Broadband Advice (longish post!)

m3kx

Hello! I'm a long term reader of the forum but haven't posted until now (as you can see from my join date!). This post might get long but I'm going to try my best to keep it short and simple (it hasn't worked, I'm sorry!)

Until now the only Internet and phone provider in my area has been BT but on Monday TalkTalk came to the door offering free Internet. They informed me that our lines are being upgraded and TalkTalk are now renting lines from BT so they were going door to door offering a special deal to our neighbourhood. Anyway they done a line check and offered me the following plan:

Broadband Plus: £0.00
Line Rental: £13.80
Phone: £7.25
Totalling £21.05 a month for 12 months.
Plus an one off connection fee £30.00

This is what we would get:
Unlimited calls to UK landlines, 0845/0870 numbers. Free router, unlimited downloads and free antivirus. Calling features boost (call waiting, diverting etc).

This all sounds good in comparison to our current BT package (I'm reading this from my account online, presume I'm in a contract of some sort not sure but I joined almost 5 years ago):

Broadband option 3: £23.60
Line Rental + calling plan: £16.90
In the past 3 months we made 76 calls, 36 were free the rest cost us £13.63.
We pay £46 a month.

This is what we get:
Unlimited calls to UK landlines after 7pm on weekdays and all weekend, Inclusive calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers after 7pm on weekdays and all weekend, Up to 3 calling features for no extra cost, 24/7 help and support for your home phone. Unlimited downloads, free email addresses, digital vault

(I should say we would make more calls with the landline but the line is awfully crackly, a lot of our neighbours have the same problem.)

Now I like BT, I want to stick with BT, I've had no problems and because I've heard bad things about TalkTalk I want to stick with BT more so but I could do with the cheaper price! So my question is... Should I try to haggle BT down to a better price? I feel like we are in a good place to do so, this is the first competition BT has had and like I said I've been with them since I moved in, almost 5 years, so surely I have some sort of long term customer something... I can't think of a word.. I know it's nothing special but I thought being a long term customer would help?

Does anyone have any advice on haggling with BT? Or anyone have any good things to say about TalkTalk? I'm not the best haggler but I was just going to call up and tell it how it is as I have done to you, this is what I've been offered can you match it sort of thing?

Thanks in advance for reading my post and any advice you can give me.

Kim

Having written all of this I have just checked SamKnows.com and according to that I can also get PlusNet. It is £23.48 a month, 60gb download limit free router as well as free connection if I take a 12 month contract. Calls are evening and weekends or an extra £3.50 for any time calls. Oh this is confusing!

Neil49

A couple of questions to clarify your requirements.

Do you need free phone calls 24/7 as offerred by Talk Talk - you don't get that on your existing contract with BT. Are free evenings and weekends sufficient for you?

How much do you use the internet (in gigaytes per month). Do you download films etc on a regular basis or is usage limited to general surfing. BT seemed to have changed their plan names so it's difficult to tell what you are getting at the moment.

Have you studied Martins pages on phones and broadband as this covers many of the offers available at present (including cashback via quidco etc)

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/phones/home-phone-calls

m3kx

Hi Neil49, thank you for the reply.

As I said we aren't using the land line as much at the minute due to the crackling but once that is fixed I doubt we would need 24/7, it is just what was offered to me. With BT we get unlimited downloads and internet use, having checked with BT our recent usage (as from when I do not know, for the phone its the 17th of September so I can only assume this is also from then?) is 8.19GB. We were previously on option 2 which was limited to a certain amount but we went over the limit a lot as we download and watch a lot of TV online. Yes I have taken a look at Martins articles on numerous occasions, they have not always applied to us due to only now getting talk talk into the area which leaves me unsure of changing suppliers of both calls and internet or internet alone.

Oh and I apologize for using the old plan names, I hadn't realised they had made changes to their plan titles!

Kim

spike7451

Until now the only Internet and phone provider in my area has been BT but on Monday TalkTalk came to the door offering free Internet. They informed me that our lines are being upgraded and TalkTalk are now renting lines from BT so they were going door to door offering a special deal to our neighbourhood. Anyway they done a line check and offered me the following plan:

Be very very wary of these reps.They don't work for Talk Talk but for a external marketing firm,over here they work for Skye Marketing.It's in their interest to get you to sign up as they only get paid by commission.So no sale,no payday! I spent a day out with them before being offered the job,which I turned down (not financially secure employment) & to say their tactics are dodgy is an understatement.Quite often you'll find out what they offered when they called is different from what you get in reality...

m3kx

spike7451 wrote: »

Be very very wary of these reps.They don't work for Talk Talk but for a external marketing firm,over here they work for Skye Marketing.It's in their interest to get you to sign up as they only get paid by commission.So no sale,no payday! I spent a day out with them before being offered the job,which I turned down (not financially secure employment) & to say their tactics are dodgy is an understatement.Quite often you'll find out what they offered when they called is different from what you get in reality...

