UPC student offer problem

Tusky

Fuming after yet another epic call to UPC. Signed up to 30mb BB + Digital TV last September. The student deal at the time was free BB & Tv for the final 4 months of a 12 month contract. I can clearly remember going over the details of the offer with the person on the phone at the time.

The offer was spoken about by UPC Jason on bargain alerts.

UPC: Jason wrote: »

Sign up now (before November 14th) and your broadband will be free next May, June, July & August. You can add digital TV and will also get that free for 4 months too when you take broadband.

30mb Broadband is available with this offer, and you will get a free wireless router also, meaning you can share the connection internally.

& also in their press release here: http://www.upc.ie/pdf/Home.pdf

Notable parts:

Rhona Bradshaw, Head of Marketing of UPC, commented, “We understand that it is getting
harder for students to make their budget stretch but broadband and TV are two services that most
students just can’t do without these days. Our latest offer allows students to get the best broadband
and digital TV services available for a full year while only paying for 8 months.”

&

UPC Student Package Offer
• New Students - Sign up for TV and Broadband for 12 Months and get Summer months for
free

So I paid Aprils bill over the phone earlier this month by Laser card and while doing so, confirmed that it would be the last month we would be billed. The lady on the phone said that we would still be billed for tv as it was only broadband which was free. I argued this with her from memory and informed her that she was incorrect. I did not have the press release or Jasons post in front of me at the time. She said she would look into it.

So this morning I get a txt saying that our account is in danger of suspension if we dont pay the balance of our bill. This confused me as first of all, we shouldnt owe anything and second of all, even if we did, we never received a bill.

So I ring them up and after 15 minutes on hold I get through to a human. She informs me that we owe 30 something euro for our TV package. I go through the same argument with her as last week. Although this time Im able to read to her directly from their literature. Infuriatingly, despite reading a direct quote from their head of marketing, from a press release on the offer, she still tells me I'm wrong. I get put through to a manager and he says that as far as he knows, TV is not included but he will look into it.

I spent 50 minutes on the call in total, and almost 40 minutes last week. It terrifies me to think how long I have spent on the phone to them over the 8 month contract. I'm genuinely not normally one to complain either. We have paid them almost 700 euro over the 8 month contract, and would have been willing to sign up again - but not now.

Has anyone else had similar issues with this deal?

Virgin Media: Jason

Tusky

Billing is not my area, but as you mention me directly in your post, I am happy to respond to you to assist.

Lots of people signed up to this student offer at various different times on different days over a 2 month period, so everybody will have different biling cycles. (so difficult to comment specifically without all the facts in your case)

I can confirm that if you signed up to TV and Broadband on the same day, you will get a full 4 months free billing cycle (the last 3 months) as part of your 12 month contract. If you are still experiencing difficulties in understanding your bill I would be happy to have a billing supervisor contact you directly. Please PM me your account number if you require this assistance.


Hope that helps

Regards

Jason

__________________
If you want to order new products from us and get a voucher for €50 through this boards offer, (and free activation of product) just click through this link http://www.upc.ie/boardsoffer/ (Please see the terms & conditions)

Want to see our products in use? Come into our new store in Carphone Warehouse on Henry Street, Dublin 1 and play with our HD TV and 30mb broadband yourself. Seeing is believing.


- For all customer service queries, please contact 1908.

**I am not authorised to comment in general threads without approval***

Tusky

UPC: Jason wrote: »

Tusky

Billing is not my area, but as you mention me directly in your post, I am happy to respond to you to assist.

Lots of people signed up to this student offer at various different times on different days over a 2 month period, so everybody will have different biling cycles. (so difficult to comment specifically without all the facts in your case)

I can confirm that if you signed up to TV and Broadband on the same day, you will get a full 3 months free billing cycle (the last 3 months) as part of your 12 month contract. If you are still experiencing difficulties in understanding your bill I would be happy to have a billing supervisor contact you directly. Please PM me your account number if you require this assistance.


