Slightly unrelated to the topic but Virgin are a strange company imo, I have broadband with them and to be absolutely fair it is great and rarely has any kind of issues and on the whole I am very satisfied with it. But as a company they have done nothing to promote any of their products to me at all as an existing user, they are constantly advertising Tivo and phone services on TV and everywhere else but I have never been offered any package deals or had any speculative calls from them trying to entice me to try other products in their range, pretty much every other company I have been with has. You may think it should really be up to me to do the leg work in that department and that would not be unreasonable- but when I think about my folks who are with Sky and the amount of special offers and enticements they get it makes me think that Sky put a bit more effort into their existing customer base than Virgin do.
Pilchard - my missus phoned up today to say no deals been sent to us unlike her Mum, (as we are existing customers) and they sorted it out straight away as er my post above
Fair point regarding the Virgin group they were NTL telewest and Blue yonder weren't they? That said it would be beneficial to them to join up a bit better. Regarding info I must say I don't recall ever saying no to them but it was a while back now!!
I've had both. Sky for me is the best by some distance. I have all the Sky Sports Broadband etc etc and saved in excess of £12 per month. The Customer service is great, it did not exist on Virgin and Sky Go is incredibly good. Sky every time
I've been with virgin a while, but am always tempted to switch because of sky Atlantic and sky sports cost. Virgin's Internet has been excellent though and there's a decent amount of on demand stuff, plus you can record 2 channels and watch a third. I haven't got a TiVo box yet as I'm wondering whether to switch, but that looks good. Difficult!
I have been with both. Am not using either at the moment. I would recommend Virgin to everyone. I had no problems with customer service or any complaints at all. In fact I always found them very helpful If my house had Virgin I would have it now but sadly it doesnt. Broadband is amazingly fast. no peak time lag either
Tivo learns what you like and records programmes it thinks you may like. The interface is pretty fast and if you use the iPad Tivo app you will discover that Tivo is very fast. Being able to record 3 channels whilst watching something recorded is very useful - it may seem overkill but allowing for overlapping programmes its surprising how many times its used. Also, when you try to record too many programmes at once, Tivo will check if a programmes is broadcast at another time and change it for you. Broadband is steady 50mb and will be going up to 120mb soon and the upgrade is free! Catch-up and On-demand is far superior to anything Sky has.
I work for BT. The BT infinity unlimited usage deal with line rental is great quality but naturally more expensive. You can get tv sky thing called BT Vision with it too which I dont know too much about but heard its good.
Virgin for Phone and Broadband, Sky for TV. Have been tempted to switch over to Virgin for everything but lack of HD sports channels keeps me with Sky.
Had cable since they cabled up our street around 13 years or so ago. Was tempted to go to Sky and got a decent package but Virgin matched it when I said I was off so stayed with them. Never had any issues with the TV or telephone side of things just one or two broadband issues which were relatively quickly resolved - last fault was due to a modem issue and got a nice new wireless modem from Virgin to replace the other one I had. I would be tempted to go to Sky simply for Sky Atlantic but I'll hold fire on that for a while. The only other reason I hold off of going to Sky is that the broadband will be on an Openreach line from the local exchange to your property and having worked for Openreach in the past I found that broadband speeds could be variable to say the least.
They have the worst 'customer service' that I have ever had the misfortune to experience. I am only still with them as I haven't got my arse in gear to sue the useless lying bastards yet (it's a long story and far too tedious to recount - suffice to say that they are twats of the lowest order). If you have a problem, no-one will give a shit and will just bullshit you to get you to go away. When that fails, they just make up some bullshit about you needing another department, and then you get lost in the process and your phone goes dead. You will then have to wait another 45 minutes on the line for the same thing to happen again. Like I said, twats who love marketing and signing people up, but obviously spend close to f**k all on customer service.
Don't get involved - you may live to regret it!
P.S the boxes are shit slow and unresponsive and will drive you nuts; no complaints about the broadband, though.
I know where you are coming from. I have experienced some of that. A tactic is when you get one of their ignorant operators is to hang up and try again. Thet do have some helpful ones - I would say one in three from experience.
Switched to Sky recently. The Rep lied to us from the beginning promised us we'd have all our current channels plus more. We didn't. I phoned up Sky "Customer services" and they couldn't help me because the rep doesn't directly work for Sky! Was told that somebody would ring me back within a week 3 months ago. So far they don't seem to have noticed that i have cancelled the direct debit.
Once they have you for a year they do not give a flying fuck about you until that year is up.
Oh and their internet is a joke. Although if you unplug it from the back of your Sky box when not using on demand it does speed it up.
Have used both, but with Sky now. Forgetting about the broadband I find the TV much much better on Sky. Quicker and better interface on the box. Some great little settings, have a ton of channels stored that aren't on the standard EPG.
Never had the need to record more than two things at once. Sky now have 1tb boxes like TiVo or just spend half hour like I have replacing the hard drive to bump it up to 2tb.
I'm with Virgin purely for the vastly suprior (60meg) broadband. Not worried about not being able to watch sky atlantic as if there's any shows on there I want to watch (madmen etc), I just download them from EZTV......................
Is HD really that good? I have Sky HD but I quite happily watch the non-HD channels. I also have BT Vision in my bedroom. All the i-player/catch up channels are on it but it does rely on a very good Freeview signal to get 100% service.Got ESPN free with that. Good libary and on demand stuff but not a patch on Sky. I think I'm going to stick with Sky.
