Updated Find the cheapest broadband discussion thread

EdwardB

MoneySavingMouse wrote: »

They are also putting broadband up from £7.50 to £10 a month, from March.

Is that right?

I thought it was a £1.49 increase which was bad enough.

If it they added £2.50 a month it would be a 50% increase for me as I pay £5 a month over term of contract.

I will probably wear it for 3 months but then bye bye sly sky.

CarlosR

Just been trying to re-negotiate my Broadband Infinity 2 and Line rental deal with BT (supposedly 72Mb but same speed as Infinity 1 52Mb) as up for renewal 31st March.

Had the usual you get what you pay for, up to 50 users compared to 150-200 contention issue from other providers etc. etc. as a valued customer we can offer £41.49 per month Infinity 2 and think that included paying the line rental saver twelve months in advanced.......

If I'm a new customer I can get the Infinity 1 deal 52Mb, which is what I'm getting speed wise, including line rental for £29.99 per month which includes a £150 MasterCard reward card.....mentioned this on the call and told only available to new customer only.

The question is can I get my partner to sign up in her name (not same surname) and place an order to take over the line/broadband as a new customer on the contract end date to receive these deals???

roxy28

CarlosR wrote: »

If I'm a new customer I can get the Infinity 1 deal 52Mb, which is what I'm getting speed wise, including line rental for £29.99 per month which includes a £150 MasterCard reward card.....mentioned this on the call and told only available to new customer only.

Will the £29.99 per month increase from April with new price rise?

CarlosR

Just been on the online chat to BT and they've said no it's fixed for 12 month

EdwardB

CarlosR wrote: »

Just been trying to re-negotiate my Broadband Infinity 2 and Line rental deal with BT (supposedly 72Mb but same speed as Infinity 1 52Mb) as up for renewal 31st March.

Had the usual you get what you pay for, up to 50 users compared to 150-200 contention issue from other providers etc. etc. as a valued customer we can offer £41.49 per month Infinity 2 and think that included paying the line rental saver twelve months in advanced.......

If I'm a new customer I can get the Infinity 1 deal 52Mb, which is what I'm getting speed wise, including line rental for £29.99 per month which includes a £150 MasterCard reward card.....mentioned this on the call and told only available to new customer only.

The question is can I get my partner to sign up in her name (not same surname) and place an order to take over the line/broadband as a new customer on the contract end date to receive these deals???

Gosh how do people afford these prices!

So here is something I have done before.

You tell them you are moving on 25th March, pay up to end of contract, give them your parents address to send any new bill to but ask them to leave BB active as you will be redecorating property before you leave.

Then sign up your partner from 26th, old BB will probably remain active until the switch at the exchange, if it is possible to avoid rise you will do it, but if not you will have chance to jump ship if a better deal comes along.

Might be worth calling Plusnet to see what deal they have.

Doc_N

CarlosR wrote: »

Just been trying to re-negotiate my Broadband Infinity 2 and Line rental deal with BT (supposedly 72Mb but same speed as Infinity 1 52Mb) as up for renewal 31st March.

Had the usual you get what you pay for, up to 50 users compared to 150-200 contention issue from other providers etc. etc. as a valued customer we can offer £41.49 per month Infinity 2 and think that included paying the line rental saver twelve months in advanced.......

If I'm a new customer I can get the Infinity 1 deal 52Mb, which is what I'm getting speed wise, including line rental for £29.99 per month which includes a £150 MasterCard reward card.....mentioned this on the call and told only available to new customer only.

The question is can I get my partner to sign up in her name (not same surname) and place an order to take over the line/broadband as a new customer on the contract end date to receive these deals???

There are a few posts on this excellent point scattered around the net, but nobody seems to have the definitive answer.

What seems to be the case is this: yes, it can be done, but you might end up with a gap of a few days (maybe even more) in service, a new number and some additional connection charges.

Let us know!

Mikeyboy01

Hi,
I am looking for help I am one of those that is called silver surfer and my experience is limited I have been with sky for about 14 yesrs and sick of getting treated like second class. I tried Plus net they were just idiots and told me what I needed without asking any questions needless to say I told them to bog off. I am looking for Braodband not a big user but can use it and have line rental for the weekend calls with sky. I am looking for the best deal for broadband and line rental but to pay in advance save the big bills coming in but get confused when start to read everthing can anyone recommend a deal for me not keen on BT either hate football and belive the customer service is not all that good. I think when you tell them you are retired then that is a licence for them to print money. They get me all the time on how much I use and need which I have unlimited with sky and it does me and the wife she user her tablet mainly to watch coronation street yes sad I know but we are getting there. Any help as said would be much appreciated and where do I get it. I like the sky telly can I keep that for all my history and war programmes

Doc_N

Mikeyboy01 wrote: »

Hi,
I am looking for help.......

Have you considered TalkTalk? Pretty competitive at the moment at £27pm (fibre) inc line rental and another £5pm for anytime landline and mobile calls. A lot of add-on extras free at the moment too (call forwarding, call waiting etc).

EdwardB

Mikeyboy01 wrote: »

Hi,
I am looking for help I am one of those that is called silver surfer and my experience is limited I have been with sky for about 14 yesrs and sick of getting treated like second class. I tried Plus net they were just idiots and told me what I needed without asking any questions needless to say I told them to bog off. I am looking for Braodband not a big user but can use it and have line rental for the weekend calls with sky.