Hope that helps

Regards

Jason

__________________
If you want to order new products from us and get a voucher for €50 through this boards offer, (and free activation of product) just click through this link http://www.upc.ie/boardsoffer/ (Please see the terms & conditions)

Want to see our products in use? Come into our new store in Carphone Warehouse on Henry Street, Dublin 1 and play with our HD TV and 30mb broadband yourself. Seeing is believing.


- For all customer service queries, please contact 1908.

**I am not authorised to comment in general threads without approval***

Thanks for the reply Jason. The problem is nothing to do with the billing cycle - the problem is that I am being told the offer does not include TV and I am being billed for it as a result. They have told me it is only broadband which is free for the final 4 months (4 months rather than the 3 mentioned in your post) and not TV.

Virgin Media: Jason

Hi Tusky

If you ordered "Student TV and broadband" at the same time,and qualified for that offer, then you will get the last 4 months free of subscription charge. (corrected my typo, thanks.)

Please PM me and I will get you sorted straight away, or twitter @weareupc . I cannot comment further on this. It trust your issue will be resolved with immediate effect.

Cheers

Jason

Tusky wrote: »

Thanks for the reply Jason. The problem is nothing to do with the billing cycle - the problem is that I am being told the offer does not include TV and I am being billed for it as a result. They have told me it is only broadband which is free for the final 4 months (4 months rather than the 3 mentioned in your post) and not TV.

Kingkong

Hi Jason,

RE: UPC STUDENT OFFER

I wonder can you help me I am having awful trouble getting my 4 months free with UPC at the moment. We noticed we were being direct debited the last 2 months are rang up. They informed us we had not signed up for the offer and were not entitled to the 4 months free.

The agent was very adamant and would not investigate it. I told the agent we had received the 50 euro voucher and we signed up via the website like www.upc.ie/boardsoffer

After that experience I didnt feel like ring up again and sent an email to upc explaining my case and that we were being billed. (see below response)

Dear Mr X,

Thank you for your recent email.

As per the account details I can confirm that one of the agents have already assisted your query also I would like to advise you please forward the copy of the confirmation email for the Offer so that we can assist you further.

For more helpful information, please visit the Customer Support section of our website.

If you have any further queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Kind regards,

Manisha

As you can see the response was not very helpful and immediately put the onus of proof on me. If you search my boards.ie posts you can see I posted about signing up for the offer back in september.

After digging through all my emails I did manage to find the original email from UPC confirming I had used the www.upc.ie/boardsoffer page. The email is dated is 17 September and has a reference of GNN-463051.

I also noticed that a company called Rigney Dolphin is/was acting as an agent of UPC for this offer. Can I ask is UPC having difficulties tracking the accounts which have signed up to the student offers due to outscouring customer service support to this company?

Thanks

Virgin Media: Jason

Hi Kingkong

Sorry for the delayed response, I was on annual leave.


I will have my guys call you now to sort out for you. Sorry for any confusion

Regards

Jason

Kingkong wrote: »

Hi Jason,

RE: UPC STUDENT OFFER

I wonder can you help me I am having awful trouble getting my 4 months free with UPC at the moment. We noticed we were being direct debited the last 2 months are rang up. They informed us we had not signed up for the offer and were not entitled to the 4 months free.

The agent was very adamant and would not investigate it. I told the agent we had received the 50 euro voucher and we signed up via the website like www.upc.ie/boardsoffer

After that experience I didnt feel like ring up again and sent an email to upc explaining my case and that we were being billed. (see below response)



As you can see the response was not very helpful and immediately put the onus of proof on me. If you search my boards.ie posts you can see I posted about signing up for the offer back in september.

After digging through all my emails I did manage to find the original email from UPC confirming I had used the www.upc.ie/boardsoffer page. The email is dated is 17 September and has a reference of GNN-463051.

I also noticed that a company called Rigney Dolphin is/was acting as an agent of UPC for this offer. Can I ask is UPC having difficulties tracking the accounts which have signed up to the student offers due to outscouring customer service support to this company?

