Good Alternatives to BT Broadband?

[fat haggis]

Hi jim I moved to talk talk 900mbs for £38 2 years they supplied 2 eero 6 pro routers. Expensive bits of kit.

 

[Coolcats]

We are not talking about copper lines and phone lines. It’s Fiber only. Jim is Fiber to cabinet and is looking to move to another supplier. All suppliers us the open reach Fiber network. FTC is not a clean as ftp not ad fast. But it’s still classed as the open reach Fiber network. It’s completely different.

Open reach install and maintain FTC and FTP on behalf of BT who own the fibre and the cabinets. They also install for the other competitors who use that network.

‘The fibre infrastructure is installed and maintained by Openreach, and is available for use by non-BT ISPs either directly from Openreach,[9] or from BT Wholesale as part of the WBC product family.[10]’

Now there are some providers such as Virgin who use thier own networks and do not use Openreach or the BT owned fibre

You too could be a isp sell a few 10,000 of thousands connections and call it fat haggis fibre and get a deal from BT wholesale and get Openreach to install

It’s all smoke and mirrors

 

[BrochMike]

My fault for not making a reminder for the contract ending, but after all those years, I won't pay BT another penny

Fair enough - I had the same with my insurer when I was too busy to check last year and so let them take mick (first time ever) but, in the end, I stayed with them when they price-matched (better the devil you know and all that)

It seems there are some regulatory changes that mean those of us who used to put in the work each year to keep our own prices down are now penalised in order to protect those that didn't/couldn't be bothered/weren't able to challenge their supplier and were being ripped off...

Should mean more "equity" but, overall, it seems to have driven up prices for all.

 

[TheCaller]

Jim
As others have said, what you are really choosing is who you pay your bill to, based on a combination of price, support when you need help & who is going to best fight your corner with BT/Openreach if/when things go wrong with the connection. You may or may not be interested in any entertainment bundle that may be on offer. I'm not, so that ruled out Sky & the like for me.

Like many others, I was with Plusnet for years, but left some time after BT bought them & their support, especially to business users started to go downhill.

I chose Andrews & Arnold www.aa.net.uk . Partly because I'd just had a bad experience with BT with phone lines (not dissimilar to yours) & wanted a company with an excellent reputation for taking no sh!t from BT or Openreach if a customer of theirs was having a connection problem. The other serious contender for my business was Zen & would still remain so.

I have since moved all my phones, email & web hosting to A&A as well.

Neither Zen or A&A will be the cheapest, but there is a good reason for that. Both do a proper job on the technical front & offer first class, knowledgable customer support. You will find many IT professionals as customers of both, because those customers understand what they are getting for their money.

I've been with A&A for 6 years now & have no complaints. They are a quirky bunch, with a highly independent, customer focused outlook. The sort of people you'd like to have a beer with.

 

[Coolcats]

Jim
As others have said, what you are really choosing is who you pay your bill to, based on a combination of price, support when you need help & who is going to best fight your corner with BT/Openreach if/when things go wrong with the connection. You may or may not be interested in any entertainment bundle that may be on offer. I'm not, so that ruled out Sky & the like for me.

Like many others, I was with Plusnet for years, but left some time after BT bought them & their support, especially to business users started to go downhill.

I chose Andrews & Arnold www.aa.net.uk . Partly because I'd just had a bad experience with BT with phone lines (not dissimilar to yours) & wanted a company with an excellent reputation for taking no sh!t from BT or Openreach if a customer of theirs was having a connection problem. The other serious contender for my business was Zen & would still remain so.

I have since moved all my phones, email & web hosting to A&A as well.

Neither Zen or A&A will be the cheapest, but there is a good reason for that. Both do a proper job on the technical front & offer first class, knowledgable customer support. You will find many IT professionals as customers of both, because those customers understand what they are getting for their money.

I've been with A&A for 6 years now & have no complaints. They are a quirky bunch, with a highly independent, customer focused outlook. The sort of people you'd like to have a beer with.

Reading Jim’s posts it’s not the technical issues as BT does seem to do a good job it’s about the lack of notification of still being on an old tariff.

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[TheCaller]

Reading Jim’s posts it’s not the technical issues as BT does seem to do a good job it’s about the lack of notification of still being on an old tariff.

True, but having made the decision to move away from BT, the choice of replacement supplier is all about future requirements & what differentiates the various candidates.

 

[Coolcats]

True, but having made the decision to move away from BT, the choice of replacement supplier is all about future requirements & what differentiates the various candidates.

Yup normally about price, if you have BT email you loose that unless you want to pay for it along with cloud storage included in the price.

It’s a bit of an inanimate object it’s amazing how we can all get a bit wound up over it

This makes me chuckle

 

[Peterd82]

I’m not so sure about losing your BT email address if you leave them. Can’t remember exactly where but I did read that you would retain access to your BT email by using the webview but it wouldn’t work with apps. Our experience is that after moving from BT to Zen nearly 5 years ago both our BT email addresses are still working fine even using mail apps on both Android and iOS. Maybe we have just been lucky, they show as “due to be downgraded” when I log on to BT but they still work fine.

