Hi all,

I've been reading these forum for a while and thought I'd join up to talk about the new 1st July charges.

I actually work for Virgin Media Broadband support and will obviously thus be a part of the new system.

Just wanted to give you all the view from the BBI support team.

Currently we get long waiting times, customers calling up with problems that we're not paid to deal with, but none the less cause other people with VM issue to have to wait. Adding a charge will reduce this waiting time, it will also remove the answer phone messages and silly little call tree I know a lot of you hate.

On the down side obviously is the price, in my opinion it is too high but as long as the advisors do it correctly the customer will only be charged with time spent dealing with a local PC issue. Which if you think about it, why should Virgin give free PC support ?

Now I know a lot of you think the advisors will blame your PC for everything and to be honest there are some idiots that work with us... India included in that but remember you can always ask for a call back from a manager if you feel you've been treated unfairly, or the issue is on going.

One thing I have heard is of Indian colleagues refusing a manger... dont stand for this, ring straight back and explain, the advisor will then sort out your credits and arrange a call back and feedback against that colleague.

As for transfers, No dep can tranfer to ctech support, regardless of if it says so in your notes. It cant be done. We can transfer you to other departments if we call you back but again if you call us, we cant transfer you. Customer care will not have access to us. They have "apparently" been given access to more technical information and we have been told to increase the detail in your notes for this reason.

Its not my nor anyone else on tech supports choice to make this a pay per minute, nor is it any of the managers you can speak to. If you dont like it, we are more than happy to call you back to make a complaint or arrange a manager call back.

Please, please remember that the people you speak to have no real control over Virgin and most of them think the cost is too high.

Any questions I'm more than happy to try to answer or I can go to my manager about them.

[Wizard Of Odd]

Cheers for the post.

What is the new charge anyway? I don't actually ever read any of the stuff I get sent in the post...

Originally Posted by Wizard Of Odd

Cheers for the post.

What is the new charge anyway? I don't actually ever read any of the stuff I get sent in the post...

As of 1st July Virgin media will be charging 25p per minute for tech support, the money will be refunded if the call turns out to be an issue with Virgin media equipment or service.

Not the brightest idea... but still.

[madnes]

Thanks for being as honest as you can VirginMediaEmployee If poss could you answer the following

In the past, well quite recently I have suffered slow speeds - Straight away my PC was blamed (Spyware), 5 mins later was advised there was an outage - why would I have been advised the problem was with my PC raather than the network?

What does VM define as non technical support / Customer education?

If I /we do have a problem which is classed as non technical support / Customer education will VM be able to assist @ 25P per min or will I/will be told the famous line of "Sorry we dont support that" and be told to call a £1 min line and still be charged 25p + connection.

Do VM intend to bring in futher PC tools? - as the tool I use is PC Guard and Broadband Support tools - which only helps with email problems.

[Rooks]

Originally Posted by VirginMediaEmpl

On the down side obviously is the price, in my opinion it is too high but as long as the advisors do it correctly the customer will only be charged with time spent dealing with a local PC issue. Which if you think about it, why should Virgin give free PC support ?

Because it creates customer loyalty and the £37 per month charge more than off-sets the occasional customer education call from a particular customer. And if it really is a PC, not Virgin issue then it doesn't take long to say "well that sounds like your graphics card may be at fault, I can't really help you with that but call this number and they'll be able to help". If a company supplies a service then charges as much as Virgin then support should be provided at the lowest cost possible. You can put whatever spin you like on it but it's all down to penny-pinching and not improving support.

[intheknow]

Exactly, we're already paying monthly fees for the service of our broadband, we don't need 5 pound extra charges for not paying by DD, expensive calls to support when WE need help.

You want to piece of mind that you have help on the end of the line, not the thought that if you phone up it's going to be costing you a packet on top of the most expensive broadband and phone prices in the UK.

The general consensus amongst customers is that the prices are going up, the hidden fees are going up and the service level is going down. If they have a large outage, what are they going to do? put 100's of people on hold making a killing, those people aren't going to hang on for ages, they will put the phone down having paid pounds for not getting through, and they won't get a refund because they didn't get to an operator.

The whole thing is aimed at getting more money from customers. Virgin's cards are marked with some customers for the Sky channels and other issues, small things could tip the balance now. No wonder approximately 1 in 5 customers have left them over the last year. It's so bad now that from all the customers they attract from the new campaigns almost equal amounts are leaving.