I was very wary of talking to them to be honest but I work nightshift and they caught me un-awares, just out of bed at half four in the afternoon (I was still in my PJs, no glasses and bed head hair haha) I did check their ID's and they have to leave their name for getting the commission. I have confirmed with Talk Talk what I would be getting and it is what the lads said. I'm not overly keen to go with Talk Talk I'm thinking about telling them to forget it, I'm a bit worried its not going to be worth the switch.

Neil49

The basic Talktalk essentials package should be sufficient for your requirements as it provides evening and weekend calls etc and 40g/b per month for internet usage.

I fully agree with m3kx above regarding these cold calling sales techniques. Don't be rushed into anything and do your research. Samknows is very useful (as you have discovered) and should hopefully indicate that Talktalk have an LLU connection for your area i.e. they have their own equipment in the exchange rather than pay bt rental for it. This may also allow them to provide varying broadband speeds. I say 'may' because I am also with Talktalk on an LLU exchange and despite talk of faster speeds I'm still stuck on 3 m/b line speed - I suppose if I pay more it will miraculously go much faster.

As mentioned above you could also look at using the Quidco cashback site. They are currently offering £50 cashback but with only 6 months broadband discount. Then again, if you only go for the Essentials package it would still be cheaper overall.

I know Talktalk get bad press for customer service but I have never found them to be anywhere near as bad as BT. The only major problem I had was when I lost both phone and internet for 5 days. They struggled to find the problem but it ended up being caused by the BT Openreach engineer at my local exchange - when they put the plug back in, the engineer phoned up to apologise.

I think if you phone BT and say you are thinking of switching to Talktalk they may make you an offer you can't refuse.

I'd start there first but don't be rushed into anything - once you are in a contract you are there for the duration!

Best of luck

spike7451

Neil49 wrote: »

The basic Talktalk essentials package should be sufficient for your requirements as it provides evening and weekend calls etc and 40g/b per month for internet usage.

I fully agree with m3kx above regarding these cold calling sales techniques. Don't be rushed into anything and do your research. Samknows is very useful (as you have discovered) and should hopefully indicate that Talktalk have an LLU connection for your area i.e. they have their own equipment in the exchange rather than pay bt rental for it. This may also allow them to provide varying broadband speeds. I say 'may' because I am also with Talktalk on an LLU exchange and despite talk of faster speeds I'm still stuck on 3 m/b line speed - I suppose if I pay more it will miraculously go much faster.

As mentioned above you could also look at using the Quidco cashback site. They are currently offering £50 cashback but with only 6 months broadband discount. Then again, if you only go for the Essentials package it would still be cheaper overall.

I know Talktalk get bad press for customer service but I have never found them to be anywhere near as bad as BT. The only major problem I had was when I lost both phone and internet for 5 days. They struggled to find the problem but it ended up being caused by the BT Openreach engineer at my local exchange - when they put the plug back in, the engineer phoned up to apologise.

I think if you phone BT and say you are thinking of switching to Talktalk they may make you an offer you can't refuse.

I'd start there first but don't be rushed into anything - once you are in a contract you are there for the duration!

Best of luck

Doubtful,the speed you get is dependant on the age/condition of the wiring from the exchange to the master socket & the length of the line as it's run.

daggy

You should check on Samknows, this site will show you a list of all providers on your exchange... you should be able to chose between all of them.

Make sure you take a look at the traffic management policies of the different ISP's too.

Talk Talk only slow down p2p traffic, but they manage most other protocols - if you pay them extra, you traffic gets priority.

Plusnet are by far the worst, if you only go for their basic package, they slow down almost everything.

BT only slow down p2pduring peak hours, aside form that, they are fine.

Sky do not slow down anything - I've found that my torrents are much faster on Sky than virgin.

As for a deal from BT:

You have been with them for 5 years, so you have built up a lot of loyalty and therefore can expect a cracking deal.

Your contract was probably 12 months, so you can terminate at any time.
As a guide, it's good practice to renegotiate every 12 months as you can generally get better deals.

m3kx

Well BT called me after fighting with TalkTalk over twitter for my business and offered me a good deal. They set up a new 12 month contract giving me option 3 broadband for lower than the price option 1 (or what ever they call it now) and took a few pounds off the line rental (its now £26.10 for both broadband and line rental) so it's not as cheap as TalkTalk but I'm happy. Thank you for the help and info!

propertyman

After complaining to Talk Talk and proving that their exchange is over subscribed, all of sudden I have a "line fault" on the landline while the Broadband continues-poorly-.......hmmmmmm

TalkTalk

hi m3kx,


I can assure you we do not try and obtain business via our twitter contact, if customers tweet regarding TT we will repsond to provide advice and support. However we do not attempt to obtain new business via these means. I am however glad to hear you managed to resolve your issues and are happy with your current deal.


Propertyman - If you join the TalkTalk Members Forum, we can assist you with any issues you may be experiecing with your TalkTalk Service. We are able to raise line faults and have these investigated by the network as applicable.

Regards

Mark