Small business broadband. Who's the cheapest?

MSE_Jenny

Does anyone have any tips on the cheapest broadband for a small business? Thanks,
Jen

Savvy_Sue

We use - drat I can't remember their name! - at work, will post again if inspiration comes later.

It would also be worth looking on the Internet Access board. Also, I am not necessarily saying that this is the way to go, but I know some small businesses use a domestic connection.

I know I found that it was cheaper to get a BT line for Broadband than to use one of our existing Telewest lines, but I think Blueyonder have since realised how many small businesses were doing this and brought their prices down to a more realistic level!

Edinburghlass_2

Depends really how small the small business is as Savvy Sue says we didn't register as a business as the prices for internet access were really high.

Originally had all Telewest lines and went with AOL for dial up because it was AOL or Telewest but as Telewest knew we had business lines we would have been charged appropriately. When bb came to the area it was cheaper to put in a BT line and then registered for Tesco bb.

However I do think we had to tick a box to say that it was for domestic purposes

star1_2

Business Broadband?

There are basically two main choices (dependant upon where you live) for small businesses - Cable or ADSL based. Telewest/NTL (Cable are generally better contention ratios, and more reliable), but cost more - especially when they are installed to a business address (but if you're installing at a home address - this would be my preference, as prices can start at around £14.99).

For most people ADSL is the only option (Delivered accross your existing BT phone line). The main diffrence between Business and Domestic Services is the contention ratio - normally 20:1 for business and 50:1 for domestic (but check with your intended provider to see what their stats are) ... some offer more favourable support arrangements for business customers etc.

In english = the contention ratio is the number of subscribers who will be sharing the connection capacity taken by the provider at their 'headend' connection to the internet. eg. if you pay for a 1mb service on a domestic service your provider will have signed up 49 others for the 1mb service too.

Hope that helps.

Savvy_Sue

Savvy_Sue wrote:

We use - drat I can't remember their name! - at work, will post again if inspiration comes later.

Hurrah, my brain came back! Must have been trying to remember hymn words for someone on the I wanna board ...

We use Free Online - initially dialup then moved over to BB. Very happy with them - when there ARE problems (rare) they have an 0800 number on which you can sort them out.

bargain-hunter_17

Hi

We use Griffin Internet for our broadband connection at our junior school. Over the last 18 months the service has been brilliant, so good that I have swapped my home connection from BT to them http://www.griffin.com/

They have competetive pricing for business and domestic and also no limits on the download which I know BT have just upted to 40GB, but this could be a factor if a number of users are using it for long hours. Depends how hard Martin works ya LOL :money: :rotfl:

bridiej

Edinburghlass wrote:

Depends really how small the small business is as Savvy Sue says we didn't register as a business as the prices for internet access were really high.

Originally had all Telewest lines and went with AOL for dial up because it was AOL or Telewest but as Telewest knew we had business lines we would have been charged appropriately. When bb came to the area it was cheaper to put in a BT line and then registered for Tesco bb.

However I do think we had to tick a box to say that it was for domestic purposes

Ditto, I signed up for domestic internet but used it for my business, it was just too expensive otherwise.

sophiedb

We use Freedom 2 Surf's Connect Lite option for £14.99 + VAT per month. They may not be the cheapest now (certainly not as far as activation goes!), but we haven't had any problems.