Customer satisfaction must be at an all time low...

[mossy2103]

Originally Posted by intheknow

If they have a large outage, what are they going to do? put 100's of people on hold making a killing, those people aren't going to hang on for ages, they will put the phone down having paid pounds for not getting through, and they won't get a refund because they didn't get to an operator.

Firstly, under ICSTIS rules, they won't be allowed to put callers on hold. Secondly, they will only start getting charged when they get through to an operator/advisor. There will be no queueing, if all are tied up, the call will ring out and will then be dropped (at no charge). These are the ICSTIS regulations covering premium rate lines.

[intheknow]

Originally Posted by mossy2103

Firstly, under ICSTIS rules, they won't be allowed to put callers on hold. Secondly, they will only start getting charged when they get through to an operator/advisor. There will be no queueing, if all are tied up, the call will ring out and will then be dropped (at no charge). These are the ICSTIS regulations covering premium rate lines.

Well if I don't know that (never having rang one before) then a lot of other people won't. I consider myself to be knowledgeable about technology etc. People aren't going to know. I bet they will be putting people on hold too

[mossy2103]

Originally Posted by intheknow

Well if I don't know that (never having rang one before) then a lot of other people won't. I consider myself to be knowledgeable about technology etc. People aren't going to know. I bet they will be putting people on hold too

Well, if they break the rules, then you can bet that someone will report them to ICSTIS pretty quickly.

And I have seen the info above quoted by VM themselves on the newsgroups, so they are aware of what is expected of them.

[maz_london]

Originally Posted by mossy2103

Firstly, under ICSTIS rules, they won't be allowed to put callers on hold. Secondly, they will only start getting charged when they get through to an operator/advisor. There will be no queueing, if all are tied up, the call will ring out and will then be dropped (at no charge). These are the ICSTIS regulations covering premium rate lines.

If they can no longer put people on hold, how are they going to check things with 2nd line (such as the UBR capacity, SNR, 2nd opinions and advice), while the customer is on the phone? I'm sure there are also other departments that occasionally need to be called during a call, say there is an account issue that is part of the reason for the modem being offline.... but if the hold option has gone, how is this possible?

[mossy2103]

I guess that they will have to arrange a call-back

[maz_london]

Originally Posted by mossy2103

I guess that they will have to arrange a call-back

I guess so... seems a rather clumsy way to go about it though, especially if it involved consulting with 2nd line on more than one occasion, or more than one dept. to resolve the issue. A normally 15 minute call could easily turn into half an afternoon wasted

Originally Posted by madnes

Thanks for being as honest as you can VirginMediaEmployee If poss could you answer the following

In the past, well quite recently I have suffered slow speeds - Straight away my PC was blamed (Spyware), 5 mins later was advised there was an outage - why would I have been advised the problem was with my PC raather than the network?
.

When an advisor checks for an outage they check a page which is linked to a database, another way to find an outage is to book a trouble call, which is basically a log of any troubleshooting they have done, when they begin this process they will be shown a screen which has what are called flags on it, this screen will tell the advisor if there is an unplanned outage the system has found and this will appear before the outage page. If the advisor doesn't check this which a few dont, they wont know the issue until they come to write it up, thus a change of minds.

Hope this clears it up.

Originally Posted by mossy2103

I guess that they will have to arrange a call-back

thats right, as soon as we need to call another dep, we call you back, put you on hold and go through.

[GEETHING]

I think this charge 25p per min and a 10p connection charge is a bit steep. Now i agree that you prob get loads of ppl wasting there time but my beef is why should i pay Virgin for me to tell them there is something wrong with my BB. I dont know what all this UBR and SNR stuff is all about i just want a good service which i dont have to take a bank loan out to tell them its all gone pete tong. We all dont have the bank balance of Burch or Branson. Just my opinion though

Originally Posted by GEETHING

I think this charge 25p per min and a 10p connection charge is a bit steep. Now i agree that you prob get loads of ppl wasting there time but my beef is why should i pay Virgin for me to tell them there is something wrong with my BB. I dont know what all this UBR and SNR stuff is all about i just want a good service which i dont have to take a bank loan out to tell them its all gone pete tong. We all dont have the bank balance of Burch or Branson. Just my opinion though

To be honest that reflects my opinion, but I'm open to be proven wrong... it might all go really well and customer are happy to not have to wait and only pay if their computer is at fault.

