Virgin Media hit by widespread outage

Broadband services down for customers across the UK with phone and TV services also affected for some

Virgin Media customers across the UK have reported failures in the provider's broadband services.

The site Downdetector, which tracts customer complaints about online services, indicates that problems started around 1.15am with the maximum number of reports received at around 8am, presumably as customers tried to log on in the morning.

Reports of outages were received across the country, including from London, Cardiff, Birmingham and Glasgow. For most customers, the problems were resolved around 8.30am, although complaints continued to trickle in on social media.

The outage apparently disrupted Virgin Media's own site, with the service status page down for many during the outage. The company's DNS servers were also apparently affected, with some customers reporting success using VPNs to bypass the firm's infrastructure.

Some customers also reported problems with other services, including phone and TV channels.

Virgin Media has been replying to complaints on Twitter with the following statement

"We're aware of an issue that is affecting broadband services for Virgin Media Business customers as well as our contact centres. Our teams are currently working to identify and fix the problem as quickly as possible and we apologise to those customers affected."

Last year Ofcom reported that Virgin Media, which is owned by multinational telecoms giant Liberty Global, was the second most complained about broadband service in the UK, receiving 18 complaints per 100,000 consumers.

The timing is particularly unfortunate for Virgin Media, which this month hiked its average prices for broadband, TV and home phone services by an average of 13.8%.