ChrisB

Did you really expect it to be allowed? I'd give them a month to try to sustain bandwidth for a bunch of P2P users who download anything and everything, then go bump.

Geezer

Well, that will teach me to post without first reading the rest of the thread! Didn't exactly cover myself in glory there did I?

Yes, you are correct, it does look cheap, but still, few things in life are free. I doubt their broadband offering for 'free' will be anything like their paid services (which are quite expensive, and have hidden capping limits).

Geezer

Spoon

Nice recovery. I agree about the free bit, as a CWH user I await the T&C's.

matchmaker

So charging you for calls to engaged numbers isn't a catch? I signed up to Talk Talk about a year ago and only recently found out you get charged for failed calls to landlines

Petem95

That was a letdown then..

You need to sign up for their 'international calling package' on top of the line rental to get 'free' broadband - so it makes the price £21/month. And theres a £30 connection fee on top, and I think it was an 18month minimum contract which is longer than average.

Oh and then you need to be near an exchange which has their equipment in, which mine doesnt (apparently will from May..)

The speed is upto 8gb with a 40gig monthly limit which seems fair, but overall its not lived upto the hype!

Cable companies offer a similar sort of package for about the same price, only they generally give you unlimited monthly downloads...

Leslie

Always makes me smile when you get caught out PSL, and you never have a good answer for it. Spoon has got your number for sure!

Talk about all mouth and trousers.

Les

NWMark

not lived upto the hype??

i think it has, what cable package can you get UPTO 8Mb BB, and all calls for free for £21 a month.

NTL charge charge me £15 a month for a worse call package and then £25 a month for 2Mb Broadband with 30Gb limit???, 1Mb package is £15 but only a 3Gb limit.

So £40 a month for inferior broadband, and a worse call package!!

Then a colleage pays the following to BT and Plusnet

£11.99 a month line rental plus calls (roughly £15 a month) no call package
£22.99 a month for 1Mb broadband
so £50 a month for similar package to the TalkTalk one

Personally i think they'll clear up and make other providers have to make changes to their packages. SKY are meant to be launching a similar package shortly.

I think ISP that dont have a telecoms arm to support free broadband are going to get hit the hardest.

Mark

Petem95

Yeah other companies should be offering similar, or better deals very soon I would think.

CPW have at least got a lot of free exposure with this deal, and as a result I expect a massive amount of people will take it up.

Whats interesting is theyre using their own equipment in the exchanges for the broadband, so that does exclude BT there - so I expect BT will come up with something before too many people sign up for 18month contracts with CPW.

richardg

we pay more than £20.99 a month for just our telephone with BT - and we don't make that many calls! cable is all well and good if there's a service in your street. if there was cable in our street, we'd certainly be using it (why the hell to telewest spend so much on advertising and nothing for years on expanding their network - they bypassed 500 odd customers where i live, just to get their service about 500 metres further down the main road we live off!). i am certainly considering the talk talk deal

edited to say thanks for the tip PSL

Geezer

Details are now up on the Talk Talk website. A 'massive 40gb' download limit then . I don't see the point of ISPs offering faster and faster connections and then not allowing you to utilise them? How are people supposed to get video on demand services when you would use you your allocation in a day or two?

Very good package for low usage people though, and hopefully it will drive the competition into making some sort of concessions.

Geezer

Spoon

Pete, how on earth can it be a let down?

Everybody pays a line rental so why not pay it to Carphone Warehouse?

The free call packages are what everybody should already be on anyway, with which ever provider, if they are switched on.

That's 2 out of the 3 conditions covered.

It'll cost me £2/month more to upgrade to International 3, which I'll use a fair bit.

Therefore my existing £23.44/month paid to Pipex for my broadband isn't necessary, assuming I'm happy with the download limit offered by Carphone Warehouse.

That's a saving of £21.44/month for me. Obviously there is the connection charge of £30 to take into account too, but that's soon swallowed up.

18 month contract? I reckon it soon passes, but sure they'll be some competition, just how good we can't tell yet.

