August 18, 2010
TalkTalk are offering a huge 6 months free broadband and phone for customers who sign up online.
 This special online only offer from TalkTalk (www.talktalk.co.uk) launches today (Wednesday 18th August) and will run until Thursday 30th September. Customers need to sign up to the Essentials package on an 18 month contract to be able to get the 6 months free after which time they will have to pay the standard rate of £6.99 per month.
The line rental is not free and will need to be paid at a charge of £11.49 per month and there is also the one off connection charge of £29.99.
What the TalkTalk Essentials package offers customers is up to 24Mb broadband, 40Gb monthly data transfer, a free wireless router and unlimited calls to UK landlines on evenings and weekends.
----------------------------------
August 17, 2010
Virgin Media have launched a free malware defence campaign to help protect customers computers from malware such as viruses, trojans and spyware.
 The free service will be available customers who have Virgin Media broadband and be in adition to the free security package that customers already receive with their broadband service.
The executive director of broadband at Virgin Media, Jon James said:
We’re writing to customers we’ve been told may be infected by malware, encouraging them to check their computers have an up to date security package, such as Virgin Media Security, and offering advice on simple and free ways to disinfect their computer. For those who need a little bit more help we also have our fee-based Digital Home Support service which fixes problems using the latest cutting edge remote control technology.”
“Malware doesn’t just affect computers – it can affect lives. It’s time for ISPs to go beyond the basics and do whatever they can to help protect their customers from this growing problem. Customers may think they are protected, but with the ease by which malware can infect a computer – even just by visiting a innocent-looking website – we’re going to do whatever we can to help defend our customers from serious consequences such as identity theft, and even banking fraud.”
Virgin Media will be working with organisation and groups such as The Shadowserver Foundation who monitor the spread of malware around the internet.
Those customers who Virgin Media are informed are likely to be infected with malware will be sent a letter from Virgin Media which will tell them how to scan their computer and also remove viruses. They will also be given the details for how to sign up (at a cost) to Virgin’s home support service which is able to access customers computers remotely to remove malware.
----------------------------------
August 11, 2010
TalkTalk are facing claims of hypocrisy after they announced that they would be raising it’s monthly landline fee by 55p per month after having previously slating Labours plans to bring in the 50p per month “broadband tax”.
Back when Labours controversial 50p per month “broadband tax” was being talked about as a way to raise funds to pay for next generation broadband in rural areas, TalkTalk were against the plans and said that they believed it would drive people off broadband.
One quote from their own blog on 24th March 2010 said:
“We think this tax is an unfair, regressive and wasteful way of funding superfast broadband which would deliver less benefit than it will cost, slow superfast broadband roll-out and drive around 200,000 homes off broadband.“
Also, a quote from Charles Dunstone, the Chief Executive of TalkTalk:
“As well as being unfair we estimate that the increase in price will mean that over 100,000 mostly low income homes will be forced to give up their broadband lines. This is wholly inconsistent with the Government’s plans to tackle digital exclusion by increasing uptake and use of broadband.“
The hypocrisy claims aren’t hard to spot, saying that 100,000 or 200,000 homes could be put off broadband due to a 50p per month line rental “broadband tax” charge and then months later to up your own line rental charge by 55p per month sort of stinks of double standards.
However, TalkTalk said the following to PcPro
“The difference is the Government wasn’t implementing a price rise, it was implementing a tax.
It wouldn’t have stopped providers increasing prices to maintain their business.“
The new charges are set to come in on the 1st October 2010 with line rental charges being upped from £11.49 per month to £12.04 per month, day time calls will also be increased from 5.8p to 6.4p per minute. These rises follow a similar prise rise for line rental and call charges that BT recently introduced.
----------------------------------
August 6, 2010
BE Broadband are launching their own landline services and lanline installation services with prices that are cheaper than BT’s.
 BE are aiming to keep things simple too, with tying the length of the landline contract to the length of the broadband contract and with contracts not automatically being renewed without the consent of the customer.
For those after a new landline installed then BE Broadband Bare over £40 cheaper than BT for the same service, with a charge of £85 compared to the £127.99 that BT charge for the same service.
The available landline deals include:
Landline only where you only pay for the calls you make, BE are charging £9.50 for this compared to £13.24 from BT.
Evening & Weekends with BE will costs £10.50 compared to BT at £13.24.
Anytime calls which offers free calls to UK numbers plus 600 free minutes to over 20 countries will costs £13.50 with BE compared to £81.23 with BT.
BE Broadband are an ADSL2+ broadband provider who offer broadband up to 24Mb and have recently won the “Best Consumer Broadband” award at the Internet Service Providers Awards (ISPA).
BE currently have a 2 months free broadband running which is available until the end of August or on the Be Broadband Promotional Codes page.
----------------------------------
July 29, 2010
The speed of fixed line broadband has seen an increase of over 25 per cent in the last year in broadband speed test done by Ofcom.
After Ofcom conducted it’s own broadband speed test research in partnership with the broadband site SamKnows the results showed that broadband speeds on average were raised from 4.1Mb to 5.2Mb.
This speed increase comes as broadband providers continue to try and offer customers faster and faster broadband speeds, a statistic which is proved with the fact that in April 2009 just 8% of broadband users fixed line connections were advertised as above “up to” 10Mb, with that figure now raised to 24% on services offering above “up to” this speed.
