Brief update

[tigerfort]

Uh, wow, it's been a long time, hasn't it. Oops.

Anyway, quick comment that I currently don't have a mobile at all, and when I do have one next it'll almost certainly be a new number. It'll still be unlikely to get answered or checked for messages or anything, so this is unlikely to affect anyone very much :).

(Why? Well, Virgin Mobile very kindly sent someone else a replacement sim for my number. Having repeatedly failed to get them to do anything useful to correct this, I'm now giving up and getting a new sim from someone else. The probably-a-fiver-or-so of PAYG credit simply isn't worth the hassle; I'm probably going to decide the same about trying to get the old number transferred.)

Otherwise, things are ... (gestures at pandemic, rapidly approaching crash brexit, global climate crisis, Tory Kleptocrat government, etc)

Comments

[sir_guinglain]

That's a great pity. I've never had any problems with Virgin Mobile offering me extra replacement sims through misdirection; how unhelpful.

[tigerfort]

I'm making a couple of assumptions, with that description. To be fair, it could also be that someone stole it in the post, or that Virgin simply failed to send it - but given that it's been totally impossible to get any kind of human reply or even acknowledgement of the problem...
The full version is that I got a text a couple of months ago saying "we need to send you a replacement sim, please go to our website and confirm your address". So I went to their website (very definitely; no clicking on links here:), and confirmed that the address associated with my number was still correct. A month or so later (having totally forgotten about it in the meantime), I got a text saying "you need to switch to the new sim this week or you'll no longer be able to connect to our network".
Back to the website, which says that a new sim is in the post to me and should arrive that week. A few days after that, my phone stops working for anything except 999 calls. Check website, still "in the post". OK, delivery of basically everything has been messed up this year, I can wait.
Fast-forward to last week, when I suddenly realise that I still don't have a working phone, and go check their website again. Now it says "Congratulations, you are already using your new sim!". Which... yeah, no. All attempts to get further information or a replacement sim have been met with the website telling me that I need to contact them from the mobile number in question. Which I can't do, because the phone won't connect to their network any more.
I've wasted a couple of hours over the last couple of weeks trying to find some way of getting through, and now I'm giving up because it's clearly going to be quicker and easier to just get a new sim.

(Edit to add: sorry for the great wall of text. I just... [gestures in frustration])

[sir_guinglain]

Utterly hopeless - and suggests that someone else is merrily using your number. I've been able to contact Virgin Mobile from another phone and speak to an 'agent' before on a similar topic, but it's increasingly difficult to do that now in our laughably-named service economy.

[ewx]

'Engage with company on Twitter' is a fairly common strategy when they're inaccessible or unhelpful by other means (although with mixed results).