Zen unlimited FTTx without a Zen phone line

As the previous thread on unlimited FTTx has got a bit rambling and some of the information has been invalidated over time, I thought I'd use the 1000th thread in the Zen forum to deal with the one question that keeps being asked: Can you have Zen unlimited FTTx without a Zen phone line?

The only options available online are combined broadband and phone packages.

What follows is what has been established this far. It would be helpful if people who've spoken to Zen sales about their situation reply in this thread to update our collective knowledge.


Existing Zen FTTx customers

During the soft-launch phase, AndrewW was able to switch to Unlimited Fibre 2 without moving his phone to Zen. I followed his example and was also able to switch. The price is the old Fibre Active price: £29.50/month plus VAT (£35.40 including VAT).

This switch could only be done by phoning Zen sales on 01706 902000. I don't know if it is still possible to make this switch now that the packages have been publicly launched.


I was within my 12 month minimum contract period, having paid for my FTTC install in January. By changing package I entered into a new 12 month commitment, but was not told about any early-termination fee for my Fibre Active deal (so, applying a long string of case law on onerous contract terms, especially Interfoto, it would be impossible for Zen to hold me to one).

I do not know how Zen will handle those people who took up the later offer of free installation in return for a 24 month minimum contract period. It's possible Zen may impose some sort of fee on these customers for changing package.

Phil Long has indicated (in Zen's own forum) that those on the old FTTx products with a cap of 400GB/month or more (the old Zen Office and Zen Office Plus products) who switch to the new unlimited products are moved from premium prioritisation to standard. As this involves a change of the underlying wholesale product, I would expect this option to involves early-termination fees if within a minimum contract period. Phil has also indicated that there is unlikely to be any difference in observed quality of service.


Those who do not already have Zen broadband

If I understand jez9999's post correctly, Zen have said they will not offer the new broadband deals to new customers without taking a broadband and phone package. This is is accordance with the Zen FTTx web site - if you press the "Show broadband products" link at the bottom of the page, you are offered the old Zen Lite / Zen Active / Zen Pro products at a new, lower, price. Edit: As Andrew has pointed out, the "Show broadband products" link at the bottom of the Zen FTTx and phone packages page shows the Zen ADSL products - this is extremely misleading on an FTTx page despite clearly saying 'up to 16Mbps', which I'd missed. I suggest Zen replace this roll-down section with a link direct to the Zen ADSL product page to avoid others being misled.


Those who are currently Zen ADSL customers

At the moment, nobody in this category has asked Zen sales and reported back. Who will be the first?

Edited by deleted (Sun 29-Sep-13 12:30:54)

Nice Write up

I too noticed the section at the bottom the the new page where you commented

"This is is accordance with the Zen FTTx web site - if you press the "Show broadband products" link at the bottom of the page, you are offered the old Zen Lite / Zen Active / Zen Pro products at a new, lower, price."

This to me looks like the ADSL type products and not FTTC?

Had a little discussion with BT again this morning, when i realised i was no longer on their line saver product, and could find no notification of end of the 12 month period AGAIN.

This and the recent BT statement about price increases, I may well switch to zen.

I do have one question about use of alternate international voice providers. which i will ask zen about next week.

Andrew


Andrew

In reply to a post by AndrewW:

I too noticed the section at the bottom the the new page where you commented

"This is is accordance with the Zen FTTx web site - if you press the "Show broadband products" link at the bottom of the page, you are offered the old Zen Lite / Zen Active / Zen Pro products at a new, lower, price."

This to me looks like the ADSL type products and not FTTC?

I was misled by this being on an FTTx page. These are the ADSL packages. I've edited my post accordingly.

In reply to a post by AndrewW:

Had a little discussion with BT again this morning, when i realised i was no longer on their line saver product, and could find no notification of end of the 12 month period AGAIN.

This and the recent BT statement about price increases, I may well switch to zen.

