Thank you BankFoddler. I'm confused again. Virgin said that I should send a request for removal of the default to Virgin. That's what I would like to do right now but don;'t know what to write / what template to use (if there is one) I assume you are referring to sending a SAR if I consider taking action with regards to compensation. Or do I need a SAR even if I simply want to remove the default? Thank you for your advice. It's very appreciated.

Hello First of all my apologies as this question has been asked. I have read through the posts but I'm more confused as to before and I wonder how to go about it in my specific case. Situation: Subscribed to Virgin Media and terminated services outside the minimum contract because of house move. They sent me a final bill which I paid in full and collected their equipment from my new address. As far as I was concerned all was settled and dusted. I received post addressed to me but for a different flat number in the building (I have no idea where they got the wrong number from as equipment was collected from correct number) dating back to October on 16th January consisting of letters from Virgin Media asking for £19.70 outstanding call charges. Letters got more persistent threatening court action etc. On one bill it states that payment will be taken by direct debit. Since Virgin terminated the direct debit agreement when they ceased service this never happened of course. I emailed someone in Virgin's credit department (I had this email from an earlier incident) and asked to waive the charges and to remove any defaults on my credit file. He waived the £19.70, said that he contacted the debt collectors to stop action but that I must send in a request for the removal of the default to Virgin and supplied me with an address. I emailed back asking what to write and to compensate me for my time and expense (postage etc). I got a sloppy reply saying 'just that you would like to have it removed'. I must add that I am self-employed and time is money. Because of Virgin's clerical error my risk rating has gone up (I checked with my bank) and a crucial loan important to my business has been refused. I know that this is because of Virgin as my account conduct is very good e.g. I never default, pay on time, increased volumne going through account etc. I also have not applied for any other credit. I was offered a loan shortly before Virgin's screw-up but been refused ever since. What I require A template I can send to Virgin requesting to have the default removed. Advise on compensation for my time, cost and inconvenience. Is Virgin in breach of anything I can them pressure with? Surely, if it's their clerical error I'm entitled to something? Taking into account what effect it has on my business. How do I threaten them? What is the time frame for removal of a wrongly recorded default? I would like to see my credit file in two months time to check that the default has been removed but don't see why I should bear the cost. Virgin has to pay for me to do so or credit reference has to supply it for free. How do I do that? Your help and wisdom is very appreciated. And thank you very much for your time. All the best, Martin

Things get lost along the long way between Virgin Media's glossy advertising and brochures and the bully that installs your line (I wouldn't be surprised if community service know includes having to contract for Virgin) and that person on the other side of the planet that can't pronounce your name when things completely cock up.

Don't get me started on this one! For new customers: £8 first three months, £16 thereafter. South East region still has not been upgraded to 10MB so that means I was paying £25 for a dire 4MB connection whilst others pay the same for 10MB (where it has been rolled out), and new customers pay £16 for 10MB!! That's definitely a case for Trading Standards and the OFT. What Virgin tries to tell is that 4MB to 10MB is a 'FREE' upgrade and therefore there are no grounds for compensation or reduced fee if you're still on 4MB and stuck with their £25 charge. There's nothing like a FREE (Oh, we are VM and soo nice to our customers') upgrade! The reason is that Virgin must upgrade all of their cable networks otherwise they can't cope any longer with the load and stay competitive. Current upgraded networks will be able to handle 300 to 350MB synchronously (up and downstream) and they will be offering a 50MB down service by the end of the year. That's the REAL story behind it. BT is trialling a 100MB service in some village as we speak. What bugs me is that Virgin has got a monopoly on the cable network and are the only cable provider at the moment. I'm sure that can't be right in the EU and it must be possible to force them to open it up to competitors in order to have a healthy market? Anyway, this will be a separate thread.

The Terrabyte was a joke. The only situation in which I'd agree they throttling you. Still, if you can post written confirmation on here and on your FB group would be great.

As above, if they debited today you will need to contact Lloyds before 3.30 tomorrow. They are obliged to put your account back into the state before VM tried to take the money plus waive any penalty charges for going over your limit plus if the unpaid direct debit has been recorded on your credit file reverse that as well. Like it never happened. That's the law. If it's later than above mentioned period, inform your bank that VM has taken the payment in breach of the DD Guarantee. Don't mock around withy their incompetent first line customer care but speak to a supervisor. If supervisor refuses to compensate you for bank charges plus award you compensation then ask for the supervisors manager. They are not available but will call you back and sort out the situation. Last time that happened bank compensated me £35 for unpaid DD plus VM dropped my BB package fee from £25 to £17 for a 12 month period, saving me £96. So total compensation for one failed DD due to Virgin's fault was £131 Fight, battle & don't give up!! The consumer is right!!

