Aquiss price

I was previously a customer of Aquiss on their Pure Fibre 1000 product which I got for 3 months at half price. Service was good and happy with the price. Obviously even better deal now with 6 months at half price.

My issue is that they are not competitive from year 2 onwards, I have set a limit of £50/month and that is easy to get, there are even options at £40/month and while their service is good (better than most!) good is also not that hard to find. Ideally no interations is the way to go!

I'm a few months away from my 24 month contract with someone else ending (and even though they have annual price rises I have maintained my sub £50/month), my intention is to go back to Aquiss but as it stands, for a year when I will have to make a decision on where to then move to.

Do you really need 1000? When I was on FTTC, about 4 years ago, I ordered 40 instead of 80. It was enough for 2 of us. We moved and the best we could get was wireless broadband and I ordered 30 instead of 60 and that was just about enough. And now I am on 220, upgraded from the 160 I ordered.

Why do you think you need 1000?

Aquiss look to be uncompetitive on all packages from month 6 onwards, not just the 1000 service.

Edited by FibreBubble (Sat 19-Apr-25 21:40:26)

... if your only consideration is price.

Which is why I asked OP about their use case. I am quite happy to trade all my speed above the 160 I originally contracted for to get

• No CGNAT
• IPv6 on request
• clean BQM
• responsive and knowledgeable support
• very little need to involve support in the first place

In other words, there is more to it than just price and headline speed. Everyone is different, but some of it is more important to me than those 2 parameters and I am guessing that OP is in the process of balancing all those factors against price, so OP might want to question their speed as part of their evaluation of options

Edited by DFScale (Sat 19-Apr-25 21:38:24)

The OP is considering price. On that note, there is no need to reduce price by moving to slower similarly uncompetitive services. This is bad advice to the OP.

There are plenty of services that are cheaper and also offer no cgnat and ip6 as standard, should that also be important to the OP.

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The OP is considering price. . . .

Why do you think it is not a valid question to ask the OP to consider what connection speed they actually need? This could have a significant effect on the price.

The other points you make have their own validity but do not justify your comment about bad advice.

The speed is the speed - not in question and not questioned in my OP!

As I said, support from Aquisss is good (maybe very good) but so is my current provider and good support is not hard to find. In my time with Aquiss (1 year) I raised 1 issue that was dealt with quickly and without fuss, with my current provider (1.5 years) I have had no issues to raise. My experience is that they are at least good but (worthless) surveys tell me that they are highly rated.

The 'issue' is simply on year 1 price versus subsequent yearly pricing - in my opinion they encourage you to move away after 1 year.

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The OP is considering price. On that note, there is no need to reduce price by moving to slower similarly uncompetitive services. This is bad advice to the OP.

There are plenty of services that are cheaper and also offer no cgnat and ip6 as standard, should that also be important to the OP.

Plainly OP is happy with everything about Aquiss except the price. When I look at my own needs, from just a year ago, 30M was adequate [except for the outdated 'fair use' policy]. So I would say that 50M would do me fine. And 1000M would meet my needs about 2000%. But I am happy to pay what I do for 400% of the speed I need. I am taking my own advice and I am living happily by it, no matter how bad you think it is.

We don't know what speed the OP needs. But the likelihood is that 1000M is 100% or more in excess of what they need. And if you make a plain reading of what OP is saying, there is a price point at which they would be quite satisfied with Aquiss. So maybe there is a speed and price point at which OP would be happy. But either way, OP is not so daft as to be unable to apply the question of speed to all ISPs which are in consideration.

I think your contribution is just patronising.

In reply to a post by DFScale:

Do you really need 1000? When I was on FTTC, about 4 years ago, I ordered 40 instead of 80. It was enough for 2 of us. We moved and the best we could get was wireless broadband and I ordered 30 instead of 60 and that was just about enough. And now I am on 220, upgraded from the 160 I ordered.

Why do you think you need 1000?

I second this. I'm on Aquiss 300/50: it gets me to a £45 price point, which I'm happy to pay, and is the best of all worlds as far as I'm concerned.

You might be able to get 1G for the same or even slightly less from other providers, but once you factor +£3 within a year and +£6 a year later, the overall price becomes similar - and you're locked in for 2 years.

Personally, I don't think most people will notice the difference between 1G and 300M - especially when using wireless - except when running speedtests.

But at the end of the day, it's really down to what you want and what's most important to you.

