Virgin Media Business broadband review: Cracking speeds, so-so customer support

Big players have joined forces in the broadband market in recent years, and Virgin Media’s marriage to O2 is a prime example. It was good news for Virgin Media Business customers, as those on certain tariffs now have the luxury of a 4G connection to fall back on if their fixed-line connection fails.

Unfortunately, it seems that Virgin Media Business customers are more likely than anyone else to need that fallback option, as the company scored the worst in reliability of any of the major providers in our survey.

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Of course, if there are problems with your business broadband connection, the one thing you really want is someone on the end of a phone line who’s ready to resolve it. Unfortunately for Virgin Media Business customers, there’s still work to do on the company’s customer service. In our survey, 6% of the company’s customers declared themselves dissatisfied with the customer service – the worst score of any provider in our survey – although it has to be said that almost nine out of ten customers were happy.

Still, if there’s something Virgin Media has long had in its favour, it’s speed. The slowest connection the company offers is 100Mbits/sec, which is more than you might be able to receive from other providers on a comparative plan. And, although it didn’t top the charts for speed in our survey, the availability of different speeds, from 100Mbits/sec all the way up to 1Gbit/sec, gives business customers a decent range of options to choose from, as we’ll explore further below.

Virgin Media Business broadband review: Essential 100 and Voom 400, 600, Gig1

If you’re just looking for a fixed-line broadband-only deal, Virgin has four speed tiers, ranging from 100Mbits/sec right through to 1Gbit/sec. However, there’s more that differentiates the various tariffs than just speed.

The cheapest Essential 100 package has a 48-working-hour resolution guarantee, which in theory means you could be waiting up to five days for a problem to be resolved (there are ten working hours on weekdays), although Virgin claims that in “the rare situation where a customer needs an engineer to attend outside of working hours, the issue will be escalated to a field team to resolve”. On the most expensive Gig1 package, that time is reduced to only 12 working hours.

The number of static IP addresses also varies. There are no static IP addresses on Essential, but you get up to five on Gig1, which could come in handy for things such as remote access to files on office computers. Be sure to check all the package details carefully before you buy.

It’s also worth noting that each of these packages can be bundled with a landline for £7 extra per month. Likewise, another £7 can provide you with the 4G backup for your connection, provided by the O2 network.

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Virgin Media Business broadband review: Volt Voom 400, 600, 800 and Gig1 with SIMs

It’s more common these days for businesses to want mobile SIMs with their broadband, not landlines. These Virgin tariffs – branded as “Volt Voom” – all include an O2 SIM with 6GB of data, and some also include a fixed line.

Again, repair times and the number of static IP addresses improve as you move up in speed and price, and all of the packages include 4G broadband backup (though it’s an option to choose between that or a speed boost to 600Mbits/sec on the cheapest Volt Voom 400 tariff).

Another Volt bonus is a Wi-Fi router that includes guest Wi-Fi facilities, which could be handy if you regularly have outside visitors to your office.

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Virgin Media Business broadband review: Coverage

Virgin’s network is by no means nationwide. Just under 60% of the country’s households and business premises are within reach of its network, although Virgin plans to cover 80% by 2026.

However, unlike with the Openreach-based providers, anyone able to connect to Virgin’s network will be able to hit the top gigabit speed. So, if connection speed is absolutely essential to your business and you live in one of the country’s major towns or cities, Virgin Media Business will likely be your best chance of getting gigabit-grade bandwidth.

Virgin Media Business broadband review: Performance and customer satisfaction

Although, on the face of it, Virgin Media offers some of the fastest connections in the country, there was more than the odd grumble about its speeds among the businesses we surveyed. Just over 7% of customers said they were unhappy with the speed they were receiving, compared to less than 1% dissatisfaction with Vodafone’s speeds, for example.

We suspect these speed gripes might be related to reliability, where Virgin Media finished bottom with, again, 7% of customers left unhappy.

However, these scores do need to be put in context: in every category, Virgin Media still has more than 80% satisfied customers – so, it’s not perfect, but by no means a disaster, either – and just under 80% of customers said they were likely to recommend Virgin Media Business.

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Virgin Media Business broadband review: Verdict

With a comprehensive range of fast connections, and a good selection of 4G backup and phone line options to go with them, Virgin Media Business has a package to suit pretty much any business.

However, the company needs to iron out the kinks in its customer service and its reliability if it wants to trouble the award winners. There’s no doubting Virgin’s speed, but if rock-solid reliability is your priority, it may be wise to look elsewhere.

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