With TalkTalk, looking to save AND get faster Internet

leitmotif · 14 December 2016 at 10:35PM

I'm with TalkTalk. My 18-month contract has expired and the monthly payments are creeping up towards £45! I want to save money and get faster Internet (have just run a test and my download speed over normal phone line is just 2.5 MB, though I am using a wireless connection).

I have a few questions:

1) Will going for their fibre options ('up to' 38 MB or 'up to' 76 MB) be genuinely faster? And significantly faster? Will the fact that I'm using a wireless network (with a range extender) hamper that increase in speed (or negate it completely)?

2) How much can you haggle them down? I'm not averse to switching provider. I haggled with one agent a couple of days ago, got down to around £32/month for unlimited broadband on their 38 MB fibre deal, with unlimited anytime UK calls and international calls Extra. I then spoke to them today and got offered £32/month for the same package minus the fibre! So it sounds like each agent just makes it up as they go along. I want a genuinely competitive deal.

I've been with TalkTalk for years. It doesn't seem that long ago I was paying around £21/month including line rental and boosts!

onomatopoeia99 · 14 December 2016 at 10:45PM

Wireless introduces a factor that is not the responsibility of the ISP so should never be used in speed testing.

In almost all circumstances fibre will be faster. It depends on where your local cabinet is, so it's impossible to say for sure from your post though, The BT checker will give you an idea of anticipated speeds though.

No comment on so-called "deals", buying on price is a terrible idea for internet service provision and if you go for the cheapest you deserve all you get. Or don't get, as seems more likely.

Owain_Moneysaver · 14 December 2016 at 10:57PM

You can probably haggle them down to whatever any other provider will offer.

EE work out at about £18.50 paid for up front or £19.50 monthly for ADSL. Plusnet fibre works out about £26 a month paid for up front. Plusnet have one of the better reputations for customer service and use UK call centres.

Your fibre connection should be a lot faster than current ADSL provided there isn't a defect on the cable between you and the fibre cabinet. Wifi speed depends on your computer and the wifi hub/extender, but should be adequate to cope with 'up to' fibre speeds if they're reasonably modern.

Cornucopia · 14 December 2016 at 10:57PM

When you upgrade with TT, they will give you a speed guarantee for the Fibre BB. If they fail to deliver that speed, then you are free to leave without penalty. Fibre and ADSL are completely different technologies, and there is no reason why you shouldn't get good speeds over fibre even if your ADSL is poor.

The standard TT cost for 38Mbps Fibre/no calls is now £27 pm. I pay £25pm with a small loyalty discount. Add calls, and that's not a million miles away from your first £32 offer.

I would suggest comparing with Plusnet at least.

MurkySurfy · 15 December 2016 at 11:42AM

If you've been with Talktalk for many years then you should have some bargaining power depending how good your haggling is.

I was able to get the 76mbps + unlimited anytime calls to UK and mobiles for £28.75 per month.
The discount that were given were:
18 months half price to Anytime call boost
£7 discount off for 18 months.
Fibre Speed Boost - Free for 18 Months

phillw · 15 December 2016 at 11:56AM

onomatopoeia99 wrote: »

Wireless introduces a factor that is not the responsibility of the ISP so should never be used in speed testing.

If you use the ISP's router for WIFI then the ISP is at least partly responsible, but it's unlikely to have much of an effect on a 2.5mb/s connection anyway.

To keep up with fibre then you'll need a good WIFI router and WIFI card in your laptop. My last laptop had an 802.11a/g/n 2x2 card and with a WNDR3700 cable router I was able to use cable over WIFI at the same speed as using an Ethernet cable (2 x 802.11n channels). My new laptop has an 802.11ac 1x1 card and my router doesn't support 802.11ac, so it can only do half the speed of my old laptop (1 x 802.11n channel).

ISP don't usually provide the best WIFI routers, even when they say they do. A mid-high end WIFI router will cost around £150-£200. You can then plug your cable router into an adsl router supplied by your ISP.

onomatopoeia99 wrote: »

No comment on so-called "deals", buying on price is a terrible idea for internet service provision and if you go for the cheapest you deserve all you get. Or don't get, as seems more likely.

For the low end of ADSL there isn't much difference, I have a long heavily spliced aluminium line (with paper insulation) and I only get around 2mb/s. Every time they dig up the pavement to fix one line, then another disintegrates. Therefore there is no point in paying more than the cheapest unlimited deal I can find. I have been paying around £4 a month on average for the last few years. I could go for cable or fibre, but it's 8-10 times the price and I managed going without a tv license for 18months by using a now tv box & it was just about fast enough. I would have to pay more attention if I was paying for fibre or cable again and not just pick the cheapest, but I don't need the gold standard of broadband. I just need the "good enough for the money".

leitmotif · 15 December 2016 at 5:13PM

Thanks for all your contributions. Much appreciated!

MurkySurfy wrote: »

If you've been with Talktalk for many years then you should have some bargaining power depending how good your haggling is.

I was able to get the 76mbps + unlimited anytime calls to UK and mobiles for £28.75 per month.
The discount that were given were:
18 months half price to Anytime call boost
£7 discount off for 18 months.
Fibre Speed Boost - Free for 18 Months

How on earth did you manage that? Was it during some kind of promotion? My haggling is good, but I've spent some time haggling the other day and today and the staff seem to have no room for manoeuvre. My experience is that there are two tiers: normal customer service agents (who just quote the same rates as are available to new customers) and the 'loyalty' team (who just offer you £2 off the headline rate for fibre or £2.95 off the headline rate for 'fast broadband', i.e. normal broadband, and can't reduce the cost of the boosts). The upshot of talking to the latter is that the cheapest deals TalkTalk has offered me so far are:

1) £28.75 for normal broadband, UK anytime calls and International extra.
2) £33.75 for up to 38 MB fibre, UK anytime calls and International extra.
3) £38.75 for up to 76 MB fibre, UK anytime calls and International extra.

Obviously any of these will be cheaper than what I'm currently paying, but surely I can beat these prices. The guy I spoke to keep pasting in standard text: 'these are the best deals I can offer you'. Even though I was politely asking him to do better.

Cornucopia · 15 December 2016 at 6:21PM

To be fair to TT, I get the impression they have been quite liberal with discounts in the past and they are trying to bring some discipline to it.

Bottom line is take your business elsewhere, if you can get a better deal. Bear in mind that the Regulator has recently given the market (especially ADSL) a good shake-up, and a lot of cheap deals disappeared.

They are starting to creep back - a friend got £15pm with Sky for ADSL including line rental last week.

leitmotif · 15 December 2016 at 7:32PM

I didn't realise there were so many providers. I've just been looking at Origin, because of the recommendation on this site (can get down to £12.50/month if paying 24 months in advance, but I'd be a little wary about that because they're not a big company). That led me to ISPreview and I'm checking out deals for the top 50 companies. Unfortunately, it seems that many of them are either ludicrously expensive (I'm financially comfortable, but I'm not paying £63/month for Internet!) or don't offer phone as well as Internet.

Owain_Moneysaver · 15 December 2016 at 9:20PM

leitmotif wrote: »

...or don't offer phone as well as Internet.

Unless you're a heavy phone user, the typical 1.2p/minute call charges of VoIP providers such as Sipgate will be cheaper than an £8 a month 'inclusive' calls package.

leitmotif · 15 December 2016 at 9:35PM

I'm not a heavy phone user. My partner makes calls to Europe a couple of times a week. My kids download a lot of YouTube videos. It's the broadband I'm mostly interested in.

With TalkTalk, looking to save AND get faster Internet

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