I'm also very pleased with Aquiss, and my BQM is noticeably cleaner than it was with BT.
As for speeds, I have the 500/75 only because I like the higher upload speeds as I upload files to the cloud.
In my area, we only have Openreach FTTP and no one does symmetrical speeds, so to get a decent upload you need to pick the higher download packages.

Perhaps coincidentally Mark over at ISP Review has yesterday published this price guide on 1 Gbps tier pricing (current versus historic) for various providers. See:

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2025/04/compar...

Might be somewhat useful / insightful.

What ISP are you currently with?

Just did a quick tot up and average of the lowest in-contract prices for those 41 listed ISP prices for a 1 Gbps service is:

Average: £42.03
Median: £40.00
S/Deviation: £12.68

Highest: £79 (Wessex Internet)
Lowest: £25 (Community Fibre)

Edited by Pheasant (Sun 20-Apr-25 14:53:09)

I didn't see Sky, Plusnet or TalkTalk on the list which may affect the sums.

Added in Aquiss (separate prices for Openreach, CityFibre and Fibreheroes/FullFibre), Plusnet, Sky, TalkTalk and UnchainedISP.

Sky and TT are very close to the average price anyway. Cerberus web pricing is offline so couldn't add them for now.

Makes a tiny overall difference to the average and SD.

Average: £42.40
Median: £40.00
S/Deviation: £12.53

Edited by Pheasant (Sun 20-Apr-25 18:15:38)

Thanks. Very surprising that ISPReview didn't include Sky, TalkTalk and Plusnet as these providers make up a massive chunk of the market.

Especially Plusnet when ISPReview published details of their £36.99 a month 1000 service only two days previously.

Edited by FibreBubble (Sun 20-Apr-25 21:41:18)

The table below is intended to examine how prices for consumer facing 1Gbps packages have changed over time, thus we’re continuing to use our original ISP sample from 2022 and haven’t added any new ones

If Plusnet weren't doing FTTP in 2022 (or just weren't included in the first article) they won't appear on the second.

Edited by jpm (Sun 20-Apr-25 22:53:06)

Okay, thanks. Makes some sort of sense.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Cerberus web pricing is offline so couldn't add them for now.

"The website encountered an unexpected error. Please try again later."

Yeah, that's not very impressive

Currently Aquiss charge £495 in year 1 and £660 in years 2+

I am just coming to the end of a contract where I will have paid £538 in year 1 and £578 in year 2. Year 3 will be higher on paper but I know that I can haggle and will likely continue around the £578 mark - or I'll simply go back to Aquiss for 1 year!

I have just worked out that Aquiss is £50.42/month over 3 years but that ongoing £660 is too much to swallow.

Yes. The price before the mid contract price rise in the first year is doing a lot of heavy lifting here.

Edited by FibreBubble (Mon 21-Apr-25 21:13:59)

In reply to a post by tallseabird:

The speed is the speed - not in question and not questioned in my OP!

What does this mean? That you are adamant you must have 1000M? Or that you don't question the speed? Or what?

In reply to a post by tallseabird:

Currently Aquiss charge £495 in year 1 and £660 in years 2+

I am just coming to the end of a contract where I will have paid £538 in year 1 and £578 in year 2. Year 3 will be higher on paper but I know that I can haggle and will likely continue around the £578 mark - or I'll simply go back to Aquiss for 1 year!

I have just worked out that Aquiss is £50.42/month over 3 years but that ongoing £660 is too much to swallow.

Apparently you can re-contract with Aquiss after year 3 and get any discounts .

so

year 1 - 12 month contract - and any discount
year 2 - rolling monthly
year 3 - 12 month contract and any discount.

In reply to a post by Taras:

Apparently you can re-contract with Aquiss after year 3 and get any discounts .

so

year 1 - 12 month contract - and any discount
year 2 - rolling monthly
year 3 - 12 month contract and any discount.

That's not quite right - the timeline would look like this...

year 1 - 12 month contract - with discount
year 2 - rolling monthly
year 3 - rolling contract
year 4 - recontracted for 12 months with discount

In reply to a post by binary:

That's not quite right - the timeline would look like this...

year 1 - 12 month contract - with discount
year 2 - rolling monthly
year 3 - rolling contract
year 4 - recontracted for 12 months with discount

Above is also how I understood it based on the post from Martin below

In reply to a post by aquiss:

Any offers that we may run, based on our current business practices, are for new customers and those who have have been with us for 3 years or more, as we believe this both encourages new business and rewards loyalty.

It seems a bit strange that this is not mentioned in the Aquiss ts and cs nor would it seem to be offered routinely to those starting their 4th year of broadband service with Aquiss.