I know the way things are going people aren't gonna keep waiting 20 minutes to speak to someone in India

[GEETHING]

Originally Posted by VirginMediaEmpl

To be honest that reflects my opinion, but I'm open to be proven wrong... it might all go really well and customer are happy to not have to wait and only pay if their computer is at fault.

I know the way things are going people aren't gonna keep waiting 20 minutes to speak to someone in India

I agree that ppl dont want to wait but on the flip side is this just a way for Virgin to recoupe some revenue lost since the loss of channels. I may be getting it all wrong. Just seems everyone these days wants my money lol

Originally Posted by GEETHING

I agree that ppl dont want to wait but on the flip side is this just a way for Virgin to recoupe some revenue lost since the loss of channels. I may be getting it all wrong. Just seems everyone these days wants my money lol

No again I agree 25p is far too high, they could just charge for the advisors wage ... about 10p an hour

However this Virginone thats coming out is on normal tv, Sky and Virgin so has access to some 22 million TV's... who do you think the networks will chose to supply good programs too ?
Figures from memory there people so dont bite my head off !!

My point is that Sky one will be no use when another channel has access to more people

[GEETHING]

On the plus side though my BB service is very good and almost never goes wrong

[Zenith]

Originally Posted by VirginMediaEmpl

...Currently we get long waiting times, customers calling up with problems that we're not paid to deal with, but none the less cause other people with VM issue to have to wait. Adding a charge will reduce this waiting time...

Do you honestly think that if the number of calls to broadband support is reduced, that VM will keep the same number of advisors to reduce the waiting times, or will they make half of them redundant?

According to VM, over 50% of calls to broadband support are about equipment not supplied by VM.

Originally Posted by Zenith

Do you honestly think that if the number of calls to broadband support is reduced, that VM will keep the same number of advisors to reduce the waiting times, or will they make half of them redundant?

According to VM, over 50% of calls to broadband support are about equipment not supplied by VM.

By Law there can not be any waiting times, so you tell me

[neo6776]

Originally Posted by VirginMediaEmpl

Which if you think about it, why should Virgin give free PC support ?

Why?

Because we pay much more than any other BBI provider for what becoming more and more of a shoddy service.

Anyway there's always the saynoto0870 website which the new number will be duly put on i expect.

Originally Posted by neo6776

Why?

Because we pay much more than any other BBI provider for what becoming more and more of a shoddy service.

Anyway there's always the saynoto0870 website which the new number will be duly put on i expect.

Thats your opinion mate and I can promise you there will be no free numbers.. its 0906 anyway

[martybrum]

Originally Posted by VirginMediaEmpl

Just wanted to give you all the view from the BBI support team...

... why should Virgin give free PC support ?

Erm... they don't! See http://www.virginmedia.com/help/pchelp/index.php . They have been charging for PC Help for a long time!

What does happen is tech support, by their own admission, spend far too much time dealing with non-Virgin problems via the PC Support line. A firmer hand by those staff would work better.

I am lucky that I cannot remember the last time I needed Broadband assistance, if ever. But I am certain the first time I have to call this number and not get an instant fix and a refund of an exhorbitant charge will be the final push I need to disconnect the last of my VM services!

It is not on to charge customers a premium for problems with your own network. Its already paid for via the monthly subscription. I accept that people should get a choice of 1) a monthly fee for internet, including tech support, or 2) PAYG dialup with Premium rate support. NOT BOTH!

Wholly wrong, and a big mistake me thinks!!

Originally Posted by martybrum

Erm... they don't! See http://www.virginmedia.com/help/pchelp/index.php . They have been charging for PC Help for a long time!

What does happen is tech support, by their own admission, spend far too much time dealing with non-Virgin problems via the PC Support line. A firmer hand by those staff would work better.

I am lucky that I cannot remember the last time I needed Broadband assistance, if ever. But I am certain the first time I have to call this number and not get an instant fix and a refund of an exhorbitant charge will be the final push I need to disconnect the last of my VM services!

It is not on to charge customers a premium for problems with your own network. Its already paid for via the monthly subscription. I accept that people should get a choice of 1) a monthly fee for internet, including tech support, or 2) PAYG dialup with Premium rate support. NOT BOTH!

Wholly wrong, and a big mistake me thinks!!

PC issue also means setting up outlook express or setting a home page !

Not just PC issues like printers etc.