Move to Talk Talk or stay with BT?

Maz1963

Hi, am wondering if anyone can share any words of wisdom? I've only ever been with BT for phone and broadband. I have always been happy with the service and the customer service, but not happy now with the price! I've looked at other deals via Uswitch and have found a 24 month contract with Talk Talk for £25.50 a month, broadband (standard), line, unlimited calls. I don't download much, just email and a few websites, so don't need fast broadband (current download speed with BT is apparently 2.9MB - has been fine so far for my needs). Have tried twice with BT so get them to reduce my current costs and the best offer today is £35.99 for line, broadband and calls included 24/7. So, Talk Talk still cheaper. One fly in the ointment is that I want to keep my BT email address, which will apparently cost me £5 a month from BT, so moving to TT will now cost £30.50. But, still cheaper than staying with BT! I have a major concern with the reviews I've seen of TT, but then if you Google BT reviews, they don't seem much better (though my experience has always been good).


Would I be daft to move to TT to effectively save £5.49 a month, or am I being daft in thinking TT service will be that bad? I have to say, the reviews of TT seem pretty awful.

wlam

Well as you already did the maths, you are looking at saving £5.49 a month, which equates to a saving of around £65 a year. Another way to look at it is £431 vs £366 per year.

I was in a similar position to yourself, in that I was with BT Fibre Broadband for the last few years, but with the price increases, and lack of a decent offer to stay, I switched to TalkTalk (switch happens later this week!)

Sure I am worried about problems after switching, maybe I get poor internet performance or experience other unseen problems, which would undoubtedly take time and effort to resolve.

Personally I'm OK spending time to resolve issues, so if it was my choice I absolutely would switch based on the cost savings. However if it was my brother or sister who was thinking of switching, as they are people who expect the internet to just be working, then I would probably advise them to pay the extra few quid to avoid any potential hassle switching may cause.

One thing I would suggest is to open a gmail or hotmail account, and begin to migrate away from the BT email address. May take awhile but probably work out best for the long term.

2see

can you get fibre ?
std broadband costs aren't to far away from fibre,
bt would not give me a good fibre deal, so hello plusnet
in a few day's time,,,

usernameisvalid

Talk talk is great when it works

When it goes tits up, you have a problem

I was with talktalk very happily for 18 months, then they cut my speed from 3.1 to 0.1 and said that that was all my line was ever capable of supporting ( extremely rural area) disregarding the fact for the previous 18 months I was getting 3.1

I never ever ever want to hear the word 'ma'am' ever again

Maz1963

Thanks for the opinions. I have decided to stay with BT. I called them again today and the offer improved by £2.51 a month! Interestingly, when I spoke to Talk Talk again they offered to pay the £5 for me to keep the BT Internet email account. So I've stayed with BT at an extra cost of £7.98 a month. I feel it's probably worth it for me, given the reviews and comments I've seen about Talk Talk. Not once have I ever had any problems with BT and their customer service is always good. Of course there's no guarantee BT won't hike the price again in the next 12 months, but if they do then presumably I am able to look elsewhere again, in view of contract terms. I will make sure I move all contacts to my gmail account over the next 12 months too so that I'm not 'held hostage' by the email account in any way in future.


wlam - it would be helpful to have some feedback on how your switch to TT goes.


I can't get fibre yet where we are, it's a semi rural spot. I've added that into the mix with staying with BT.

grumpycrab

I would prefer to stay with BT than go to TalkTalk. However, and assuming your haven't started another 12 month contact, there are some new players in the ADSL market e.g. JohnLewis (uses plusnet but appear cheaper); SSE; EE. Even Plusnet on a 12month contract with cashback (e.g. Quidco or direct offer) may be worth a look.

wlam

Maz1963 wrote: »

wlam - it would be helpful to have some feedback on how your switch to TT goes.

My switch from BT to TalkTalk was completed yesterday evening, and happy to report everything went smoothly and no complaints or problems so far.

The switch-over occurred around 17:15, and kids rang me at work to tell me the internet was down! When I got home, it took 5 mins to change some things on my router (I don't use the TT supplied one) and everything was back up and running.

I was on BT Infinity 2 for about 4 years, and on BT my router sync was consistently around 70/20 but on TT it's slightly lower at 65/20. I believe it takes few days for the line to optimise itself again, so hopefully I can get a higher sync, but not a massive issue for myself.

In terms of browsing and general internet use, to be honest have not noticed much of a difference from BT.

Early days but things looking good so far.

lee111s

The grass isn't always greener

KILL_BILL

CrapNet aka Plusnet - dont touch with a bargepole