Change from Virgin media broadband to O2?

SparkyG

I am absolutely sick to death with the extremely erratic speed of our Virgin media broadband connection, but am terrified at the thought of changing, and jumping from the frying pan into the fire!!:eek:

We are paying £18 a month just for broadband, on the 'up to' 20mb option, whereas in reality we are getting a max of 4.5mb. I realise this is due to the BT line and distance from the exchange etc, and when I checked on the BT site they can only offer a similar speed even though we are supposedly in an 'up to' 20mb area.

I am totally out of my depth with all this, and don't have the technical knowledge to make an informed decision or move to a different provider. On comparison sites O2 seem to offer the best deal (I am an O2 mobile user), but to change would mean changing our email addresses, which I am reluctant to do.

We pay home phone rent and monthly call package to Tesco (which I am happy with), and don't want a TV deal, so aren't interested in 'bundle' deals which cover all media.

Any advice please?

jellygoodfellow

If you pay Tesco for your line rental you havent got a BT Line as such.

SparkyG

jellygoodfellow wrote: »

If you pay Tesco for your line rental you havent got a BT Line as such.

Not too sure how it works, but it's still connected to the BT exchange!! What I'm trying to say is, it's definitely not cable. The only cable connection we have is broadband, not phone.

ACDeag

SparkyG wrote: »

Not too sure how it works, but it's still connected to the BT exchange!! What I'm trying to say is, it's definitely not cable. The only cable connection we have is broadband, not phone.

It means that to have O2 broadband you will have to move line rental back to BT. O2's system probably cannot find your number, have you checked?

https://www.o2broadband.o2.co.uk/getBroadband.do

Ypaymore

If he can have Virgin National Broadband (Ex Virgin Net ) on his Tesco Phone Line, their should be no reason why he cant have O2 or another ISP.

ACDeag

Ypaymore wrote: »

If he can have Virgin National Broadband (Ex Virgin Net ) on his Tesco Phone Line, their should be no reason why he cant have O2 or another ISP.

Depends I think in what order he set them up. If he had a BT line when he subscribed to Virgin, then moved line rental then that will be why it was possible.

I am not 100% sure but I don't think O2 will see it to do a line check, I maybe wrong.

SparkyG

ACDeag wrote: »

It means that to have O2 broadband you will have to move line rental back to BT. O2's system probably cannot find your number, have you checked?

https://www.o2broadband.o2.co.uk/getBroadband.do

Yep, just checked and it is available.

Since I first posted, my husband, who is the Virgin a/c holder, has been on the phone to them complaining about the erratic service and low speeds. Once they realise you are thinking about changing they become very helpful!! They checked the speed and agreed with us that it wasn't acceptable. He then got put throught to India (but a very easy to understand lady:D), and she thought that our cable modem was at fault and needed a new one, which they are sending us. Also crediting our a/c with £5 for the 'lack of service'.

Hope that solves the problem, but am not holding my breath:rolleyes:

It's just taken me about 15 minutes trying to get back onto MSE to reply:mad:

macman

SparkyG wrote: »

I am absolutely sick to death with the extremely erratic speed of our Virgin media broadband connection, but am terrified at the thought of changing, and jumping from the frying pan into the fire!!:eek:

We are paying £18 a month just for broadband, on the 'up to' 20mb option, whereas in reality we are getting a max of 4.5mb. I realise this is due to the BT line and distance from the exchange etc, and when I checked on the BT site they can only offer a similar speed even though we are supposedly in an 'up to' 20mb area.

I am totally out of my depth with all this, and don't have the technical knowledge to make an informed decision or move to a different provider. On comparison sites O2 seem to offer the best deal (I am an O2 mobile user), but to change would mean changing our email addresses, which I am reluctant to do.

We pay home phone rent and monthly call package to Tesco (which I am happy with), and don't want a TV deal, so aren't interested in 'bundle' deals which cover all media.

Any advice please?

If you are on Virgin Media (as opposed to Virgin National), then you are on a cable service-which I assume is the case, as in your later post you refer to a faulty cable modem. So your slow/erratic speeds is nothing to do with the BT line (because your broadband comes by cable, not via BT), and nothing to do with exchange distance, as cable broadband does not get slower with increased exchange distance.
If your BT line can support around 20MBps then you are in a ADSL2+ area and can get up to 24MBps on a BT line with O2-check your likely speed on the O2 site.
https://www.o2broadband.o2.co.uk/getBroadband.do
O2 is an excellent service, but make sure you can get it on an LLU basis (do not sign up for the O2 Acces package, which is just a resold BT Wholesale product, you want the Standard or Premium package.
Open a Googlemail account, takes about 10 minutes, then you have an email address that stays with you even if you change your ISP every year. Group email to all your contacts advising the new address take seconds.

macman

ACDeag wrote: »

Depends I think in what order he set them up. If he had a BT line when he subscribed to Virgin, then moved line rental then that will be why it was possible.

I am not 100% sure but I don't think O2 will see it to do a line check, I maybe wrong.

He hasn't got Virgin National ADSL, he's got Virgin Media cable broadband.
Re the BT line, I have paid my line rental to TalkTalk for over a year now, and migrated to O2 last month without any problems with the line being recognised as a BT line.

SparkyG

macman wrote: »

If you are on Virgin Media (as opposed to Virgin National), then you are on a cable service-which I assume is the case, as in your later post you refer to a faulty cable modem. So your slow/erratic speeds is nothing to do with the BT line (because your broadband comes by cable, not via BT), and nothing to do with exchange distance, as cable broadband does not get slower with increased exchange distance.
If your BT line can support around 20MBps then you are in a ADSL2+ area and can get up to 24MBps on a BT line with O2-check your likely speed on the O2 site.
https://www.o2broadband.o2.co.uk/getBroadband.do
O2 is an excellent service, but make sure you can get it on an LLU basis (do not sign up for the O2 Acces package, which is just a resold BT Wholesale product, you want the Standard or Premium package.
Open a Googlemail account, takes about 10 minutes, then you have an email address that stays with you even if you change your ISP every year. Group email to all your contacts advising the new address take seconds.

Have checked on the O2 site, and they are saying 7mb likely speed, so if we don't get any joy with the new Virgin media cable modem, we may consider changing to the O2 standard package - up to 8mb. It will certainly be a lot cheaper.

Have already got Hotmail and Googlemail email addresses, so changing wouldn't be too much of a problem. Just what you get used to!:rolleyes:

Thanks for the advice:T

macman

If you already have Googlemail then you're laughing. Current price for O2 Standard with mobile discount, first three months free and £50 Quidco cashback is 1st year average of £1.34 a month-so you'll save just under £200 in the first year vs Virgin.
O2's CS is really good to-free no. and open 24/7.
Just make sure that Virgin don't sign you up for another 12m just for supplying the new modem.