I'd happily switch our voice service to Zen, but their prices are uncompetitive for us, as we have two voice lines each with unlimited calls. BT Retail's any time calls package covers the entire account, whereas with Zen we'd need two calls packages. We've also got some unexpired Line Rental Saver on one line (BT Retail will only let you have Line Rental Saver on one line, you have to pay full-price monthly rental on further lines).

The recently announced BT Retail price rises reduce the price gap between BT and Zen significantly for us, as we will land up paying the new BT Retail £1.75/month caller display charge on top of extra line rental. It may well be that we eventually switch to Zen for voice.


I would like Zen to look again at what they can do for those with multiple phone lines. VoIP may be a solution - at the moment Zen have a residential Broadband Voice product which is outgoing only (no good to us) and a business SIP trunking product (which allows incoming and number ports, but the minimum tier is £30/month for up to 8 channels).

Is there any hope of a VoIP product that blends the two to become the equivalent of a residential phone line, with:

• incoming calls on a geographic phone number
• number porting in, return to donor and number porting out to other providers supporting porting
• similar call features to a BT WLR3 line
• residential call packages

Zen likely have all the elements of this available to them - they just need to put them together as a product. I would certainly be interested in such a solution and can't find anything like it at any of the VoIP providers I've looked at, including Gradwell, who I use for other services. Every VoIP provider I've checked jumps straight from a low feature residential offering (with no incoming calls or no porting) to a full multi-line business offering with nothing in between.


My last BT Retail customer support experience was poor, which is further reason to switch to Zen, but the price increase by doing so (even taking into account the Zen FTTx discount I'd get for taking the package) irks me.

In reply to a post by David_W:

In reply to a post by AndrewW:

I too noticed the section at the bottom the the new page where you commented

"This is is accordance with the Zen FTTx web site - if you press the "Show broadband products" link at the bottom of the page, you are offered the old Zen Lite / Zen Active / Zen Pro products at a new, lower, price."

This to me looks like the ADSL type products and not FTTC?

I was misled by this being on an FTTx page. These are the ADSL packages. I've edited my post accordingly.

In reply to a post by AndrewW:

Had a little discussion with BT again this morning, when i realised i was no longer on their line saver product, and could find no notification of end of the 12 month period AGAIN.

This and the recent BT statement about price increases, I may well switch to zen.

I'd happily switch our voice service to Zen, but their prices are uncompetitive for us, as we have two voice lines each with unlimited calls. BT Retail's any time calls package covers the entire account, whereas with Zen we'd need two calls packages. We've also got some unexpired Line Rental Saver on one line (BT Retail will only let you have Line Rental Saver on one line, you have to pay full-price monthly rental on further lines).

The recently announced BT Retail price rises reduce the price gap between BT and Zen significantly for us, as we will land up paying the new BT Retail £1.75/month caller display charge on top of extra line rental. It may well be that we eventually switch to Zen for voice.


I would like Zen to look again at what they can do for those with multiple phone lines. VoIP may be a solution - at the moment Zen have a residential Broadband Voice product which is outgoing only (no good to us) and a business SIP trunking product (which allows incoming and number ports, but the minimum tier is £30/month for up to 8 channels).

Is there any hope of a VoIP product that blends the two to become the equivalent of a residential phone line, with:

• incoming calls on a geographic phone number
• number porting in, return to donor and number porting out to other providers supporting porting
• similar call features to a BT WLR3 line
• residential call packages

Zen likely have all the elements of this available to them - they just need to put them together as a product. I would certainly be interested in such a solution and can't find anything like it at any of the VoIP providers I've looked at, including Gradwell, who I use for other services. Every VoIP provider I've checked jumps straight from a low feature residential offering (with no incoming calls or no porting) to a full multi-line business offering with nothing in between.


My last BT Retail customer support experience was poor, which is further reason to switch to Zen, but the price increase by doing so (even taking into account the Zen FTTx discount I'd get for taking the package) irks me.

Re Searching for a VoIP provider meeting your requirements. Do your stumble upon http://www.callmaster.co.uk/ because I believe they can supply what you want.

