Let's see if Virgin Media's unwanted mail opt-out works

[POSTMAN]

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So far it’s been impossible to stop the avalanche of post sent to ‘The Occupier’

Like SK in your 8 August column, I suffer from the avalanche of Virgin Media mailings addressed to “The Occupier”, but the spokeswoman you quoted is being disingenuous. Her “solution” – the Royal Mail’s opt-out service – only stops delivery of unaddressed leaflets and flyers, not anything actually posted as a letter.

I’m registered with the service and still get endless Virgin mailings. Marking them “not known” or “gone away” and putting them back in the post seems like an option, but I’m not convinced they ever get back to Virgin, or that the company takes any notice if they do. I think you need to press Virgin Media much harder on its mailing policy and why it thinks it’s OK to piss people off like this. DK, London

We had several letters along these lines, and one might be tempted to conclude that Virgin Media has been trying to pull the wool over our eyes. As you say, the Royal Mail opt-out service does not stop these letters to “The Occupier”. We accepted Virgin’s claim face value but this has turned out to be nonsense – as confirmed by Royal Mail this week. So we’ve gone back to Virgin Media to ask, on many readers’ behalf, how they can stop these annoying letters.

After much to-ing and fro-ing, the company has come up with a way to opt out. Virgin says readers should email their full name and address (including the postcode) to optout@virginmedia.co.uk. This is processed within “a couple of days”; however, you may receive letters for up to a further six weeks due to the way it processes its data for the next month’s mailings.

Readers can also phone Virgin’s call centres on 0345 454 2222 and ask to be removed from the mailing list. The agent fills out a form on its system, and the same process/timing applies, it says. Let’s see if that works.