Does a MAC switch trump one-month's notice period?

If from MAC request to switch takes eight days do you still have to pay three weeks subscription (without access) to your previous provider?

In most cases yes you do lose part of your payment. I think just a few ISPs will refund you any unused time.

If you want to get migrated as quickly as possible from "NOW" then you get your MAC and sign up to another ISP. The day the migration completes you ring and email and go to the Head Office and blue-tac notices on every door saying you have left. You lose any outstanding connection time you have paid for, but you may, if you are lucky, avoid them taking another few months subs as well. (If it's Tiscali/Pipex then you probably need to change your bank account and "lose" all your credit cards and get new ones).

If you want to migrate with the minimum loss of sub it depends on how and when you are invoiced and debited by your ISP in relation to their bandwidth charging period. With Newnet, who are an excellent provider, it's a nightmare as the bandwidth period is calendar monthly, but the billing period is (I think) one of three depending on when in the month you sign up and get migrated in. With my previous ISP - Prodigynet - your bandwidth usage and billing dates were the same so it was easy.

The basic idea is to ask for your MAC as early as possible within 30 days of the next crunch date as very badly described above. That's so you get it with plenty of time to spare, as long as it isn't AOL you are leaving. They seem just to screw you up completely.

Then you wait as long as you dare before the crunch date - say 10 days before? Then sign up to your new ISP with it.

With luck you only lose a few days subscription.

In all cases when asking for a MAC, do exactly that. Do not say anything like "I want to cancel my broadband with you". Many ISPs will take that as a broadband Cease and get your ADSL disconnected by BT. And don't fall for any special offers "just for you" because you will almost certainly be entering a 12 or 18 month contract without being told until you want to leave.

Edited by RobertoS (Sun 06-Apr-08 21:28:52)

If from MAC request to switch takes eight days do you still have to pay three weeks subscription (without access) to your previous provider?

If that's what you've got left on your contract, or are on a 1 month rolling contract, yes.
That's why it's best to request a MAC before you actually want to use it, then issue it to your new ISP approximately 8-10 days before the end of contract with your current one.