Virgin Media’s Exit Fees for Non-Network Areas Put Under Spotlight

A new article has once again highlighted Virgin Media UK’s practice of charging hefty contract exit fees, which specifically relates to situations where customers move house into an area that exists outside of the operator’s current broadband ISP and TV network coverage.

At present the operator’s cable broadband and TV network is available to over half of premises across the United Kingdom (they aim to reach around 60-65% of UK premises by 2019/20), albeit predominantly inside urban areas. Obviously that can create a problem when customers move house into an area that Virgin Media cannot serve.

Nearly all of the market’s largest broadband and phone providers will levy some form of Early Termination Charge (ETC), which applies to customers that choose to exit their contract before the current term has come to an end. Virgin Media calls these Early Disconnection Fees and they can range from about +£10 to +£24 per month (applies to the remaining months of your existing contract). Similar fees also exist for the TV side.

However this becomes more controversial when the customer wishes to retain VM’s service but is unable to do so because their network does not exist in the new area (other ISPs have been known to waive these fees for similar situations). The Guardian highlights how a number of customers have been hit by such exit fees, which can often be well above the £100 mark.

The good news is that Ofcom has been conducting a probe of Virgin Media’s contract cancellation charges (here), which began last June 2017 and is due to report back with a “provisional decision” in April 2018. A spokesperson for Virgin Media said, “We note Ofcom’s investigation into early termination charges and are working with them during their inquiry.”

Mind you there can be wider issues with exit fees, such as when they are forced upon customers who are attempting to leave their contract early due to terrible support or service quality. Typically ISPs do incur costs when setting up a new service and the whole purpose of offering a longer contract term is to help mitigate that for customers, such as via lower pricing. The downside is this can make it harder to exit when the service is poor.

We should point out that some providers, including Virgin Media and many smaller ISPs, do offer the option of shorter monthly contracts and these naturally tend to attract a higher price. Nevertheless if you’re unsure about the quality of a service then sometimes it’s worth using the shorter contract option as a means of trying the service before committing to a longer term at less cost.

Anybody in this sort of situation would be well advised to take a gander at our ISP Complaints and Advice section, which covers some of the situations, common rules and how to get related disputes resolved.