In reply to a post by trolleybus:

Do your stumble upon http://www.callmaster.co.uk/ because I believe they can supply what you want.

They may do. Unfortunately their minimal web site is silent about pricing and number porting, which are two crucial elements in what I'm looking for.

In reply to a post by David_W:

In reply to a post by trolleybus:

Do your stumble upon http://www.callmaster.co.uk/ because I believe they can supply what you want.

They may do. Unfortunately their minimal web site is silent about pricing and number porting, which are two crucial elements in what I'm looking for.

I am a sole trader subscriber to their service. I obviously need a traditional land line for the Broadband service but ported over my other line number with ease. The cost ex VAT is £10 for a fully featured service on that number and £5 for fax to email a month. 01/02/03 numbers at 1.2ppm using monthly credit account. No set up costs but you have to buy the hardware. Now what else do you want to know?

Excellent information. Can you give more detail about the hardware and costs please?

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Excellent information. Can you give more detail about the hardware and costs please?

You are free to source any SIP bit of kit you fancy from any supplier. Just shop around for the best deal. Used the service with ATAs, Gigaset, VoIP router and snom360 - it just worked with then all. Never thought I would need conference and call transfer facilities before being a VoIP user but now use that frequently. Gave my son and daughter a Gigaset as an Xmas present and got an on-going benefit of free calls to them for years to come!

Thanks. What would be ideal would be to have a VOIP app on my iPhone and use that with my landline number for making and receiving calls. Do you know if that's possible?

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Thanks. What would be ideal would be to have a VOIP app on my iPhone and use that with my landline number for making and receiving calls. Do you know if that's possible?

Only gotcha with the iPhone (doesn't apply to iPad and iPod Touch) is the WiFi turns off when the screen is off. So the VoIP app would have to be permitted to register over the mobile data connection. Some 3G services don't allow this.

Hmm, my personal hotspot still works with the screen off...

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Thanks. What would be ideal would be to have a VOIP app on my iPhone and use that with my landline number for making and receiving calls. Do you know if that's possible?

I think we are going beyond the spirit of this thread and may have to continue the conversation by PM. I don't see why it's not possible but haven't tried to do so because unanswered calls go to voicemail. This in turn is converted to an email which is read on my mobile phone, and listen to, at my leisure.

I do however have a VoIP number in my mobile which could accept forwarded calls from my 'den' VoIP device, but I believe it is discourteous to answer mobile calls, or have a ringing tone, when with a client. Vibrate with incoming email works fine for me.

That same VoIP number in your mobile could of course be used to make and receive calls with your landline number but unless connected to a someone's router, the quality of the calls are not that great. Described above is a more reliable communication solution with the added benefit of having a recording of the call. The audio could even be automatically converted into a text file!

Thanks for the answer there. Your comment about courtesy reminds me when I was out for dinner the other night with friends, they were saying how awful it is when people take a call in company... shortly before one of them took a call

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Hmm, my personal hotspot still works with the screen off...

Yeah, but that's different, the iPhone is sharing data outbound via WiFi.

I found this annoying when in other countries, turn 3G data off (for price reasons) and connect to Hotel WiFi, the iPod Touch, and my friends iPad would get emails / iMessage / Skype incoming etc, but the phone wouldn't until it was awoken.

My phone receives all those when the screen is off.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

My phone receives all those when the screen is off.

Over 3g then, which doesn't work when you're out the country (with mobile data off/roaming data off).

I think you need a new iPhone.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

I think you need a new iPhone.

Ha, this is the same on my personal (1 year old), my work (6 months old) and my friends 4S, and 4. All 4 phones are on different networks bought at different times. Some on iOS 7, one on iOS 6.

Obviously yours is different, probably some combination of apps we've got. :-/

I just called Zen sales. If you can get FTTC, they will allow you to take their Unlimited Fibre offers without switching your phone line to them. The website is just "encouraging" you to do so. You pay about £5 extra per month to do this (about £35 instead of £30 for Fibre Unlimited 2).