Are you SURE they don't mean 5.9 TERRABYTE??? 5.9 GB a week works out at 820MB a day, laughable!!!! If that's true what you say, I'm SHOCKED and will support you all the way long. May you post the notification VM sent you on here?

Call Lloyds NOW and make them reverse the DD immediately. Under the Direct Debit guarantee, account must be credited immediately and any charges, e.g. if that brings you over your limit, reimbursed. Speak to their 'Periodic Payments' department. Google 'Direct Debit Guarantee' Thumb rule, if payment has been taken today the 4th, you only have until tomorrow before 3.30pm to contact Lloyds and make them reverse the payment and credit your account immediately. Anything later you will need to find out but can still harrass Virgin for breaking the Direct Debit agreement and make them liable for any damages and charges.

To be fair, if there's a genuine fault Virgin Media always reimbursed me the premium call rate and I only call them on these occassions. Besides there's the free status update line. If you experience complete loss of service it helps to check each individual status announcement that is Phone, TV and Broadband as announcements and updates tend to differ. I'm a programmer and know if something is wrong on my or their end and only call on the latter occassion, making sure I get my fee's refunded. It's only fair to Virgin that they charge for any calls that are related to 'Norton Antivirus and Firewall which I got free at PC World won't display internet pages' are being charged. 25p is very reasonable I say. If you have no clue how to maintain your PC and use it don't ask your ISP. Return it to PC World and you will soon notice that they will charge you too like anyone else will. There's nothing as free lunch and people wanting free tech support are a burden on genuine clients who want competitive prices. Go and sign up with BT. At least then incompetent people will talk to each other.

I don't think this works as the Direct Debit is still in her name. Only the Orange account isn't. I had a similar situation where I was making payments to a BT account which was in someone else's name but the payments came from my account. However as this wasn't a direct debit I just refused payment and asked my Barrister to write a letter to BT to enforce any claims against the account holder. Never heard from BT again. In this case, payment has already been taken. Usually banks have a cut-off period of one day in which you can reverse and dispute a breached direct debit. As this has passed, I may would try to open a fraudulent abuse case of the account with the bank? As Orange refused to speak to her she wasn't able to inform them of the fraudulent abuse, resulting in negligence on Orange's part but I would not try my luck with Orange. Again, best is to open a fraud claim with the bank and try to be compensated. Bummer the offender left the country though. What do you think? It's like if someone misuses my credit card and pays for goods / services using my bank account. My bank would (and has been) very quick to compensate in this situation.

Compensation for June Virgin Media customers might be aware that Virgin Media had a major systems merger in May, resulting in having their broadband (previously billed separately) and TV / Phone packages (billed separately) combined into one bill and monthly payment. So far so good. But: I used to receive my bill around mid of each month to be deducted on the 2nd the following month. Not so for the May bill. Although it was printed on the 21st May, I only received it on 2nd June, informing me of a new Direct Debit payment date of 5th June. I already queried with them why my May bill hasn't arrived yet with them earlier and got the usual 'pass the buck' to Royal Mail excuse and it will arrive soon. Royal Mail is bad in my area but not as bad. Pretty lazy though. Now that made me think whether this is in accordance with the Direct Debit Guarantee that states that one must be informed of any change (in amount or date) ten working days prior to the payment being taken. Lloyds TSB (which receives a hefty monthly banking fee from me) wasn't helpful and agreed that the print date of the bill applies whilst the Financial Services Authority (FSA) stated a breach of the Direct Debit Guarantee. So here we go. First called Lloyds about the rep who refused to transfer me to 'Period Payments' when I explicitly requested to speak to somone with 'in-depth knowledge' of the Direct Debit guarantee and the 10 day interpretation. Instead she went on about her 7years of experience with Lloyds and knowing EVERYTHING. We talking lousy first line customer care here. Call logged, being listened in by supervisors and reply to complaint pending. Called Virgin Media (Speaking to Team Supervisor) and informed them that if they take payment on the 5th they will be in breach of contract and I will be asking Lloyds to reverse the Direct Debit the same day plus I'll press for compensation charges for any distress and damages caused. I made them an offer though. Take the payment on the 5th but compensate me with £10 (what a ridiculous amount anyway), let me make a manual payment once I had time to review my bill within ten working days and waive any late payment charge (resulting because of the manual payment) which they refused to my astonishment. OBVIOUSLY, THAT MEANT WAR!!! I asked for the supervisors manager to contact me. To my surprise they actually did. Suddenly, everything wasn't an issue. As it transpired, all bills have been sent out late as of the systems change. Potentially not allowing customers to review their bill in time and thus be in breach with the Direct Debit Guarantee. Manual payment no problem, late payment fee waived and £10 compensation credited to my account. Ok, let's face it. £10 isn't worth a blink of my eye but I fought for the consumer power principle. Hope it helps others. Read tomorrow: How to save up to £96 a year on your Virgin Media broadband package if you're persistent enough and bully them into it. Watch this space.

