TalkTalk Customer Poll

lorraine.allen

Initially there seemed to be a lot of down time (mainly weekends) but that improved as the year progressed. I have been trying now since July to get away from them and use another Internet provider but they are still providing a service to my line (even though my contract ended with them) which prevents anyone else using the line. I noticed they were quick to take out the £70 penalty fee for leaving early!! After being fobbed off time and time again by them (I think I have spoken to every member of the call centre and never the same one twice) I took my complaint to Ofcom who raised this issue to Talktalk's complaints division and progress seems to have been made - I have been told by both Talktalk & BT that a cease order has been issued/received and the line will be free from 14 Sept. Fingers crossed!

afk25

My experience with talktalk has been mixed. The biggest problem is the broadband which fails too often for my liking. Somtimes it has gone down for a few days and only once have they admitted that there was a fault on their part when I've reported it - usually they blame my pc and I was once told to buy a new modem before they would look into it any further!

Their technical help phone line is a waste of time, as has been mentioned they stick to their script and that's it. You just end up getting irritated and annoyed so I rarely bother now, the connection comes back eventually.

I am glad I took the package out, it has saved me a lot of money and when its working fine its great! Once the contract expires in October I intend to remain with them, unless a better offer comes along.

morgie

Broadly satisfied with a slight hiccup when switching over originally but a quick call to customer services got it sorted. More of a problem when the local exchange was recently unbundled. When the service was not restored after the 4 hour outage I had a devil of a job getting the Indian call centre to accept the problem was their end. They wanted me to wait at least 24 hours without any phone service at all before logging a call. Had to be very firm in insisting they log a fault call straight away. It got a result as within a couple of hours all was back to normal. Much better responce when the line went dead last week, fault logged immediately and service was back after an hour or so. Apart from that I can't complain about a full phone and 6mb+ BB service for less the £30 a month.

alij

We applied for the Talk Talk package in May 2006 and they have never been able to sort out the broadband! We have supplied 3 Mac codes and all we get is "it's an internal error we need another mac code".The customer service is appalling.They won't return phone calls when they say they will.Nobody seems to know what they are talking about.We sent a complaint email and never got a reply. We are looking elsewhere and i hope they don't keep us to the 18month contract. In our view the contract was for phones and broadband and we have never had that.

Tiglet

I signed up quite soon after the free broadband offer started. Although I had to wait a while for the broadband to be connected, it mostly gave me what I wanted.

The setup disc crashed, disabling the remote support feature (which suited me) and leaving me without an email address (which didn't but I can live with it).

The broadband connection has been a bit ropey on occasions, dropping out for no reason, although it usually comes back quite quickly. The worst problem is that it sometimes reports a bad password when it does fail.

I don't know whether my experience is typical, but stability seems to have improved recently. I think they must have installed extra equipment at the exchange. The reported connection speed had been dropping consistently, from 5-6Meg down to 2Meg, then about a month ago it went back to 5-6Meg. Throughout this time, the actual speed achieved was aroud 2Meg incoming and 300k outgoing. (Speed tested using http://www.internetfrog.com/mypc/speedtest/)

All in all, I've found that it suits my needs, despite a few niggles. Plus the free calls to landlines and international numbers has saved me a fortune - way cheaper than BT.

leshewitt

We've been using TalkTalk for phone calls for years, and using them for line rental since it was available from them. Always no problems, always efficient, always cheaper than BT!

We used Pipex broadband for around 5 years from when it became a sensible price (£20+VAT), initially 512k upgraded to 1mb for free. As prices fell over the last year or so, they didn't seem too keen to keep my business so I recently went to TalkTalk for broadband as well.

I "upgraded" my phone package to "Talk 3 International" in mid June. They messed up taking my details (despite the fact I was already with them!). They had the wrong name, address (in every detail) and postcode. It took a little over two months to sort out the mess. "Go live" date for broadband was 28-Aug and it really did happen on the day. I did accept their offer of a free modem as they say they will only investigate problems if you are using one of their supported bits of kit, but I don't use it. I use my pretty new Netgear wireless ADSL Router - works fine.