Thanks

padocon

This is the type of thing that drives me mad, I will remember this when choosing my package next year. Hope you get it sorted OP.

iknorr

Im having the same problem.

I came across this thread while searching for proof of my contact about the student offer.

I have signed up to the student offer. But when i check my bill a few day ago ( DD) i noticed i have been charged for 10 months broadband instead of the 8 and 4 free.

3rd problem i have had wtih UPC regarding billing issues in 10 months.
All the time im ending up paying more & not getting what i paid for.

The order was made over the phone. So there is a record of it as i have used that recording as proof about another issue.

Jason if i PM you about this issue & 1 other billing issue can you have a look into it as i find i usually get nowhere with the emailing customer support ( from previous experience, it took months of emailing to finally get a solution )

Ricky91t

padocon wrote: »

This is the type of thing that drives me mad, I will remember this when choosing my package next year. Hope you get it sorted OP.

You'd be stupid not to go with UPC if you're considering getting broadband/TV in a student house.

Firstly they offer student packages which you get the summer free for, yes there are problems with some but I've had none with mine.

Secondly they offer the quickest broadband around and one of the biggest caps, Your alternative would be either Eircom/mobile broadband and Sky digital/no tv. Good luck with them, my friends who couldn't get UPC went with the above alternatives, 9 months of hell during college term and then 3 months of paying for something when they weren't even using it.

Ricky91t

OP, you're having the same problem as me. You signed up for a 12 month contract, but not on the first day of September. Because of this, you're still in the contract till the date in September that you signed up for the service last year. So you have to pay that or else you're in breach of your contract.

You haven't been billed for the four free months but UPC seem to bill you 15 days in advance of the month coming so you're now being billed for the days in September to get you to the end of your contract!

padocon

Ricky91t wrote: »

You'd be stupid not to go with UPC if you're considering getting broadband/TV in a student house.

Firstly they offer student packages which you get the summer free for, yes there are problems with some but I've had none with mine.

Secondly they offer the quickest broadband around and one of the biggest caps, Your alternative would be either Eircom/mobile broadband and Sky digital/no tv. Good luck with them, my friends who couldn't get UPC went with the above alternatives, 9 months of hell during college term and then 3 months of paying for something when they weren't even using it.

Summer free is a good offer, never knew that was available, mind you haven't looked into them at all. As for Eircom, I have had they a good few years at home and I have found there costumer service quite good. Thanks for the recommendation.

Fly High

Hey,
Sorry to crash your thread but Jason could you tell me if this offer is still available? Moving into a student house for the upcoming year!

Ricky91t

I'm also wondering the same, no mention of it on the site...

Virgin Media: Jason

All

Yes, full details of this years student offer will be announced next Monday - you wont be dissapointed. (Don't order off anyone else....) - You will be able to order via boards too ........
Details to follow ASAP.

Regards

Jason

dog_pig

UPC: Jason wrote: »

All

Yes, full details of this years student offer will be announced next Monday - you wont be dissapointed. (Don't order off anyone else....) - You will be able to order via boards too ........
Details to follow ASAP.

Regards

Jason

Any chance you could give some information about the offer? We're in dire need of of a connection and I'm not sure we can wait until next Monday!

Ricky91t

UPC: Jason wrote: »

All

Yes, full details of this years student offer will be announced next Monday - you wont be dissapointed. (Don't order off anyone else....) - You will be able to order via boards too ........
Details to follow ASAP.

Regards

Jason

Oh Interesting

truisi

I signed up for UPC broadband in September and was unable to receive this deal. I called UPC and I was told that because I signed up days before the offer became public I am unable to receive the 4 free months. I was told to put in a complaint and they may be able to help me get this sorted out. I did not receive and activate the account before the offer was valid.
I would like to know if anyone could help me get this offer activated so I do not have to cancel my UPC over the summer, (I won't be in town for the summer)
Thank you