 

[Coolcats]

I’m not so sure about losing your BT email address if you leave them. Can’t remember exactly where but I did read that you would retain access to your BT email by using the webview but it wouldn’t work with apps. Our experience is that after moving from BT to Zen nearly 5 years ago both our BT email addresses are still working fine even using mail apps on both Android and iOS. Maybe we have just been lucky, they show as “due to be downgraded” when I log on to BT but they still work fine.

This was an answer in one of the forums

Re: Keeping my BT email when I leave BT​

It happens automatically.
"If you have BT email and you cancel your broadband with us, you can:

• Close your BT email
• Keep your email but with more basic features by getting Basic email, which is free
• Keep your email with the same features by getting Premium email, which costs £7.50 a month
• Keep your email with the same features, by linking it to a friend or family member's BT Broadband, which is free

If you don't make a choice yourself, we'll transfer you to Basic email".

 

[StillGoing]

I'm paying £24/month for 145mb full fibre with Plusnet.

This morning I’ve switched to BT for the same price/speed.

PlusNet were charging me over £38!!! The annual RPI+3% price rise is a killer. The sooner OFCOM ban it the better. Even the person I spoke to in terminations at PlusNet said he’d been caught out by it. It was a 14% increase last year with a 7% increase on top this year which was why my PlusNet deal had become so expensive.

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[StillGoing]

Further to my post above, if anyone else is stuck on PlusNet with an expensive tariff (caused by the last two mid contract price rises of RPI + 3%), there is a way out.

Phone PlusNet terminations, say you want to leave because they are no longer competitive and that BT are cheaper. They can move you to a BT contract, give you an extra discount of £5 per month and you don’t pay any termination fees. Strangely, they can’t move you to a cheaper PlusNet deal.

Yesterday I went from over £38 a month on PlusNet to £24.99 on BT and avoided a £100 early termination charge. Result!

If you like TNT Sports, it’s cheaper as a BT customer so that’s saving me another £10 a month. Yesterday was a good day for saving money.

 

[Coolcats]

I was reading that Plusnwt no longer sell Mobile Sim and here is an older link pre-BT-EE marketing and rebranding. It makes interest reading and somehow aligns with the higher cost of plus net.

BT Boss Says Future of Low Cost UK ISP Plusnet is Under Review

The CEO of BT's Consumer division, Marc Allera, has revealed that the future of their low-cost phone and broadband ISP sub-brand, Plusnet, is under assessment.

www.ispreview.co.uk

 

[pagey]

I’m not so sure about losing your BT email address if you leave them. Can’t remember exactly where but I did read that you would retain access to your BT email by using the webview but it wouldn’t work with apps. Our experience is that after moving from BT to Zen nearly 5 years ago both our BT email addresses are still working fine even using mail apps on both Android and iOS. Maybe we have just been lucky, they show as “due to be downgraded” when I log on to BT but they still work fine.

My sons is the same been like that now for 5 years

 

[StillGoing]

I was reading that Plusnwt no longer sell Mobile Sim and here is an older link pre-BT-EE marketing and rebranding. It makes interest reading and somehow aligns with the higher cost of plus net.

BT Boss Says Future of Low Cost UK ISP Plusnet is Under Review

The CEO of BT's Consumer division, Marc Allera, has revealed that the future of their low-cost phone and broadband ISP sub-brand, Plusnet, is under assessment.

www.ispreview.co.uk

PlusNet have now ditched TV, mobile, TNT Sports and business contracts. I can’t see BT needing 3 brands (BT, PlusNet, EE) with the overheads that comes with. A shame. I used to like PlusNet.

 

[RowleyBirkinQC]

PlusNet have now ditched TV, mobile, TNT Sports and business contracts. I can’t see BT needing 3 brands (BT, PlusNet, EE) with the overheads that comes with. A shame. I used to like PlusNet.

Plusnet still cheaper than BT/EE for our BB package. Bounced my former Plusnet mobile contract over to EE and still get similarly discounted TNT Sports as an add-on there (can watch it on different device types, smart tv, Firestick etc).
Does make me wonder about the longer term viability of the Plusnet brand though.

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[Coolcats]

PlusNet have now ditched TV, mobile, TNT Sports and business contracts. I can’t see BT needing 3 brands (BT, PlusNet, EE) with the overheads that comes with. A shame. I used to like PlusNet.

Agreed Plusnet was rescued by BT when it was going under and if the group is going to simplify and have a new ‘young’ face then it’s probably a sensible action as EE is the consumer channel for the group.

 

[Trevor Wbm]

Hope this hasn't been said already but keep in mind the run from the cabinet to your house will still be the same copper wire that BT use, managed buy the allegedly separate company Openreach, so if the reasons you want to change include poor connectivity that might not be any better.

 

[Trevor Wbm]

BT are moving all non business customers over to EE over the next year. EE are a lot cheaper than BT

Aye, but given that BT own EE ....