I started with Freenetname which was a small ISP that provided you with a domain name and website registered with Nominet. That ISP was taken over by Madasafish which in turn was acquired by Plusnet (which you'll know is owned now by BT)

I only moved to BT last year because of the sports coverage they provide free on the sky system and asked Madasafish (Plusnet) if I could retain the e-mail service. They agreed to that and quoted a fee of £1.69 which is invoiced monthly and paid by direct debit. The e-mails are redirected to my BT e-mail system

Do they allow you to transfer the domain to a different (cheaper) domain registrar such as 123-reg?

Quite honestly I'm happy the way it is at the moment. It works! and when I look at some problems folk have on the forum....

I guess the way I would go would be to start a new domain with Nominet via such as you suggest

Yeah, you could create a new domain or migrate your existing one, it would be a bit cheaper. .co.uk domains at 123-reg are only about £4 a year and include email forwarding in the price.

I remember those ISPs with a free domain. They had a catch whereby they would charge a crazy amount of money (e.g. £100) to transfer the domain out to a new provider, essentially using it as a tool to lock you in. Not good.

In reply to a post by MHC:

Tech support - both use call centres where English is not always their first language; India for BT and Yorkshire for Plusnet!

Superb!