Looking for a Cheap, Short-term Supplier!

Hello everyone,

Hope someone can help me out here. I work in the armed forces, and this year I've been posted away from home for 6 months. At my new address, I moved my Entanet connection (provided by the excellent ADSL24, the Home 30 package) over, and it works fine. My wife was working away from home for a while as well, so we didn't need broadband at our home address.

She's now back home and looking for a broadband connection. She's a relatively light user; she surfs the internet quite a lot, but no big downloads or online gaming. On the other hand, I'm a moderate user, with the occasional large download and quite a lot of gaming on Xbox Live.

We're moving house on my next posting at the end of the summer, so only need a second connection for around 3-4 months at our current home address for my wife. Ideally I'm looking for a supplier with no initial setup charge and no long contract, so we can bin them when they're no longer needed and move my Entanet connection wherever we end up posted to.

I'd be happy to look at a provider who demand a contract, but only if they're reliable; I don't want to be stuck in a contract that means I can't play Xbox Live any more, or have flashbacks to our old Virgin ADSL account every evening...!!

Any tips, or is this a pie-in-the-sky idea? We're Sky customers, so if Sky Broadband was good, I'd happily consider switching to them.

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so if Sky Broadband was good, I'd happily consider switching to them.

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It's a year contract, so probably unsuitable. What you need is a monthly contract isn't it? Why not ADSL24?

We don't need as good a service as ADSL24 for my wife's needs, although if possible I'll certainly be sticking with them when we move. I'm basically just being a little cheap and trying to avoid the activation charge for this second line!

Ideally I'm looking for a supplier with no initial setup charge and no long contract

What idiot company would provide a free connection, without having a long contract to recover the costs that BT will charge them to connect you?

There is one way out of your situation, but it involves signing up to another 12 month contract when you move.....
Plusnet will connect you for free (but impose a 12 month contract), and will do a free moving kit (so you don't have to pay another connection fee), but will restart your 12 month contract.

Look at it from the ISP point of view.....
BT charge them a connection fee.
If they don't pass that on, they need to gradually recover it (from your monthly charge), so they need to keep you connected for many months (6-9 is often reported) before they even start to make a profit from you.

What you're asking is "would x ISP please connect me for free, then make a loss because I want to leave after a few months".
What do you think the answer is going to be?

Well Freeola are almost doing it... �9.99 connection and the first month for �9.99 all on a 1 month contract.

Regards,
Steve

I'm aware it's highly unlikely, but if you don't ask, you don't get!

PlusNet looked good because they "waive" the connection fee, but charge it restrospectively if you cancel within 12 months, which would suit me. The only irritant is that you seem obliged to accept their "free" cheap router which you then have to pay �30 for when you cancel as well.

I'll look into Freeola.

Looks almost impossibly good. Couldn't find any mention of the activation fee, but it does seem quite clear cut that it's �9.99 for the first month with no cancellation fees on a one month contract. Thanks!

Hi there,

You can go for deferred activation but no hardware on signup for all our products. Once you click on the product you want you can see the different options listed.

Down towards the bottom at http://freeola.com/broadband/ it says

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Activation or migration from another internet service provider normally takes 5-10 working days. New activations (ie. if you don't currently have broadband) are subject to a discounted BT activation fee of �9.99 (inc VAT), and you will be offered a free modem on sign-up. If you already have broadband, migrations with a MAC (Migration Access Code) from your current provider are free. The free modem is offered with new activations only.

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Regards,
Steve