It sounds like they're offering you the same deal I have - £29.50 per month (£35.40 including VAT) for Unlimited Fibre 2 without a Zen phone line.

This is great news. Was there any mention of a connection charge (or migration charge if you already have FTTx)?

That's good since their line rental now appears to be £17 when taken with the fibre products.

Zen T&C's:
"14 TELEPHONE LINES
14.1 A BT or Zen telephone line is required for the provision of the FTTC Service and must remain active throughout the Service Period"

So apparently it is just an "encouragement" to add the line rental when ordering FTTC from Zen and the broadband price can be adjusted if the line rental is not taken

In reply to a post by David_W:

It sounds like they're offering you the same deal I have - £29.50 per month (£35.40 including VAT) for Unlimited Fibre 2 without a Zen phone line.

This is great news. Was there any mention of a connection charge (or migration charge if you already have FTTx)?

I believe it's free activation. I'll probably be buying the £35 modem that they recommend.

In reply to a post by 4M2:

That's good since their line rental now appears to be £17 when taken with the fibre products.

Zen T&C's:
"14 TELEPHONE LINES
14.1 A BT or Zen telephone line is required for the provision of the FTTC Service and must remain active throughout the Service Period"

So apparently it is just an "encouragement" to add the line rental when ordering FTTC from Zen and the broadband price can be adjusted if the line rental is not taken

Well even if you don't switch to Zen, you are still going to have a "BT line".

I believe the £17 (excluding VAT) line rental is only charged to business customers, whose lines are provided with enhanced fault repair priority. Home customers taking a Zen FTTx and phone bundle pay £15 (including VAT) for line rental.

Sure, I pay £11.22 per month for a WLR "BT Line" with Zen on a 30 day minimum term. If the same WLR line rental was taken with a Zen FTTC package it would cost £15.44 and it would be on a 12 months minimum term.

However for a new customer the FTTC and line rental package would still possibly be less expensive than ~£35 per month for FTTC and line rental paid separately to another provider assuming they are not locked into a contact with that other provider's line rental...

Edited by 4M2 (Mon 30-Sep-13 14:53:36)

In reply to a post by jez9999:

I believe it's free activation. I'll probably be buying the £35 modem that they recommend.

Free activation would be nice.


I'm sure you meant £35 router - the modem is provided by BT Openreach as part of an FTTC install. The £35 router Zen use is, I believe, perfectly adequate if on the basic side. If nothing else, it's worth having as an inexpensive spare unit if you later upgrade to something more fully featured.

My router is a Dell server running the excellent pfSense.

In reply to a post by David_W:

I believe the £17 (excluding VAT) line rental is only charged to business customers, whose lines are provided with enhanced fault repair priority. Home customers taking a Zen FTTx and phone bundle pay £15 (including VAT) for line rental.

Yes, sorry - I looked at the wrong Zen price list

In reply to a post by 4M2:

In reply to a post by David_W:

I believe the £17 (excluding VAT) line rental is only charged to business customers, whose lines are provided with enhanced fault repair priority. Home customers taking a Zen FTTx and phone bundle pay £15 (including VAT) for line rental.

Yes, sorry - I looked at the wrong Zen price list

No need to be embarrassed - you won't be the first person who wonders why there is a disparity in line rental prices between the business and home user sites.

The Zen web site defaults to business pricing unless you select the "Home & Home Office" tab or a link specifically targeting home users. The business prices are displayed excluding VAT, whilst the home user prices include VAT.

It will be interesting to get confirmation regarding free activation if Zen "Unlimited Fibre 2" is taken without line rental...

In reply to a post by David_W:

In reply to a post by jez9999:

I believe it's free activation. I'll probably be buying the £35 modem that they recommend.

Free activation would be nice.


I'm sure you meant £35 router - the modem is provided by BT Openreach as part of an FTTC install. The £35 router Zen use is, I believe, perfectly adequate if on the basic side. If nothing else, it's worth having as an inexpensive spare unit if you later upgrade to something more fully featured.