I am looking for the best deal for broadband and line rental but to pay in advance save the big bills coming in but get confused when start to read everthing can anyone recommend a deal for me not keen on BT either hate football and belive the customer service is not all that good. I think when you tell them you are retired then that is a licence for them to print money.

They get me all the time on how much I use and need which I have unlimited with sky and it does me and the wife she user her tablet mainly to watch coronation street yes sad I know but we are getting there. Any help as said would be much appreciated and where do I get it. I like the sky telly can I keep that for all my history and war programmes

Hey Mikey

The first thing you need to know about broadband is that regardless of provider. it is going to be your local exchange and who has invested in it that determines the quality of line you get.

So you start off by understanding the lay of the land so to speak

If you live in an area where the wiring from your house to the green box you see in the street is old or if your location is just too far from the exchange then the speed you get will be impacted.

Even the wiring in your house might be a factor and it costs £60 if a call out is determined to need a change in your house (say because of a bad extention).

If you are in a rural area you may be poorly served

If you live in the outer parts of a town you may be poorly served (by lack of investment in the exchange) in these cases supplier buy from BT Wholesale so their speed is based on what BT Offer.

If you live in the centre of town but far from exchange your speed may not be that fast

Even in the centre of town you can get congestion and dead zones.

I tell you these things so that you know that regardless of supplier the problem may be any of the above.

Sadly the solution to most of the above is fibre (where available), except when it is your house.

So depending on where you live the supplier choices you have may be few, this link will tell you which companies have invested in your exchange and what market type exchange you have.

https://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_search

You type in your location and then choose the exchange

This is an example of a remote exhange with just ADSL

https://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange/NSJOG

It has no BT Fibre (look under BT Wholesale) described as follows:

FTTC status:
FTTP status:

Out of possible providers it is then a case of whether they have their own kit in the exchange or whether they only buy from BT. Own kit is called LLU. Sky, TalkTalk, and Virgin may have their own kit, Plusnet just buy from BT.

Note that Virgin is slightly different because they have their own cable network and may not service your street but might the next one along.

The exchange above has no LLU providers

Now compare that to a busy town like Cambridge

https://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange/EACAM

It has all BT Services, Virgin and several LLU providers

So you see the choice you have really depends where you live

There are too few choices and factors for you to rule out any supplier unless you really hate them with a vengeance because you feel they have complete disdain for their customers, which is pretty much how I feel about TalkTalk.

Now you need to also consider your needs as far as TV is concerned, Sky lock you in by giving you a device that allows you to record programmes, but if you cut back say movies, you will no longer be able to watch any of the movies you already have on the Sky box. If you leave SkyTV you lose access to all of the paid TV programmes on the Sky Box. Even then you may have to pay Sky a subscription to record free channels.

So you either make a firm decision to say FU to Sky and get your content elsewhere or you suck it up and buy the lowest TV service that meets your needs and get your BB elsewhere. Sky will structure their channels so that you are pretty much forced to go buy their more expensive services.

This means you have to weigh up your choices which are

1. SkyTV & BB Bundle
2. SkyTV & BB from another provider
3. Alternative TV & BB from another provider
4. Alternative TV & Sky BB

I listed Option 4 because occasionally there are Sky Deals that are compelling, although these are usually restricted to new Sky customers. So this is ruled out until you have left them for a year.

You have stated that you want to keep your current Sky programmes so as long as you hold that desire Option 3 is ruled out.

Your best approach for option 1 is to find a viable deal for Option 2, you have to ring Sky's and act angry as if you are fed up with being ripped off. You can point out that you have been a loyal customer for 14 years and spend X with them. Yet as you can see here they have offered Line rental and Broadband at just £5 for a year in 2015 amd for £61 in 2016 http://!!!!!!/skybb5

Actually doing the research for option 2 before you call is important, there are various money saving websites that are exposed to different deals, also there are cashback sites like TopCashBack which may enable you to combine deals.

By far the easiest way to do this is to wait until their is a cracking deal on offer and to call to say you are leaving, ring them to ask what notice you are obliged to give, you can even pretend you are going to bin the TV, I know Sky will give 6 months TV at half price if you say you are struggling financially as you are no longer working.

I do think the BB market is completely messed up, allowing BT to buy EE without floating their Broadband business was a mistake as they already own Plusnet. We have had way less deals in last year than we used to get and the providers keep increasing the line rental without adding ANYTHING to the Line Rental service.

I hope this helps you get a better price. Be hard with Sky, act angry and be prepared to give notice, their retention dept will most likely come up with something. I will almost certainly be leaving Sky whe June £61 deal expires. I am happy to survive on mobile till a better deal comes along.

P.S. Do not tell them you are retired, just say you are looking for their best deal and practice the words "You will have to do better" and mean it.

schofield8883

Help needed if anyone can? Im currently with BT and have been for 10 years usually i ring when out of a contract and the offer a good enough deal not to switch however now i want to do fibre its working out quite expensive, there top fibre is going to cost £43.69 and £10 for hub! been looking around and Vodafone do a similar deal at £28 with a £24 set up, but as ive never been with anyone other than BT i dont know what there like can anyone help? or can anyone suggest who else to look at? i find broadband has started to drop at times but i do live in the sticks and some company wont do my area i did try the link Edward suggested in the above post but i haven't got any idea what the results tell me. Any help will be much appreciated

edit: on the link shared above it says : This exchange has BT Wholesale as the sole provider of broadband services, does this mean i can only get fibre from BT?