Neil Berkett has a reputation for being a measured, pragmatic chief executive. The New Zealander, a self-confessed “practical Antipodean”, who was brought in as head of Virgin Media last year to replace Steve Burch, has a record of making smart market moves.

His company, however, is not immune to the credit crunch. Yesterday, the cable company said that it was in talks with its senior lenders to agree a three-year delay on repayments of its £4.4 billion debt.

“It shows he’s not afraid to act early,” one analyst said yesterday. “Virgin showed this when it released a $1 billion convertible bonds issue earlier this year, taking advantage of the market. Tackling the debt issue now is a pragmatic first step that buys it some time.”

Virgin Media’s share price soared by as much as 36 per cent on the news.

The group was due to refinance its debt next year, ahead of a set of hefty repayments – including £1.1 billion in 2010 and just under £1 billion in 2011 – but with the credit markets in turmoil, this may have proved impossible. Rather than be faced with a problem next year, the group has opted to talk to its lenders to delay the payments. The hope is that Mr Berkett will be able to bring the business to the point where the free cashflow can cope with the repayments.

Mr Berkett, 52, is comfortable around numbers, having joined ICL Australia as an accountant in 1978, rising in just five years to become their youngest-ever financial controller.

The Virgin Media boss’s CV is nothing if not varied. He started his working life in the New Zealand Post Office in the early Seventies. He has had stints in consultancy, followed by a financial role at Australia’s Eastwest Airlines, where he became chief executive after one year.

He is a former head of retail at St George Bank, Australia’s fifth-largest bank. He then moved to the UK where he bought, ran and successfully sold two businesses, only to move back to finance, first as chief executive officer at Prudential Assurance and then as managing director, distribution, at Lloyds TSB.

Whatever the future holds for Virgin – and with fierce competition from the likes of BSkyB, BT and Carphone Warehouse in the broadband market it is unlikely to be a smooth ride – Mr Berkett can at least breath a sigh of relief that he is no longer in the banking sector.

Yesterday’s move buys Virgin breathing space in troubled times.