My router is a Dell server running the excellent pfSense.

Yep, router's what I meant.

Thank you Zen for being hands down the best ISP out there. The day i moved from BT openworld over ten years ago on a fellow tribes player suggestion i knew i'd made the right move. When i'm out of contract with BT for my phone services i'll be in touch.

Well I did it i moved my line to Zen,

As promised i can confirm (which is the basis for my line move) that i can use alternate providers for international calls. Zen will not block the numbers. They simply charge for the amount for the connection to the provider. So if the dial in number to the provider starts 01 for example then there is no Zen charge.

Also 0800 numbers are free calls unlike some providers

I swapped from Zen Pro (200gb) to Zen Unlimited 2. I received a refund of the difference for my remaining two months. I paid £96 (I think) installation fee at the time.

In reply to a post by AndrewW:

Well I did it i moved my line to Zen,

As promised i can confirm (which is the basis for my line move) that i can use alternate providers for international calls. Zen will not block the numbers. They simply charge for the amount for the connection to the provider. So if the dial in number to the provider starts 01 for example then there is no Zen charge.

Also 0800 numbers are free calls unlike some providers

Why do Zen charge customers anything if they use 18185 etc,? bt don't charge and neither do Plusnet according to a post on another forum regarding using CPS services , as apparently the CPS provider and the telco SP (BT ,Plusnet ,and others) negociate a fee between themselves ,they do not charge the customer ,so if Zen allow the use of CPS services then you should not be charged by them for calls to 18585 ect, and the destination /price of the call has nothing to do with the telco SP as you ain't using their network, Well that's how it supposed to work at least

In reply to a post by tommy45:

Why do Zen charge customers anything if they use 18185 etc,?

Eh? Who mentioned charging to 18185 (etc.)? It says "They simply charge for the amount for the connection to the provider." In the case of 18185 this is either going to be zero or the number will be blocked.

We have been listening to you feedback and questions since launching our new Fibre and Phone packages. We have tried to answer some of the more frequent questions in the following Fibre and Phone packages blog post.

"They simply charge for the amount for the connection to the provider" ?

Well if calls to 18185 don't attract a fee then they are FREE are they not, ?

So why not say this instead of going round the houses I asked a simple question do zen block or charge for CPS calls such as 18185 a simple answer is all i asked for , yes or no would of sufficed

In reply to a post by RichieatZen:

We have been listening to you feedback and questions since launching our new Fibre and Phone packages. We have tried to answer some of the more frequent questions in the following Fibre and Phone packages blog post.

That FAQ is a helpful response to the comments here and in other forums. It makes a clear statement that any of the new fibre packages are available as 'broadband only' for an additional £4.50 plus VAT over the quoted price - though it then appears to make a mathematical error, as this is £5.40 including 20% VAT.

£5.40 matches with the uplift I'm being charged for 'broadband only' Unlimited Fibre 2: £35.40 per month (which matches £29.50 before VAT shown in the customer portal).


On a related note, my most recent bill shows the expected £29.50 plus VAT charge, but the product is described as 'Fibre Active'. The last time I changed product, the billing system failed to reflect the change and it looks like this has happened again. This time, fortuitously, the amount billed is correct as it's the same price as our previous Fibre Active product.

If someone at Zen wants to look at this billing issue, please private message me for the Zen user name, otherwise I'll contact billing at the end of next week when I'm less busy.


As the product development continues, it would be great if some attention can be given to the pricing and order history parts of the customer portal. It's very confusing for the details of your current product to found against the original order on the line in the Order History screen! In our case, the original order was for a 1Mbit/s fixed speed ADSL product ordered in 2004, which has gone through numerous regrades and upgrades to get to where we are today.

In reply to a post by RichieatZen:

We have been listening to you feedback and questions since launching our new Fibre and Phone packages. We have tried to answer some of the more frequent questions in the following Fibre and Phone packages blog post.

