Saturday 22 November 2008

Cheer leading for creative writers

Virgin Media V+ upgrade

This afternoon, a Virgin Media engineer has arrived to 'upgrade ' my existing set top box to a V+ (TV drive).

This is a straightforward box swap. No additional wiring or drilling is required. However, the new box failed to initialise. We both stared expectantly at the following screen for an eternity:

Card Status: No T-Stream

IPPV Status: BLANK

He then called technical services who initiated the operation. He double checked the serial numbers of the V+ box and the card. He tried to bamboozle me with science 'Hits must be slow today'.

Eventually, he gave up and fetched a second V+ box from his van. I reciprocated with a visitor's parking permit. It now looks unlikely that this simple box upgrade will be finished within the original 5 minute period.

We made more polite smalltalk like a couple on their first date. We waited. And waited. The 'IPPV Status' stubbornly remained 'BLANK'. He showed me the User Guide - a booklet cunningly disguised in a DVD box.

We waited a little longer. We both pretended to admire the new black V+ remote control.

Suddenly, he exclaimed 'At last !'. He seemed very pleased the see the 'Credit Limit' field change to £105.00. 'Oh good - it's finally starting to come through. Shouldn't be much longer now.'

But it was. We waited. I offered him a cup of tea ('Ta. Milk, two sugars').

He called the service centre yet again to quadruple check the serial numbers had been entered correctly. He seemed a little frustrated and annoyed to discover the numbers were not 'paired off' (mismatch between STB and SmartCard) correctly.

This news seemed to disappoint him as he said quite forcefully 'I have been waiting around for 45 minutes for this TV Drive reset'. However, he now seemed supremely confident that this time, the box would be initialised properly in the next 5 minutes.

It wasn't. We talked. I showed him my holiday photos from Norway. We finished our tea. My wife asked if he 'would be stopping for tea.'

Eventually, I suggested that he went off to his other three jobs and return later this afternoon. He politely rejected this suggestion, saying 'No let's just give it another 5 minutes.'

15 minutes later, he gave up and went off to his remaining jobs, promising to call me later to confirm that the V+ box is finally ready.

However, another 45 minutes has passed and the 'Card Status' is still 'No T-Stream' so I have a feeling he will be returning but only to reinstate my original set top box.

March 23, 2007 | Filed under and | Comments (View)

free upgrades from Virgin Media

I currently pay £92 per month to Virgin Media:
  • Telephone Rental - £5.50
  • Talk Evenings/Weekends - £11
  • Digital TV (L) - £11.50
  • Broadband (4MB) - £25
  • Additional Set Top Box - £15
  • Sky Sports 1/2/3 - £24
I just called Customer Retentions on 0800 0730591 (not 150) to try to renegotiate my package after the recent loss of Sky One. It took a while (15 mins) to get through on the Freephone number but it was worth it. Without much pushing, the gentleman kindly summarised Wednesday night's episode of 'Lost' and then offered me:
  • Upgrade to 10MB broadband
  • Upgrade to VIP package (XL TV and free movies)
  • Free V+ box
  • Price reduction to £85 per month
As my mum used to say, 'If you don't ask, you don't get.'
March 9, 2007 | Filed under and | Comments (View)

I am a Virgin (again)

I was vaguely aware that NTL merged with Telewest last year but a glossy black/red envelope, announcing the brave new world of 'Virgin Media', took me a little off guard this morning. I sincerely hope that my existing Telewest service is not affected by NTL's recent acquisition of Virgin Mobile. My Telewest broadband service works fine (apart from the occasional self-inflicted glitch with my wireless router). My Telewest email works fine (apart from a recent problem where the POP3 server times out on the first connection and works perfectly thereafter). My Telewest Digital TV service works fine (apart from that outage on Millennium Eve that my mother-in-law keeps reminding me about). And now, thousands of pounds will be spent on an expensive rebranding exercise, a public launch party, personal communications from Richard Branson to all customers and a spiffy new Web site media portal with quotes like
'Watch it, surf it, talk it, walk it. We're there with you every step of the way. Love The Virgin Media Team x'
Worse, they are are promising me a brand new email address. Please prepare to update your address books to 'norman@virginmedia.net'. Another example is the jokey, friendly marketing flyer I am now reading 'Small print that you can actually see' with a pledge for plain English speaking. The T&C's is titled 'Boring (but important) stuff for you to read' and contains 10, yes 10, pages of very small print that I can't be bothered to read. Another source of unease is that, many years ago in the days of 28.8 dial-up modems, bulletin boards and extension cables trailing across the bedroom, I was a customer of Virgin.net where I received some appalling service and was eventually forced to go elsewhere.
January 31, 2007 | Filed under and | Comments (View)
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