By Jo Best, 8 November 2006 12:40
NEWS
Goodbye NTL:Telewest, hello Virgin Media - the UK's first quadruple play player has been rechristened.
After the long buyout saga that saw NTL and Telewest merge and then acquire Virgin Mobile, the consumer division of the combined company, NTL:Telewest, will go under the new name Virgin Media from the first quarter of next year.
Post-rebrand, the company will push content across various delivery platforms and has already announced its first quadruple play offering, where users can buy their broadband access, pay TV, fixed and mobile phone from a single supplier. Pre-rebrand, the business units will continue to operate under their own names.
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In financial results out today, NTL:Telewest revealed its losses have deepened as a result of the acquisition. For the quarter ended 30 September, the operator reported operational losses of £9.6m, compared to £4.7m in the corresponding quarter last year.
NTL:Telewest attributed the increase to costs associated with rebranding and restructuring.
NTL:Telewest is hoping to remake itself in the image of Virgin. Not known for its great customer service, the cable co will be spending £5m this year to improve its customer care.
The company is also looking to boost its broadband speeds under the Virgin banner. NTL:Telewest is to begin trialling a 50Mbps service with a rollout likely next year.
Comments
There are 7 comments. Join the discussion
1. Rory Choudhuri
>>Not known for its great customer service
Priceless! After having suffered again at the hands of NTL over the last few days, it was good to get a laugh!
2. Rob
Really goes to show that bad news travels faster than good news. I've been with NTL for about 3-4 years now and my experience with their Customer Service has been nigh on excellent.
3. misceng
Rob you don't know how lucky you are. I am waiting for a little bit of stability in the broadband market to get away from ntl under any name. I have never had an answer from ntl in any form about anything. Letters, phone calls or email are either ignored or the response is to tell you rubbish and in most cases blame you or your equipment.
4. Sarah
Whatever they are called they will still have the same awful customer service that drove me away from them.
If they spent as much on their customer service as they obviously will do on this rebranding and their PR, then they might be a half decent organisation.
5. anonymous
I support Rob - On the one occaision that I had to use their support the response was quick correct and very effective. I do have the technical background to ask the correct questions!
I have run a computer services help desk in the past and one of the biggest problems from the other side of the fence was customer ignorance coupled with downright dishonest error reporting - then there were the cleaners pulling the plugs out overnight for the vacuums......
6. John Hewett
NTL have improved enormously since the days I waited 8 hours not to get an answer from Custmer service. A complaint to OFTEL got me a phone call from the MDs office within an hour. They may have improved but they still provide the worst customer care of any organization I use, I don't think an extra £5million will be enough
7. anonymous
£5m investment - LOL.
Over the last 3 years i am sure they have made more then £5M in cuts within customer service, so all they are actually doing is returning to the awful state they were a few years ago instead of their current chronic state.
Is the Virgin brand supposed to lure the disgruntled customer back ROFL.