What's the activation fee for new customers taking "Unlimited Fibre 2"
broadband only, i.e. without line rental?

Thanks for your question.

I can confirm that there is no activation fee for new customers taking "Unlimited Fibre 2"
broadband only, i.e. without line rental.

Hope this helps.

In reply to a post by RichieatZen:

Thanks for your question.

I can confirm that there is no activation fee for new customers taking "Unlimited Fibre 2"
broadband only, i.e. without line rental.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the reply

Another question: could a customer currently taking Zen line rental on a 30 day minimum term for £11.22 have "Unlimited Fibre 2" broadband only on a 12 month minimum term for £35.40 - this would hypothetically keep his WLR (BT based) line rental options open, hence a switch of WLR line rental provider would be possible during the duration of the "Unlimited Fibre 2" broadband only contract?

Edited by 4M2 (Mon 07-Oct-13 13:05:30)

In reply to a post by RichieatZen:

We have been listening to you feedback and questions since launching our new Fibre and Phone packages. We have tried to answer some of the more frequent questions in the following Fibre and Phone packages blog post.

Nice that the blog post clears up the Zen phone line thing, but I still think this page is misleading:
http://zen.co.uk/business/broadband/fibre-optic-broa...

When you "Show broadband products", it doesn't include unlimited fibre 1 and 2, with the increased price for when you don't switch your phone line, implying that you must do so to get unlimited fibre 1 and 2.

Has anyone upgraded from Zen ADSL to unlimited fibre without phone yet? This is what I'd want to do. If I can't I'd have to request a MAC

There should be no problem moving from Zen ADSL to one of Zen's unlimited fibre options 'broadband only', though I think you'll have to order by phoning Zen sales rather than online.

You will pay £4.50 (£5.40 including VAT) over the 'phone and broadband' price for the broadband option you choose. Unlimited Fibre 2 'broadband only' is £29.50 (£35.40 including VAT) per month with no activation fee.

Thanks for that. I'm currently paying £35.74 for Zen Pro ADSL so this would be a huge upgrade for practically the same monthly cost. I'd be silly not to really

I took very similar route to you. I took Zen Pro ADSL in the days when the usage limit was 100GBytes/month. Zen doubled the limit to 200GBytes/month, which I didn't really need, but I stayed on Pro ADSL, knowing that FTTC would soon be here.

When I upgraded to FTTC, I went to Fibre Active, the 100GByte/month package, saving myself 34p per month. I recently moved to Unlimited Fibre 2 at the same monthly cost.


If you take any fibre-based products, you commit to a new 12 month minimum period with Zen. Unlike when I took Fibre Active, there's no activation fee for Unlimited Fibre 2. So long as you are happy to stay with Zen for the next 12 months, it's a no-brainer, as you say - almost certainly a faster connection (especially in the upload direction), no usage limit and a small monthly cost saving.

Phone this morning and ordered unlimited fibre 2. Specified broadband only. This has now appeared in the portal

ADSL to Zen Fibre Regrade New Product: Unlimited Zen Fibre 2 Bundle

Is that right? The word "bundle" has me worried that it might have been put through as a broadband and phone order

It looks like that description might have been truncated by the portal. Do you see "Bundle: No" when you open the order details? That's how Zen indicate 'broadband only'.

My regrade from Zen Fibre Active to Zen Unlimited Fibre 2 'broadband only' appeared in the portal as "Zen Fibre Regrade New Product: Unlimited Zen Fibre 2 Bundle: No".

Ah, yes it does say that. My phone screen must have cut it off

Thanks

That's good news. I hope that the FTTC install goes smoothly.

FTTC is now available in my area. I'm on ADSL active upto 16mb and want to regrade to FTTC unlimited 2 without phone line.
When I try to regrade through the Portal, I only get the old "Fibre lite, active and pro" options with a install charge of £48.