I suppose I'm still in the settling in period of 10 days or so where they are still seeing what line speed will work reliably. I had one spell where the router was not connecting for the best part of 12 hours overnight; apart from that I've had a few short spells where it was off-line (less than 10 mins, which was what they said would happen). I'm on an LLU exchange but quite a long way from the exchange, so speed has been between 3 and 4mbps download, 440kbps upload.

I use their e-mail service with full Microsoft Outlook (rather than Outlook Express); it's just fine. Well before I left Pipex, I got my own internet domain, a ".co.uk" which costs me £2.59 a year, so I suppose TalkTalk really costs me about £20.70 a month.... :-) I can send with my domain as the "From" address so that's great. I'd recommend doing this. I found it easy to set up and it makes switching ISP much easier as you don't need to tell everyone about e-mail address changes.

From what I can see, the only other people who compete are Tiscali who seem to offer a similar service for 50p cheaper, always assuming you are on a Tiscali LLU exchange (which I was not when I signed up with TalkTalk). Cable is much more expensive, none of the other suppliers using BT-style lines come close. As my wife and I are both so-called "silver surfers" (early retirement from our day jobs), the "price v. quality" equation changes somewhat when the income changes....

In summary, so far so good. I agree with a previous poster; excellent value for the money and if the downtime is just a few mins every once in a while and it comes back after a short while then it's good enough for me. If you want premium service, then you need to pay premium prices. This is a very fast, cheap-and-cheerful service giving us calls+line+broadband for less than we used to pay for broadband alone.

Schneaky

I am pleased with TalkTalk, and have been a customer for quite a few years, just for phone, and then when BB started I switched to them, and apart from a single issue where I lost my phone line for a day (due to BT apparently!), and the loss of connection (sorted by restarting router).
I plan to sign up for the Setenta offer in a few days, so I can ensure I get the two Liverpool games in November, before I cancel (having given 30 days notice beforehand), and then get to keep the freeview box which is currently for sale in Argos for £50 (See here)! It looks like a good deal, but the contract is with Setenta (see FAQ), so you don't have to go through TT to cancel.

She_t

A few teething problems with the system when I first signed up to Free Broadband and evening/weekend calls. The Indian call centre couldn't actually understand or assist with the problems I had. That was a major frustration (also they wouldn't put me through to the relevant team I was asking for). However, since then everything has been really good. Can't fault the service - so glad I read Martin's website and decided to "go for it".

happyinchorlton

My experience with Talk Talk has been a complete nightmare! Even though its dirt cheap its simply not worth entering into a 12 month contract. Their customer service is a joke and so frustrating! I was told an engineer was going to come round to my house to fix my broadband problem - complete lies! Be prepared to be put on hold for up to 30 minutes!!! After three months with no broadband and repeated attempts to sort out the problem i have signed up with a new company. STAY CLEAR IS MY ADVICE.:mad:

John-L_5

TalkTalk just have total contempt for their customers. All those who have suffered should boycott Carphone Warehouse, I certainly haven't set foot in that once-reputable chain of shops for over a year now.

My experience was like that of so many others: they direct debited me every month for the 'service' but provided nothing, no phone, no broadband, just a dead line. Hours on the phone to the Indian call centres where the only qualification is an inability to speak English and a low IQ. After endless troubleshooting it was always 'can't do anything, you need to speak to BT'. But I'm not a BT customer! After almost six months and a change of job (my work required me to be on the internet at home) I stopped the direct debits. Then they passed my details to a debt collection agency and tried to stop me transferring my account to a proper provider on the grounds that I owed them money.

Dunstone never replied to the emails I sent him. The only bit of goodwill I ever received was to be allowed to terminate my contract early, and that only after I'd issued a legal warning. The whole experience cost me hundreds, maybe thousands.

The BT engineer who came to sort out their broadband service said he was sick of TalkTalk blaming them.