Virgin Mobile

[ChevronB19]

Will probably get a kicking for this from PH, but...

1) go onto new contract, leaving EE and joining Virgin for a new phone

2) recycle offer = value of phone plus £100 bonus

3) send phone in on 21st October, properly packaged, phone in perfect condition, unlocked, or linked to iCloud etc

4) *personal error* lose tracking number

5) call virgin on 11th November asking where the trade in value is. Told they hadn’t received phone, nothing they could do. Said I’d write off value of £45 for phone and just accept the £100 bonus due to my fault for not keeping tracking number. Told I was committing fraud? Operator said anyone could apply for the £100 bonus code and just not send in something. Seems a bad business model, means anyone could randomly ring up virgin, ask for a bonus code, send in a phone with zero value and get £100 quid. Operator now in ‘hard of thinking’ stage.

6) gets interesting. The day after number 5, suddenly an email says they have received my phone. Followed rapidly by 2 emails - number 1 says it is on a ‘GSMA’ database as stolen (I bought the phone brand new in 2014 from EE and EE have confirmed proof of purchase), number 2 says it was late (received 20 days after despatch - as I say, they suddenly found it the day after my complaint, bit convenient?), also it has an unspecified LCD fault (was perfect when sent) and also is locked to iCloud (erased and unlinked from iCloud on 16th October).

Their terms and conditions say they will not enter into any conversation on their decision. It is final. EE (previous provider) are recommending I report to OFCOM. I’m totally baffled.

Suggestions?

[poing]

Are you still within the 30 day period? Can you tell them to stick it and stay with EE if so?

I'm afraid not keeping posting proof etc stuffs you and not taking pics/videos of the phone prior to sending doesn't help either. I've only once done a similar deal which was with O2 and because I don't trust these companies I took every measure possible to cover my arse but it all went smoothly. Hindsight and all that I'm afraid.

If you can't reject it all then see if you can escalate it and hope for a nice person that will meet somewhere in the middle.

[ChevronB19]

poing said:

Are you still within the 30 day period? Can you tell them to stick it and stay with EE if so?

I'm afraid not keeping posting proof etc stuffs you and not taking pics/videos of the phone prior to sending doesn't help either. I've only once done a similar deal which was with O2 and because I don't trust these companies I took every measure possible to cover my arse but it all went smoothly. Hindsight and all that I'm afraid.

If you can't reject it all then see if you can escalate it and hope for a nice person that will meet somewhere in the middle.

Yep, looks like it. I’m literally just out of the 30 day period, by a matter of hours. Mea culpa on the receipt, but I was in the middle of going abroad for work and everything was chaos. Their recycling terms and conditions say they will not enter into any correspondence and that their decision is final. There’s a load of inaccuracies (e.g. phone is stolen) and other issues (marked as late when it’s obvious it wasn’t scanned on receipt).

I know in PH style it’s ‘not much money’ but that’s not the point. I’ve already been accused of fraud by them once, then the phone miraculously appears in their depot the day after my complaint, is broken, stolen and locked to iCloud.

[poing]

It can't hurt to take the advice of EE and see what ofcom say. The Virgin terms and conditions might still be borderline or outside the the ofcom advice. Chances are Virgin outsource the phone buying bit to the cheapest company they can.

I've had to use ofcom once in the past for a phone company charging me for a phone I didn't own and not willing to take my word for it that they were wrong. It was sorted a couple of days later and I heard nothing more. Seems they have enough power to get results.

Have you checked to see if Virgin have a forum and if others are having similar? If so it would help with any ofcom investigation.

[Matt_E_Mulsion]

It sounds to me that they could have got the phone mixed up with someone else's or someone has done a crafty switching manoeuvre. You really need to see the phone or get them to confirm the IMEI number.

[ChevronB19]

Matt_E_Mulsion said:

It sounds to me that they could have got the phone mixed up with someone else's or someone has done a crafty switching manoeuvre. You really need to see the phone or get them to confirm the IMEI number.

Yep, I strongly suspect this. They’re sending the phone back, it’ll be interesting to see what I receive, I doubt it will be the same phone I sent in!

[ChevronB19]

Update: I got the phone back, it’s in perfect nick, no screen fault and not connected to iCloud. EE have confirmed my purchase date and IMEI number and that it is not on a stolen database.