A) Water Industry Act 1999 does not allow disconnection in England & Wales. Am I wrong? So it's a breach of OFT guidelines? B) I don't disclose any personal details out of principle. I assume that contacting the landlord is a very questionable practice, being in breach of OFT guidelines by the supplier and the Data Protection Act by the landlord. C) Not so fast. I got the 'crossed meter' up my sleeve. No opening readings so don't hold your breath for any payment. D) I'm not actually as the bill started from a month BEFORE moving in.

I do admit that it has been a wrong decision to give the Halif****** a go in the first place. I'm naive and believe in the good. Background: Halifax downgraded me from 'Silver Account' (the one that comes with RAC, Mobile Phone insurance, Travel insurance etc) to 'Classic' after six months because of a failed direct debit that was due to Virgin Media's fault. If you're or have been a 'Silver Account' customer and will be / have been downgraded to a 'Classic' account bear the following in mind: - Did they tell you in writing or did it just suddenly show up as 'Classic' in your online banking? - How long did it take until you received a replacement card and still, the card details were different, right? Wasting your time updating payment details. - You did have no roadside, mobile and travel cover whilst you were in good faith you had. What if anything had happened? Well, I never got anything in writing when Halifax downgraded me from Silver to Classic. Don't care if it's in their T&Cs and honestly don't have the time to read but it sounds right that they must tell me. That's what you signed up and pay for and if there's an alternation to the original agreement without you knowing I say its void. It took them six weeks after they decided to downgrade me to send me a replacement 'Classic' card. I had one unpaid direct debit which wasn't my fault and got proof of. Still if it was my fault they should have informed me. So no excuse. Obviously I never activated the 'Classic' card and didn't use the account as it wasn't what I signed up for and therefore in dispute. Outcome: £40 from Virgin Media as compensation for direct debit error plus a compensation of £60 over 12 months, totalling £100. £150 in compensation from the Halis****** for two hours time spent of my time and general damage. Used the Halif****** money to pay off overdraft, withhdrew the rest and closed account. Spent it on dinner HALIFAX - NEVER AGAIN! PS: Bank Manager tried to bully me into £2.38 of monthly fees when closing the account which were waived when I asked loudly 'DO YOU WANT TO DISCUSS YOUR INCOMPETENCE IN PUBLIC AND EMBARASS YOURSELF OR DISCUSS IT IN PRIVATE?'

Thank you v_j_r and for that very detailed info from bigpeterlg22 My apologies for the late response. News: An annual water bill of around £110 to 'the occupier' arrived today! It works out at around £8.68 a month whilst others in the property pay £35, £36, £25 and £19 a month. All roughly same sized properties with roughly the same number of occupants. As it said 'metered' on the bill I went on a search and finally found them at the pavement. Scaring away the spiders I was able to do a reading of the meter that's supposed 'ours'. Thing is that it did spin when no one was using water so I got suspicious. With my fiancee opening and closing taps I was finally able to find the correct meter and got a reading. Bottom line, the bill we received is not for our meter. Question is how do I go from here? When we moved in there's no mentioning of the meter on the inventory report from the letting agent and we did not receive any opening reading. We are responsible for water bills though. The utility company didn't sent any correspondence in over a year. Their fault. Sending a bill for the wrong meter, their fault. Charging for the month previously we moved in, their fault. I read somewhere that some utility companies can't bill for anything older than a year but that this applies to gas and electric. Is that definitely not the case for water companies? Does anyone know what will happen if I contact them and say 'look, wrong meter' and how will they work out the bill if they haven't got an opening reading even for the correct meter? I have every right to refuse a bill that is incorrect apart from the monthly standing charge they may be able to ask me for? Thanks for your effort and thoughts.

Hi Wino Thanks for your response and the figures. Much appreciated. I'm not disputing the fact that we have to pay for what we use. I'm vary of applying this thought to water companies though as they give a damn about a corroding and leaking system. You get the idea.. Interestingly, I have asked aaround in my building and a single mother with a six yr old receives an unmetered bill of 36.40 a month whilst the flat below with two adults and a baby is paying an unmetered £19. Same number of bedrooms with one flat slighly bigger. Based on your figure, that some in our building are revceiving no bills and some others for completely different amounts raises the question how they justify and calculate the charges. Having done a quick check on uSwitch showed that based on our consumption the water company would potentially overcharge us £130 a year if we go unmetered. I'll start a separate thread about how they make up their figures as it seems not right, fair and copmpletely random!