes i wish i could SCREAM it!
All I Ask is to Get some appreciation once in a while and maybe some RESEPCT as i am at the Front line for Customer service, Complaints, Fault finding and Repair or Response.
An Engineers Job should Last no more than 30 Min’s and you should not need another appointment for at least 6 - 12 months.
Things WILL get better because they can not get any worse!
Bobtecx@inbox.com
May 28th, 2007 at 5:40 pm
respect can be truly hard to muster these days - i’m sure no-one is blaming you personally if you do your job, but - AGAIN! blueyonder (virgin media ) mail servers has ended up on rbl blacklist - meaning companies and other servers block email sent from bludyonder user accounts. I’ve spent the past four days re-routing emails while trying to sort this out (as a freelancer I need contact with project partners and not being able to is debilitating for my business - does my nice friend branson ‘care’?) the IT help line told me that (thrid day) they were now aware of the problem and that they’ve sent an email asking the MAPS service/rbl to ‘please be unblocked’ (which sounds more like boo hoo - than like a professional approach to problems solving, to me) and now they’re waiting for a reply. Waiting how long - they couldn’t say!
As advice to what I can do in the meantime? “sign up with another provider — like aol or something!”.
amazing - they are now literally sending their customers to the competition.
let see if they’ll let me go without all the ho-hey you write about above. I’m not sure you could find a more in-competent and unhelpful company if you tried.
June 4th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
I’ve had a similar problem to lillisort where emails to and from gmail and other providers are blocked by orange, thus rendering my home email address increasingly useless. I do have a gmail account, but what use is it if I can’t email anyone on freeserve/wanadoo/orange? It seems we are moving towards the ultimate spam protection, which is to disable all email. Apologies for veering off-topic.
June 5th, 2007 at 3:13 am
Whilst I fully accept the engineers view, I cannot accept the failings of the company that you chose to work for. i.e A recorded letter of complaint to Swansea was met with a reply that “We are sorry that you had to complain” but we will get back to you. What a laugh,after a month. nothing! My advice would be to quit working for the company that will cost me my ‘pnone line, Intenet access & Television, which will now happen.
I am your side!
June 5th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
I only had the most basic contract with Virgin media and with the loss of Sky One there seemed no point at all in keeping it. So I wanted to cancel my contract, I called and waited and waited and waited… I gave up eventually and wrote a letter. I too got a “We are sorry that you had to complain, but we will get back to you” letter and heard nothing. Another bill arrived, I sent another letter, received the same letter they sent the first time and a little later I got an overdue payment letter. This gave me another number to call. I called and in about 10mins got through to someobody, only to cancel my contract they needed to transfer me… at least another 30min wait expected. Anyhow they did at least give me a free-phone number, which is 0800 0529403. You can still expect a very long wait but at least it won’t cost you anymore!
June 7th, 2007 at 3:15 pm
May 19th was the intstalation date for our TV and telephone package. TV fine telphone… still waiting 26 days and many hours of telephone linked conversations later. Today found out that they had given the number promised to us to some one else last Tues,some thing they have repeatedly promised will happen tomorrow tomorrow. I am so fed up I am going to cancel and go back to sky and BT people with honest values. Cancel that is if I can give another hour of my life to those morons
June 8th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
Virgin Media are RUBBISH.
They tried to install cable to our next-door neighbours and made a mistake during the installation. Consequently OUR cable TV went down. At first they said we’d have to wait nine days for a repair. So we did. On the ninth day they phoned us and said it would be another two weeks!! Now the date has been set for tomorrow, but I’ve just received a call saying it is now going be another MONTH!!!
They say they need the councils permission to do some cabling work outside. Why did they not get this permission earlier? Its already been almost a month. The call centre people are useless. All I get are empty apologies and get passed around different departments.
How can they get with this crap???? I’m so pissed off!! I don’t even know where to go with this
June 9th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
CCRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!
I have been on hold today for at least 1.5 hours during the course of the day.
All i want to do isa get my pin reset.
The new and dis-improved interface is pointless
GOD help us all.
June 9th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
the broadband has been disconnecting on and off about 7 times an hour for 6 months. i phone the tech every month to ask them to sort it, and we have to start from scratch explaining everything(they don’t keep records apparently)after 20 min. waiting each call.this month, after waiting half an hour on the phone,i asked if they’d call me back (for once) the following day as i had to go to work and was met with a very curt no, asked if a customer service rep would call me after 6 months worth of faults to finally get this sorted, again, no.they have open contempt to customers.i’m afraid to ask to be disconnected because if they attempt to charge me a penalty i’d go through the roof. it’s hard to believe companies can do this to people legally these days(the 5 quid charge for non direct debit). it’s 3rd world.