With these increasing advertised headline speeds comes the fact that although on average broadband speeds have increased there is a growing gap between what users are advertised as their “up to” speed and what they are actually receiving.
In April 2009 the average advertised “up to” speed was 7.1Mb with the actual average broadband speed customers received being 4.1Mb which meant that users were receiving 58% of the advertised speed.
However, in May 2010 the average advertised broadband “up to” speed was 11.5Mb and the actual broadband speed customers received ion average was 5.2Mb which is just 45% of the advertised speed.
Unsurprisingly was the fact that Virgin Medias fibre broadband provided the fastest broadband, with the 10Mb and 20Mb which provided download speed around twice as fast as broadband packages offering similar headline speeds.
The fastest broadband speed was found to be on Virgin Medias 50Mb fibre broadband service which offered an average broadband download speed of 36Mb when done on a single thread test (when just 1 file is downloaded) and about 46Mb when a multi-thread test (when three files are downloaded at the same time which is more in line with how heavy broadband users use the Internet) was performed.
----------------------------------
July 16, 2010
BE Broadband are looking to offer even faster broadband speeds by offering fibre optic broadband, but admit that they can’t afford to lay down it’s own fibre network down.
In a post in the official Be Broadband Blog, Tom Williams the managing director of Be Broadband had the following to say:
“We really want to offer you a fibre solution. We want to keep providing faster and faster speeds. However, we can’t afford to lay our own fibre network (unless, of course, Alex agrees to sell his collection of antique Happy Meal toys). Right now, we’re looking at the wholesale products available.
If we do this, then there’s likely to be some initial restrictions on what we can offer in terms of speed, support, and the general customer experience. But, for many of you, it will be faster.
Whatever we offer, it won’t be perfect straight away – though it will improve over time. We want to get your input while we’re investigating the options: we want to build the BE fibre product around you as much as possible.”
Be Broadband will be making use of the fibre network that BT are installing around the country. On the main part it is Fibre To The Cabinet (FTTC) that BT are installing which will offer broadband speeds up to 40Mb, for a few lucky people there will be Fibre To The Premises/Home (FTTH) but this is mainly going to be installed in new build areas that will be able to offer much faster broadband speeds up to 100Mb.
BT are investing £2.5Bn in rolling out next generation fibre broadband over the next few years which should be available to around two thirds of the UK once completed. It will be this large fibre network that BE Broadband will be utilising on a wholesale level to provide fibre broadband deals for customers.
BE currently have an offer running offering 2 months free broadband from BE.
----------------------------------
Customers can get 2 months free broadband from Be Broadband in a limited time offer with their latest promotional code.
The offer runs until the end of July so potential new subscribers only have a couple of weeks to make sure they get their free broadband which is available on either the “Unlimited” or “Pro” packages.
When signing up customers simply need to enter the Be Broadband promo code: FREEMONTHS.
A special landing page has been set up at www.bethere.co.uk
----------------------------------
July 5, 2010
Those living in broadband “notspots” in Wales are to receive grants to help them receive basic broadband connections.
The new initiative has been launched by the Welsh Government and is called the “Broadband Support Scheme” and has £2 million put into it to help fund broadband to areas where there is still no basic broadband available.
Each application for a premises where they don’t receive even basic broadband will have £1,000 made available to them to help fund getting connected to a broadband connection.
Wyn Jones, the Deputy First Minister said:
“Broadband services are vital to ensure our country can develop the knowledge economy, improving the ability of businesses and individuals to network and innovate.“
----------------------------------
June 29, 2010
Fibre Optic broadband provider Virgin Media are offering new customers 2 months free when they take a out a triple play bundled service.
 The Triple play service includes Broadband, Television and Home Phone with prices starting at just £18 per month for all three services (when taking a Virgin Phone line at £11.99 per month). On top of this there is a further saving of £35 with the free installation offer also available.
The cheapest triple play service from Virgin Media (www.virginmedia.com) consists of the Broadband Size L which offers up to 10Mb fibre broadband, TV Size M+ which has over 65 digital TV channels and Phone Size M which offers unlimited weekend UK landline calls all for just £18 per month on a 12 month contract.
When choosing a Virgin Media bundle, providing that the Home Phone Size M is chosen then users can choose either the Broadband XL or XXL and the TV Size L or XL and receive 2 months free.
It is often cheaper for customers to buy bundled services from one supplier than getting then from individual suppliers, it also means only having to deal with one company and to pay one bill.
----------------------------------
June 28, 2010
BT Vision customers will now be able to watch Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports 2 after a deal between BT and BSkyB will see the wholesale supply of the channels.
BT Vision is BT’s broadband based TV service (IPTV) and will be able to offer subscribers the two Sky Sports channels from the 1st August, with sign ups for them being taken in early July. This comes just in time for the new Premier League football season which is due to kick off on August 14th.
The Chief Executive of BT Retail, Gavin Patterson said:
“We are delighted to have reached this milestone, which means that we can be certain of offering Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports 2 to our customers before the football season kicks off. We know our customers will be keen to sign up for the two channels.“
There is currently no pricing for how much it will cost to take up these channels with BT Vision but they will be announced soon. For a basic BT Vision subscription it costs £7.50 per month for BT Broadband customers.
----------------------------------
Older Posts »
|