I called virgin and they basically said ‘so what’. I got a deadlock letter from them (took 8 days to arrive!) basically saying ‘we never received your phone so sod off’. Weird, given I have texts from them saying they received it (after 20 odd days and conveniently the day after I complained) and they sent it back in a virgin stamped envelope...

So CISAS it is then. Half of me says I can’t be bothered, the other half (including the actual other half) says go to ombudsman. They’ve already accused me of fraud once, and now I have documentary evidence of them saying both that they’ve received the phone and (after sending me it back) that they never received it. I’m sure it’s an innocent cock up caused by lack of communication between departments, but it is the rude customer service and the fraud accusation I’m most cross at.

[Chozza]

ChevronB19 said:

. They’ve already accused me of fraud once, and now I have documentary evidence of them saying both that they’ve received the phone and (after sending me it back) that they never received it. I’m sure it’s an innocent cock up caused by lack of communication between departments, but it is the rude customer service and the fraud accusation I’m most cross at.

I must be missing your point ! ... You said earlier that you HAD failed to sent them the phone that you were supposed to - so you had attempted to defraud them - and now you are upset that they have mentioned this .. what are you trying to gain here ?

[ChevronB19]

Chozza said:

ChevronB19 said:

. They’ve already accused me of fraud once, and now I have documentary evidence of them saying both that they’ve received the phone and (after sending me it back) that they never received it. I’m sure it’s an innocent cock up caused by lack of communication between departments, but it is the rude customer service and the fraud accusation I’m most cross at.

I must be missing your point ! ... You said earlier that you HAD failed to sent them the phone that you were supposed to - so you had attempted to defraud them - and now you are upset that they have mentioned this .. what are you trying to gain here ?

Apologies for the confusion, but I did not say I had failed to send the phone. I said nothing of the sort. I sent the phone, as clearly described above. 11 odd days later they said they haven’t received it. Then accused me of fraud by lying that I had sent the phone in. The next day they messaged saying phone received and it was broken etc. They sent it back. I complain. They then send me a deadlock letter (yesterday) saying my complaint was closed as they never received the phone. Clear?

[anonymous-user]

Hi Op
Dunno if you are aware but Virgin are swapping from using the EE network to Vodafones next year I think. It may be worth checking if you have Vodafone coverage where you want to use it

[Countdown]

techiedave said:

Hi Op
Dunno if you are aware but Virgin are swapping from using the EE network to Vodafones next year I think. It may be worth checking if you have Vodafone coverage where you want to use it

Halley-flipping-llujah!

Ive just swapped from Vodafone to Virgin (because Voda Customer Service was ridiculous). However the Vodafone network was considerably better than the dross Virgin are currently piggy-backing onto.

[anonymous-user]

Countdown said:

techiedave said:

Hi Op
Dunno if you are aware but Virgin are swapping from using the EE network to Vodafones next year I think. It may be worth checking if you have Vodafone coverage where you want to use it

Halley-flipping-llujah!

Ive just swapped from Vodafone to Virgin (because Voda Customer Service was ridiculous). However the Vodafone network was considerably better than the dross Virgin are currently piggy-backing onto.

To be fair Counters it depends where you are. Virgin/ EE has always worked out good for me. I used to be on o2. I'm hoping Vodafones coverage is ok

[Chozza]

ChevronB19 said:

They then send me a deadlock letter (yesterday) saying my complaint was closed as they never received the phone. Clear?

Clear !

Yes i was misreading this.

Although they say they have reached deadlock - i think its worth trying again with them to explain the issue!
I suspect that the issue is due to Virgin incompetence BUT that this is compounded by the way there mobile product is set up!

1. The send your phone in/recycle bit is run by an external company ... they handle the returns the payment ( its probably a whitelable of one of the bigger recycling companies ) ... They probably just have a data exchange with virgin that say .. expect phone/phone = value we gave , credit account.

2. The £100 bonus is either credited by the recycling firm OR VM .. again its just a value in a data exchange .... so is populating a database . As you suggest anyone could send in a phone of zero value...