Virgin have upwards of an 80% churn rate. That tells me they are great at attracting customers but piss poor about keeping them
like every company these days sadly. Hook us in with great offers, tie you to a contract and then give a shit service, showing no loyalty to those of us who keep their business going....................
we got all the virgin stuff through the post, looked at it thought bloody hell its an amazing deal worked out about 20 quid cheaper than sky, would have meant losing sky sports but you got espn for free so would still get to see some footy anyway, we had decided to go with virgin. Mrs' rings up sky and says she wants to cancel as we are going to virgin, gets put though to a different department, 20 mins later gets off the phone, were staying with sky. they gave us a free HD box HD suscription for 2.99 per month all the movie chanels and Sky plus extra for free and reduced our monthly fee to match that what virgin were offering. We have had a HD tv for a while now but only had normal sky, it is awsome on HD the football is crystal clear and the sound is epic LOVING it!! so before you decided to give up give sky a bell and see what they can offer you. The sky guy even came to install it on a sunday morning which was great as neither of us are home during the week.
Unfortunately, Sky Go won't be 'free' for much longer... Not when it replaces Multi-Room as an added subscription thing (£5 per month)....
like every company these days sadly. Hook us in with great offers, tie you to a contract and then give a shit service, showing no loyalty to those of us who keep their business going....................
Sky Now will be subscription free! And if you are a Sky customer, have you looked at the Loyalty Rewards stuff you can get? https://rewards.sky.com/skyloyalty/home/ - definitely worth trying some of that out before bemoaning their attitude!
Been with Sky for 20 years I guess. Every 6 months I call up and threaten to leave, I always say that they are making offers to entice new customers but not existing customers, they always give me some freebies, 6 months Sky Sports for nothing, or a new Sky+ box. My mum was with Virgin, she had nothing but problems, so I got her to sign up to Sky, which was cheaper for all (TV, Phone, Bband etc). I would never go to Virgin after hearing about the agro she had.
I'm a fairly basic Virgin customer & they frequently phone me up to offer upgrades etc to the most expensive option free of charge for 3 months & if I don't like it i can downgrade to a cheaper option. Eventually I decided that I fancied upgrading but didn't want the most expensive & asked for the offer in writing that allowed me to downgrade if i wanted. They wouldn't send me one, said it's not their policy & would said the details of the upgrade once it had been installed. Call me suspicious if you like but I told them to forget it.
anyone done this in 2014 about to consider moving, need new phone and broadband as leaving my current job and they paid for that, also have two sky boxes with hd movies and sports etc
anyone done this in 2014 about to consider moving, need new phone and broadband as leaving my current job and they paid for that, also have two sky boxes with hd movies and sports etc
If you are thinking of leaving virgin be warned they charged me £200 when I moved despite being with them/ ntl for over 15 years. They said my free broadband upgrade which they did for everyone became a new contract for all their services.
Comments
Virgin HD box is also better along with features.
Virgin also has Sky Anytime.
Main drawbacks are Sky Go & Sky Atlantic.
I would recommend Virgin to everyone. I had no problems with customer service or any complaints at all. In fact I always found them very helpful
If my house had Virgin I would have it now but sadly it doesnt.
Broadband is amazingly fast. no peak time lag either
Both customer services are ok, not perfect.
Sky Go is good but I miss Virgin's BBC i-player thing / on demand stuff.
Had cable since they cabled up our street around 13 years or so ago. Was tempted to go to Sky and got a decent package but Virgin matched it when I said I was off so stayed with them. Never had any issues with the TV or telephone side of things just one or two broadband issues which were relatively quickly resolved - last fault was due to a modem issue and got a nice new wireless modem from Virgin to replace the other one I had. I would be tempted to go to Sky simply for Sky Atlantic but I'll hold fire on that for a while. The only other reason I hold off of going to Sky is that the broadband will be on an Openreach line from the local exchange to your property and having worked for Openreach in the past I found that broadband speeds could be variable to say the least.
They have the worst 'customer service' that I have ever had the misfortune to experience. I am only still with them as I haven't got my arse in gear to sue the useless lying bastards yet (it's a long story and far too tedious to recount - suffice to say that they are twats of the lowest order). If you have a problem, no-one will give a shit and will just bullshit you to get you to go away. When that fails, they just make up some bullshit about you needing another department, and then you get lost in the process and your phone goes dead. You will then have to wait another 45 minutes on the line for the same thing to happen again. Like I said, twats who love marketing and signing people up, but obviously spend close to f**k all on customer service.
Don't get involved - you may live to regret it!
P.S the boxes are shit slow and unresponsive and will drive you nuts; no complaints about the broadband, though.
P.P.S sorry for venting!
Switched to Sky recently. The Rep lied to us from the beginning promised us we'd have all our current channels plus more. We didn't. I phoned up Sky "Customer services" and they couldn't help me because the rep doesn't directly work for Sky! Was told that somebody would ring me back within a week 3 months ago. So far they don't seem to have noticed that i have cancelled the direct debit.
Once they have you for a year they do not give a flying fuck about you until that year is up.
Oh and their internet is a joke. Although if you unplug it from the back of your Sky box when not using on demand it does speed it up.
Never had the need to record more than two things at once. Sky now have 1tb boxes like TiVo or just spend half hour like I have replacing the hard drive to bump it up to 2tb.
Not putting my pennies in Murdochs pockets.
I think I'm going to stick with Sky.
Thanks for all the comments and opinions.
Every 6 months I call up and threaten to leave, I always say that they are making offers to entice new customers but not existing customers, they always give me some freebies, 6 months Sky Sports for nothing, or a new Sky+ box. My mum was with Virgin, she had nothing but problems, so I got her to sign up to Sky, which was cheaper for all (TV, Phone, Bband etc). I would never go to Virgin after hearing about the agro she had.
Virgin for the broadband and phone.
Be warned