leaving TT to avoid £25 pm

ADSLmax, rural exchange, no prospect of LLU, 50db attenuation line but TT giving me about 4mps reliably but latest price hike too much. Moderate user say 20Gb per month and no p2p. Considering BT, John Lewis, Post Office and Plusnet. Is there much to choose between them. Customer support not really an issue but connection reliability is. Wife works from home so that's important. Also want to keep BT phone. Any words of wisdom to help me choose

I can only speak from my own experience, but I used to be with Pipex which ended up with Talk Talk - I moved to Zen last November and am extremely happy with them.
I work at home too and a reliable connection is essential - not had any problems so far with that.
I did have a couple of problems with my own router and socket/wiring that I hadn't previously been aware of, but Zen Technical dept & customer Services helped sort that out very efficiently. (All UK based)

I'm on the Lite package which costs £18.37 for up to 20GB (topping up with extra is reasonably priced if needed). They do send an email if close to using your monthly allowance.

We still have our BT line, and we also use Zen's phone call service - works out cheaper than BT for us.

Zen hmm. Thanks will look them up. Think they were the bees knees a few years back.

As of 25 May I would rule out the Post Office. At least for the foreseeable future. See this News Article.

Is your (avoid) £25 the broadband cost, with line rental on top of that? What do you pay now for each?

Anonymous = me (from mobile).

Nope, £25 for broadband, line is with BT so that's whatever it is now extra(£13 pm ? or something). Last summer threatened to leave TT (as only ended up there via lineone and pipex) and they reduced from the old £24 pm (longstanding) to about £16pm. Then up to £21 in the Autumn, now £25.

Very stable connection though, for a long line.

Just off to check what is wrong with the Post Office as per reply above.

Edit: Just read it and see your point

Edited by MrOptimistic (Mon 04-Jun-12 20:43:01)

Have you tried phoning TT Retentions and see what sort of deal they could offer ?

I wouldn't worry too much about the Post Office deal. The vast majority of complaints about TT (at least the ones hitting the press) are about TT Customer Services and their Billing systems etc.. Neither of those form part of the Fujitsu/PO deal - probebly for a reason.

Retention deal ? Yes, that's what I did last year.

However, to put the bill up by 50% through a form letter with such platitudes makes me think Mr Pearson and Customer Services should not be rewarded. Perhaps they are really only interested in LLU customers, or phone bundles. No doubt I will get the full sales chat when I ask for a MAC. However, I do need alternatives and I really ought to do something to not reward the mind behind that letter.

Also, the pipex transition to TT has left me with no access to their web pages. They only sent me a letter because emailed failed they say, yet they told me which email address they were using and it's valid.

I've been with Zen for some 6 years and find them excellent. Not the cheapest but you get what you pay for - excellent speed, customer service and general help. Don't recollect any loss of service in that time other than planned or out of their control.

Just upgraded to ADLS2+, works fine (now - but that's another story I will recount later, nothing to do with Zen) and there was no charge for the change from ADSLMax.

Thanks. Will check Zen out but I can only dream of ADSL2+ on my exchange (Ravensden)

edit: hmm they are a bit pricey.......

Edited by MrOptimistic (Mon 04-Jun-12 23:16:02)

A few more thoughts.

The John Lewis service is actually provided by Plusnet, but may be a better deal than Plusnet. (These things can happen).

Also have a look at vivaciti, xilo/uno, aquiss and ADSL24. Make sure you ignore all except their bog standard ADSL products, as all the attractive ones aren't available to you . (Probably best to narrow it down by using their phone number checkers). These all have a 30GB peak, unlimited off-peak product at a fraction under £20, on monthly contract.

Yeah John Lewis sounds reasonable and also would satisfy my middle class aspirations

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

Zen hmm. Thanks will look them up. Think they were the bees knees a few years back.

They have stayed in the "relatively pricey, but recommended by many happy customers" category for all that time from what I've seen.

Another option in the "excellent but not cheap" slot is A&A (http://aaisp.net.uk/broadband-prices.html) which is worth considering if you do not use the Internet much during the working day. The minimum 2-unit account (£20/month) allows for 25Gb off-peak and 2-ana-bit peak (or 16Gb off-peak and 3-ana-bit peak, or 50 off-peak + 1-ana-bit peak, or any such mix), and if you have a quiet month you can carry what you don't use over to the next month (and the next, and so on until you do use it or you have too much "stored" (you can't carry more than 2 units extra to the next month if you are buying 2 units/month)). You can also carry backward (if you go over this month, go careful next month to redress the difference and there will be no extra charges). If your exchange is on 21CN peak time use is cheaper so you'll get more per unit, and in ether case (20CN or 21CN) there is the cheap slot between 0200 and 0600 so if you can schedule any large downloads in that time you'll have more bandwidth to use at other times.

They offer some technical extra over Zen (extra IPv4 addresses free if you have use for them (I have a /29 range for instance), and their entire network is IPv6 ready so you can use that natively instead of needing a 3rd party tunnel/brideg), though it doesn't sound like you need them.

Of course if you use much bandwidth in the normal working day (9-18/M-F) it works out much more expensive, and some people find the unit based charges confusing rather than flexible, but I suggest you give them a look if you are already considering less cheap-and-cheerful options like Zen.

Thanks to everyone for your help. Looking forward to a change.

In reply to a post by TrishaH:

I can only speak from my own experience, but I used to be with Pipex which ended up with Talk Talk - I moved to Zen last November and am extremely happy with them.
I work at home too and a reliable connection is essential - not had any problems so far with that.
I did have a couple of problems with my own router and socket/wiring that I hadn't previously been aware of, but Zen Technical dept & customer Services helped sort that out very efficiently. (All UK based)

I'm on the Lite package which costs £18.37 for up to 20GB (topping up with extra is reasonably priced if needed). They do send an email if close to using your monthly allowance.

We still have our BT line, and we also use Zen's phone call service - works out cheaper than BT for us.

that's the best deal you will ever get

I have been having a mooch around and there seems to be a pretty universal price threshold of around £18pm inc vat for what I want. John Lewis insist on having the phone as well which puts me off. On this basis Zen look competitive so I take it back. Thanks for your advice on this, I will check out the other suggestions too.

Guardian Money had a letter from a similarly disgruntled customer. They seem to think it is a policy move as TT say 85% of customers unaffected. Surprised if 85% of TT customers are llu but what do I know. Guardian advice was to move. I requested MAC yesterday and there was no attempt at persuasion.

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/5243-talktalk-gai...

Their LLU covers 91% of UK households, so why the surprise?

Tiscali was well known for promotional deals and retentions, so seeing some people getting big price rises is no suprise, when TalkTalk decide to stop honouring an agreement that is not binding anymore.

if I recall Tiscali did not price variation for being off or on their LLU network. The price changes from BT Wholesale in market 1 and economics of LLU mean TalkTalk wants to surcharge those offnet customers.

Thanks. Hope the practice doesnt catch on then! Still many suppliers apparently willing to supply at £18 pcm or thereabouts. £25 seems a firm shove. Still, I am happy to be pushed.

OK, have now completed what for me counts as exhaustive research. Zen or Vivaciti, I'll let the wife decide as then it won't be my fault. Thanks again for the help: appreciated.