How the above works is not your problem ! .... But given that you now have an undamaged phone with your IMEI , you can be pretty sure that they didnt book your phone into the system originally ( either by mistake ..or as a way to get out of the £100 bonus they had mistakenly offered! ) , BUT you have proof that they received it ( their own email )

Therefore - complain again stating the facts and that you met the conditions for the £100 and it is for them to disprove this by telling you when they received the phone and what IMEI they put into their fraud system ( if they arent willing to act here .. then maybe reminding them that since they returned the phone that the IMEI is your personal data .. so time for a GDPR SAR request to show how they have processed your data / and for any case records they have related to your phone calls/emails )

They might disagree and then its time for ombudsman but you'd either have the data to support your case or a hole in theirs

[ChevronB19]

Chozza said:

ChevronB19 said:

They then send me a deadlock letter (yesterday) saying my complaint was closed as they never received the phone. Clear?

Clear !

Yes i was misreading this.

Although they say they have reached deadlock - i think its worth trying again with them to explain the issue!
I suspect that the issue is due to Virgin incompetence BUT that this is compounded by the way there mobile product is set up!

1. The send your phone in/recycle bit is run by an external company ... they handle the returns the payment ( its probably a whitelable of one of the bigger recycling companies ) ... They probably just have a data exchange with virgin that say .. expect phone/phone = value we gave , credit account.

2. The £100 bonus is either credited by the recycling firm OR VM .. again its just a value in a data exchange .... so is populating a database . As you suggest anyone could send in a phone of zero value...

How the above works is not your problem ! .... But given that you now have an undamaged phone with your IMEI , you can be pretty sure that they didnt book your phone into the system originally ( either by mistake ..or as a way to get out of the £100 bonus they had mistakenly offered! ) , BUT you have proof that they received it ( their own email )

Therefore - complain again stating the facts and that you met the conditions for the £100 and it is for them to disprove this by telling you when they received the phone and what IMEI they put into their fraud system ( if they arent willing to act here .. then maybe reminding them that since they returned the phone that the IMEI is your personal data .. so time for a GDPR SAR request to show how they have processed your data / and for any case records they have related to your phone calls/emails )

They might disagree and then its time for ombudsman but you'd either have the data to support your case or a hole in theirs

Thank you for the useful reply Chozza, and my apologies for coming across a bit brusque. Should add that the deadlock letter says the decision is final and they will not enter into any further correspondence, and recommend going to CISAS, so I will do exactly that. A first for me, going to an ombudsman.

Edited by ChevronB19 on Monday 25th November 20:52

[Countdown]

techiedave said:

To be fair Counters it depends where you are. Virgin/ EE has always worked out good for me. I used to be on o2. I'm hoping Vodafones coverage is ok

Agreed TD. I live in the valleys so coverage from any of the Big 4 can be patchy. Vodafone was head and shoulders above the others for me personally. Obvs YMMV

[anonymous-user]

Countdown said:

Agreed TD. I live in the valleys so coverage from any of the Big 4 can be patchy. Vodafone was head and shoulders above the others for me personally. Obvs YMMV

Do you know years back we (family) were involved in the mobile industry and I can distinctly recall promises of networks working closely together to share this and that to alleviate such issues
Obviously came to nothing

[ninepoint2]

Virgin Mobile are a nightmare, few years back all 4 of us were with them, now none of us..customer service very poor

[Matt_E_Mulsion]

I switched to Virgin Mobile a couple of years ago from EE and can't fault them.

[anonymous-user]

ninepoint2 said:

Virgin Mobile are a nightmare, few years back all 4 of us were with them, now none of us..customer service very poor

Matt_E_Mulsion said:

I switched to Virgin Mobile a couple of years ago from EE and can't fault them.

And there you have it. I bet there would be similar responses about most other networks.
Personally I was with 02 had good and bad experiences. Went to Virgin possibly around 2010 - can't remember and have had very good and a poor response customer service wise.

[HTP99]

Matt_E_Mulsion said:

I switched to Virgin Mobile a couple of years ago from EE and can't fault them.

Same here, only minor gripe is they won't waive £20 for an early upgrade, tried twice in the last few weeks and they weren't interested, anyway my desire for something new and shiny has subsided now so I'm kind of glad I didn't go ahead and by the time my upgrade proper is due, there will likely be a load of newer and better handsets that would have recently been launched, so in a way I'm glad I didn't end up going for an early change.

Edited by HTP99 on Tuesday 26th November 15:45