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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Business
Emma Munbodh

Virgin Media down: Thousands complain over TV and broadband outage across UK

Thousands of Virgin Media customers have been left without service, with television and broadband down for customers across the country.

According to website Downdetector, the issues began at around 8am with more than 10,000 people complaining about connectivity issues.

Virgin Media said that there is a known issue - with London and Greater London affected by the outage.

A Virgin Media spokesperson said: “We’re aware that some customers in parts of London are experiencing an issue with their broadband. We are working as quickly as possible to restore services and apologise to those affected.”

If you're having issues in your area, you can use the Virgin Media service status tool to check your connectivity.

When Mirror Money entered several London postcodes into the tool, it said: "Sorry, we're experiencing technical issues with our Television services at the moment. Hence, we are not able to produce the right set of outages. The outages produces below may or may not affect you."

It comes as around 30% of the UK are relying on the internet to work from home as part of the government's coronavirus restrictions.

Virgin Media has 3.2million customers, including around 6million broadband subscribers.

On Downdetector, 73% of issues appear to be linked to internet connectivity, while 16% of people have no mobile internet and 9% no TV service.

One customer on twtter wrote: "Tried the service status page which is down. Also rang the number you mention, apparently our account number and area code aren't even recognised...! Now what?!"

Another said: "@virginmedia power light on my WiFi hub is flashing green. No other lights are on. Can you help? Trying to work from home!"

The majority of issues appear to be affecting those in the London area: "Good morning to every other Londoner tethering their phone to try and get some work done despite @virginmedia appalling service," one complaint explained.

The network provider says that there isn't a nationwide outage and that complaints are likely to refer to individual in-house issues.

This means that there is no set time when the issues are likely to be fixed for customers.

Virgin Media is signed up to the Automatic Compensation Scheme which makes it easier for customers to get money back when their service goes wrong.

However in this instance, it's unlikely you'll get any compensation automatically as the scheme only covers customers when internet goes down for two or more full days.

We've got a full guide on your broadband refund rights, here.

Ernest Doku, tech expert at Uswitch.com, said: "Our research found that more nearly three quarters (71%) of Londoners have struggled with their broadband or mobile signal during lockdown.

"If your broadband is down, and you have the additional data on your mobile contract, you may be able to tether to your phone and use it as a hub to connect to the internet. Just remember that using your mobile phone data in this way will eat up your allowance far quicker than if you only used it for your smartphone."

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