Checking back I can see that I made my first payment to Aquiss in April 2022: the email notification for payment for the coming month has just arrived at the standard rate with no offer of a new contract at a discounted rate.

For completeness, I again should add that the quality of service on my line continues to be excellent.

The other costs to consider as I understand it for this ISP are for buying your own router, if you do not have one and the disconnection charge at the end of the contract if you move on?

That is correct.

The disconnection charge is if you move house (whether or not you subscribe to Aquiss in the new property), or if you terminate broadband without switching to another provider.

Most other ISPs hide these costs by locking you into an 18-24 month contract (almost all 24 months these days).

In reply to a post by GoWest:

It seems a bit strange that this is not mentioned in the Aquiss ts and cs nor would it seem to be offered routinely to those starting their 4th year of broadband service with Aquiss.

Checking back I can see that I made my first payment to Aquiss in April 2022: the email notification for payment for the coming month has just arrived at the standard rate with no offer of a new contract at a discounted rate.

We are only going by what Martin said in his post (you could contact Aquiss directly if unsure), he does say in the post "new customers and those who have have been with us for 3 years or more" so you could assume (rightly or wrongly) that the half price deal is available every year after the 3rd year.

In reply to a post by PCJM40:

We are only going by what Martin said in his post (you could contact Aquiss directly if unsure), he does say in the post "new customers and those who have have been with us for 3 years or more" so you could assume (rightly or wrongly) that the half price deal is available every year after the 3rd year.

That wouldn't be my assumption - I'd think it's available for those who have been customers for 3 or more years, and perhaps only those customers who get in touch to enquire.

Edited by binary (Wed 23-Apr-25 16:23:23)

I'd interpret it as "customers whose most recent contract started 3 or more years ago", but really you just have to enquire.

In reply to a post by binary:

That wouldn't be my assumption - I'd think it's available for those who have been customers for 3 or more years, and perhaps only those customers who get in touch to enquire.

I wouldn't bet my house one way or the other but I believe If you used binary logic to interpret what he said after each completed year you would get 1 after the completion of year 3, it may be you can only do a binary test once after the completion of year 3

"Any offers that we may run are for new customers and those who have have been with us for 3 years or more"

Contacting them directly is good advice

I don't know people have taken 3 years to mean three years after the contract expires.....

In reply to a post by candlerb:

The disconnection charge is if you move house (whether or not you subscribe to Aquiss in the new property), or if you terminate broadband without switching to another provider.

Thanks, hadn't appreciated that the disconnection charge does not apply when switching.

In reply to a post by candlerb:

That is correct.

The disconnection charge is if you move house (whether or not you subscribe to Aquiss in the new property), or if you terminate broadband without switching to another provider.

Most other ISPs hide these costs by locking you into an 18-24 month contract (almost all 24 months these days).

A customer who may be in a rented property, for example, and who may need to move out on month 9 of the 12 month contract looks like facing a disconnection charge of £45 and paying up the remaining term at up to £55 a month.

Moving house as an in contract Aquiss customer looks to be punitively expensive, hundreds of pounds, when compared with moving house with other providers who encourage home-movers to re-contract and stay with them with no excessive charges.

This is something Aquiss need to look at.

Edited by FibreBubble (Wed 23-Apr-25 20:44:11)

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

A customer who may be in a rented property, for example, and who may need to move out on month 9 of the 12 month contract looks like facing a disconnection charge of £45 and paying up the remaining term at up to £55 a month.

That is correct - although they would also have had the first 6 months half price. In any case, Aquiss are probably not the best choice for someone who expects to move within the 12 month contract period.

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

This is something Aquiss need to look at.

I don't see why. There's a marketplace to choose from, and not all offerings suit all customers. There are other ISPs who offer even 1-month terms, if that suits you better.

Openreach charges for disconnection and for new activations, and Aquiss is essentially passing these charges on. If you were with BT or EE (say) then they would let you take service in the new property but would require you to sign a new 24-month contract, so the cost is amortised over the 24 months.

If you move regularly, let's say every 3-6 months, then they are probably making a loss on you; it's their choice whether to accept such loss-making customers.

In reply to a post by dgilbert2:

In reply to a post by candlerb:

The disconnection charge is if you move house (whether or not you subscribe to Aquiss in the new property), or if you terminate broadband without switching to another provider.

Thanks, hadn't appreciated that the disconnection charge does not apply when switching.

It's because when a connection is ceased as opposed to migrated so simply has a different provider routing to it, Openreach charge the ISP.