Virginmedia -is a great brand losing the plot?

Years ago, in the days when my business interests included several travel agents, I saw first-hand the corporate bullying that Virgin airline founder Richard Branson had to suffer from his evil-hearted competitors. Branson kept his head, did his stuff -and the public voted for him with their wallets. Since then, I've held the Virgin brand -and all that it stood for in high regard. In the tough times that face us all today, Britain needs fearless, innovative businesses like Branson's Virgin.

For several years Virginmedia have provided my home telecoms. They gave me a plodding but solid phone+broadband deal and I was impressed. Especially because, for the little things that sometimes go wrong, they had nice people on hand to fix them. I got the impression that, from holidays to phone services, the guys at VIRGIN really cared about their customers -and would work hard to keep folks like me coming back for more -and telling their friends.

A couple of months ago, having gone through a bad time with broadband reliability which virgin couldn't fix without me spending more money, I decided to switch my phone and broadband package to one of their national competitors. The automated confirmations of transfer I received from Virgin promised me a hassle-free handover. On the appointed day my new provider took over my phone and broadband accounts and all went well.

Unfortunately someone at Virginmedia forgot to stop charging their recurring monthly subscription fees to my credit card. Even today, when I checked, they were rolling on into September. Immediate action was called for.

The glitzy Virginmedia website points the user everywhere except to a contact email address; so, this afternoon, I attempted to resolve matters by phoning the "customer service" people. I first spoke to "Lexie" -(she refused to tell me her full name) who told me that her system showed that my account had NEVER been terminated and that monthly charges from Virginmedia were still being debited to my credit card. Lexie refused to accept that the automated emails from virgin indicating "closure" were sufficient to "switch-off" my account. I insisted on speaking to "Danny" her line-manager.

Danny (request for surname also flatly refused) admitted that my story was commonplace in the industry at the present time. He said that the fault was with my new telecoms provider and, although he could effect immediate closure of my account as from today, he could not explain why I was still being charged when the virgin system had communicated their service would be ending. Even worse, any refunds I might get would be by company cheque, a process that might take some weeks

Danny went on to say that my complaint was just one of many that he was aware of at this time that were in the pipeline..Well Virginmedia, that's NOT GOOD ENOUGH. Despite having in my possession, emails in which Executive Director, MARK DAVIDSON confirms that my virginmedia package would end 23-06-2011, without my intervention today, Virgin would have continued monthly charges to my credit card.

I want an IMMEDIATE apology and a FULL EXPLANATION from a responsible executive at Virginmedia -preferably from somebody who is proud enough of their corporate function to reveal their FULL NAME.

I look forward to the time when, once again, I can say nice things about VIRGIN. Stay tuned...