Looking to get cheaper/better than BT (& poss do away with landline?). Help/advice?

JustAnotherSaver

Ok so with the price of absolutely everything shooting through the roof quicker than ever, we're having to have a serious look at where if necessary, we can save some cash.

So on to Broadband/TV/Phone.

My current deal with BT is up in April. Having a look at my account right now

Broadband: Fibre 1 (£24.13)

Landline: PAYG

TV: Entertainment package (£10.45)

Netflix (Add-On): £9.99

I got on the Live Chat to BT on Friday night & Adrish offered me Fibre 2 broadband @ £25.99/month 24 month £0 activation.

I'm a bit weary about jumping ship. Sure enough it's real simple to find something cheaper. All I have to do is hop on some comparison site, find the most dirt cheap internet provider and job done. Sign up ....... then get annoyed at how my connection keeps dropping and wishing I'd stayed with BT. There's a bit more to it than just going cheapest. Been there & regretted that in the past.

I read that PlusNet are owned by BT and are cheaper. Anyone reading this can comment on their quality/reliability?

To be perfectly honest with you, I don't actually have an issue with BT. I've been with them for a number of years now (4-5), was with Sky before them (also didn't have an issue with) and was with BT again before Sky. The only reason I switched between them was cost. They never let me down as far as service goes.

If it turns out that there's not much quality for a cheaper price then I'll stay with BT. I'm just asking the question.

Regards the TV .... we're actually considering ditching this altogether. I can't remember the last time I watched TV other than Netflix / Prime (when we have it) / Disney (when we had it). My wife said she isn't fussed by the TV side of things to warrant the cost. Most of what we watch would be on the free channels or Netflix.

Regards the phone - I remember way back when, you HAD to have a phone with the internet. It's my understanding now that you don't? Although looking at my package, since we already have the physical phone in the house, it doesn't seem to cost us anything on a PAYG deal other than any call we make - which is none.

I see no mention of line rental in my bill. Again this is something else i remember from years ago. How come this isn't listed on my bill? I was looking to do away with the landline to 1) avoid charge for it (but there doesn't seem to be one) and 2) avoid the line rental cost (but again, there doesn't seem to be one??).

For anyone reading this who ditched their TV package, what setup did you go with as your option? Wife has mentioned Freesat but I haven't really looked in to it properly yet.

All in all just looking to see if we can save money while still having a service we're happy with (Netflix will be staying).

Neil_Jones

Broadband without phone line is available but is almost always more expensive than it would be with phone and broadband.  Just don't use the phone line side.

Modern broadband deals/rules require it to be bundled in, so you see things like £23.95 a month that includes rental and broadband, so you're effectively getting one or the other for nothing (usually the rental) bill wise.

TV wise - Freeview does what it says on the tin.  No extra harware needed, TV probably already supports it.

Plusnet - owned by BT and run at arms length, but to all intents and purposes a separate company.  Billing system is atrocious though.

flaneurs_lobster

FWIW, my story.

18 months ago decided to switch away from BT (total broadband, landline, TV - £63/mth) to Vodafone (BBand, LLine - £20/mth). The decision was wholly to do with cost, the BT service had been faultless for 5 years at this address bar one 24 hour outage.

Come the day, BT service ceased, plugged in shiny new VF router and nothing. There followed daily conversations with Customer Support (phone, online chat, Twitter) all telling me I could expect service within 48 hours. All these interactions were initiated by me, all VF staff were unfailingly polite and none could tell me why I had no service. The router was turned off and on again many times.

After 10 days I called time, aware that I was approaching the 14 day limit to cancel without penalty. Back to BT who raised a new purchase order and connected on the earliest available date two weeks later. Naturally It's been faultless since (£28/mth Fibre 1).

Contract's up in July, what would you do? I'm sure I could find a cheaper deal than that which will be offered by BT at renewal.

JJ_Egan

OP you can save by cancelling TV package and Netflix , unless you get good use from them .

JustAnotherSaver

Netflix gets used daily so that'll be staying. 

The TV side of things can go though. 

How would that leave me with the TV then? In terms of will I get BBC etc (all the services you don't have to 'pay' for or do I need to buy a freeview/freesat box?) I'll still have my BT Youview box, unless I have to send that back. 

Assuming I also still need to pay for the TV licence due to then still being able to watch live TV? 
Trying to not bombard with questions but if I basically only had Netflix and things like iPlayer, could I get away with not paying the TV Licence or is it still required? 

Then there's the occasional box office boxing match which I pay for. 

QrizB

JustAnotherSaver said:

How would that leave me with the TV then? In terms of will I get BBC etc (all the services you don't have to 'pay' for or do I need to buy a freeview/freesat box?) I'll still have my BT Youview box, unless I have to send that back.

If your TV is old enough not to have a DTT tuner, your YouView box will give you all the Freeview channels:
https://www.freeview.co.uk/tv-guide

This does require a functional TV antenna.

JJ_Egan

As above BT box should give all Freeview channels plus standard Internet IPlayer ITV etc .

BT box may belong to you or BT may want it back . Depends upon contract and date .

matelodave

flaneurs_lobster said:

FWIW, my story.

18 months ago decided to switch away from BT (total broadband, landline, TV - £63/mth) to Vodafone (BBand, LLine - £20/mth). The decision was wholly to do with cost, the BT service had been faultless for 5 years at this address bar one 24 hour outage.

Come the day, BT service ceased, plugged in shiny new VF router and nothing. There followed daily conversations with Customer Support (phone, online chat, Twitter) all telling me I could expect service within 48 hours. All these interactions were initiated by me, all VF staff were unfailingly polite and none could tell me why I had no service. The router was turned off and on again many times.

After 10 days I called time, aware that I was approaching the 14 day limit to cancel without penalty. Back to BT who raised a new purchase order and connected on the earliest available date two weeks later. Naturally It's been faultless since (£28/mth Fibre 1).

Contract's up in July, what would you do? I'm sure I could find a cheaper deal than that which will be offered by BT at renewal.

Not my experience, Left BT last week on the appointed day, swapped connections over from BT router to the Vodafone router and plugged the phone into the router and it was all up and running in less than 10 minutes.

Saved £30 a month for 30% faster speeds - so far it's been rock solid

JustAnotherSaver

That;s the thing - everyone is different. I've read some horror cases with BT and also Sky.

I couldn't fault either. I can't remember a single episode of there being a problem. Maybe we had some down time. If we did then I don't remember it.

I only left BT to go to Sky because of various cashback offers working it out cheaper. I only then returned to BT for the same reason.

But times are changing and there's more wallet squeezing going on so I have to take a closer look now.

Neil_Jones

JustAnotherSaver said:

That;s the thing - everyone is different. I've read some horror cases with BT and also Sky.

The people who complain about problems usually outnumber the people who post praise by about 98%.  You will always read more complaints than praise.

QrizB

JustAnotherSaver said:

That;s the thing - everyone is different. I've read some horror cases with BT and also Sky.

I couldn't fault either. I can't remember a single episode of there being a problem. Maybe we had some down time. If we did then I don't remember it.

I'm in the same camp. 16+ years of changing supplier every couple of years (first ADSL, more recently FTTC) and the only real problems I've had have been due to damage on Openreach's network which have been quickly fixed once reported.