I thought regrade to new FTTC unlimited products was now active for existing ADSL customers on the portal.
Would I need to phone Zen sales to order FTTC unlimted 2 without phone line? Has anybody who has regraded from ADSL to FTTC paid a install charge? I read earlier user No_One regraded from ADSL to FTTC and didn't mention paying install/activation fee. Can anybody or someone from Zen clarify please.

I would ring them as the BB FTTC Unlimited 2 no phone offer is not listed on the Zen site as far as I can tell. CS is usually very helpful and the order appears on the Portal within minutes.

Hi,

If you haven't already rectified this issue please can you PM me your details and ill ask a member of the sales team to call you.

I too have a problem like this??

I found out by lengthy local forum exchanges I found out what cabinet I was connected to and that it was FTTC. BUT all the line checkers said that Fibre was not available. I was told to email [email protected] and they emailed back on the 13th Dec so to say that I had been manually updated on the system to be able to order the service.

Then I put my order through Zen on 13th Dec for Zen Unlimited Fibre 2.
(My Billion 7800N router has ADSL & Fibre provision so I didn't need a nee router)

This order was cancelled on 16th Dec ...

Good Morning,

We are writing to provide you with an update on your Fibre order, 975959 which was placed within the portal 13/12/13.

The order failed to submit to our suppliers, this is because the order placed has been done as a new service activation however you already have a broadband service with is (non Fibre) :

zenXXXXX@zen
01XXXXXXXX

We believe this will need to be placed as a regrade order from ADSL to Fibre, if you can replace this order within the portal this will begin to progress today if you need any assistance with this you can contact our Sales team on the number below option 1.

Your order has been cancelled and credit note created

When I logged onto the Customer Portal (as instructed) for the re-grade, there were only these 3 options:
Zeb Fibre Lite, Active and Pro.

So I selected the Active as Pro was too expensive. I did think that this was odd at the time as these were clearly not the same fibre products being offered on the Zen website.

Anyway, 24th Dec, BT engineer arrived and installed the WAN modem etc and checked fibre connection OK.

If I look on the Customer portal it says my current service is :-

Zen Fibre Active
Provision type: New service activation
Care Level: Standard

Contract Length: 12 months

Now several Zen forum members, believe that these are olde services and have been withdrawn ??

If this is the case, then why was I re-graded to it with a higher monthly payment and a 100Gb/monthly cap??

The only thing I can think off, is like the ADSL where the exchange is LLU or not. Our exchange Whiteley/Locksheath is BT only, so maybe this explains the higher fibre charge as there is no Zen hardware (Or any other ISP provider) in the exchange except BT???

BTW I do actually have a Zen phone line

All the best

John

Hi,

Please accept my apologies for this.

I'm just speaking to the product manager now and ill be back to you shortly.

Hi,

While it seems the cause of the problem you have is the same (options not in the Customer Portal) the fact that you have already regraded to them is now a different problem; as I mentioned on our own forum I'd recommend contacting Customer Services to discuss the situation directly.

kind regards,
Phil.

I understand that when Zen FTTC is taken with a Zen phone line the price of FTTC is £5.40 inc. VAT less than if taken with a BT or WLR3 line from another provider.

In preparation for a future move to Zen FTTC I have switched my phone line to Zen. HomeTalk monthly line rental will be £11.22 including VAT.

As soon as I order the FTTC this line rental goes up to £15.44 a month - £4.22 more which largely cancels out the £5.40 discount on fibre for having a Zen voice service.

Is there any reason why Zen broadband customers pay 37% more for voice line rental than non Zen broadband customers?

Phoned sales today and placed a regrade order from ADSL2+ to FTTC unlimited 2 (without line rental). Total cost £35.40 p/m.

In Feb. 2013 I purchased a Asus RT-N66u router and installed a cat5e data cable from the master socket to where I want the modem and router, as I was expecting fibre to be enabled in Mar./Apr. 2013. After many BT delays, the cabinet was finally activated in Dec. 2013.
Since purchase I've been using the Asus router (with Netgear modem) and cat5e cable for ADSL2+.