StickyMicky

i dont even use a land line, but i still have to pay for one to have BB at home (dont want a home phone)

i think i should really start shopping around (with BT) but after the nightmare i had with tiscali @ work i dont really want to sign up to anything that might drop out, **** me off, not let me connect for hours at a time and generally be a PITA

Spoon

Sticks, There is no such thing as shopping around with BT. Since competition was allowed BT have continued to be a market for the uneducated. A bit like the existence of Daewoo dealerships.

Whether they can fight back now is another thing, they'll need to, that's for sure.

Of course, the issue with service is going to be very important. Pipex haven't let me down once in several years. Can the Carphone Warehouse compete with that?

StickyMicky

i picked BT because my father used them and never ever had a problem

we have used aol in the past and they were also pretty crap.
when i got the flat there was no phone line so i just thought it would be easier to set everything up with BT

FWIW i have never ever had a problem so far.....
well there was this one time, where i had to reset the router, apart from that it has been rock solid

Spoon

Sticks, that's the very reason BT still have customers, they are looked on the same as an old comfortable pairs of shoes. Easier often isn't better, it's just easier.

Cost is largely ignored because people really can't be arsed to be better off unless it's done for them.

pslewis

Remember the TALK-TALK £70 Dis-Connection Fee!!!!!

Pete

OllyK

Indeed - pair of comfy shoes that are there and do the job, rather than going for the winkle pickers with 6" heels, that get caught in a grate, snapping and throwing you in the path of an oncoming bus.

wacky.banana

I am a TT customer already and I have just signed up for the free Broadband offer.

The way I see it is this; I need broadband and telephony services, full stop. So it doesn't matter if I have to sign up for an 18 month contract. I have been with BT forevever, having to suffer their corporate arrogance, etc, so I don't see 18 months with CPW as a major disadvantage.

The 40 gig per month limit is unfortunate, based on me currently having an unrestricted service. However if the upside is an 8MB service (4 times what I get from Pipex, and yes, I live a paltry 700 metres from my exchange site (ooh yessss)), a saving of £34pm from Pipex, followed by significant telephony call savings that could easily take me to circa £50pm (wife is a huge chatterbox) then I am more than happy to "suffer" a small restriction.

There is no doubt that as soon as other service providers catch on then this limit will be removed. TT would have been unwise in the extreme not to attempt to cover the predicted upsurge in demand through some kind of cap, to ensure service quality.

Yes, the one-off charge of £29 does apply, but then the broadband bit is free. In reality the whole bundle of telephony, line service provision, and broadband is £21pm.

If I ever want to cancel and move away then it will cost me £70 to do so. The way I see it I could afford to move from them if I wanted to after only 3 months, based on the savings to be had from my current Pipex offering

I will have some of that please.

Spoon

A predictable reply from a BT customer maybe?

If you've always worn your comfy shoes then you won't know just how good the 6" heels actually are.

You'll be a demon on the dance floor and your entrance ticket would be so much cheaper.

speedking

It's not the size of your wife that determines your bill but how much she uses the phone

OllyK

A predictable reply from sombody who broke their ankle in high heels on a couple of occasions and decided that they'd return to the dependability of the comfy shoes.

I now pay BT £13 per month and get my BB from plusNet. It works and it doesn't cost a fortune. I don't get 3 bills per month from 1 company any more, I don't have to deal with overseas call centres etc etc.

wacky.banana

Speedking,

How dare you sir, you dastardly cad!!

Lesser men have been sat on (or should that be $hat on) for suggesting less.

WB

Spoon

Keep it sensible. I've never fell off my heels, as I'm sure you know but couldn't possibly bring yourself to admit. Nowhere have I said I'm returning to the comfy and dull shoes.

I'll continue to get the best value/service combination with whoever offers it. The same as if I bought anything.

You don't mention your PlusNet cost I see?

Oh, and with Talk Talk you get 1 bill for the lot, online if required, and no overseas call centre either.

OllyK

No but I have had bad experiences with other Telco's, never have with BT. Hence me returning to and sticking with the comfy shoes.

PlusNet is £24 pm

Spoon

In which case, if you've had bad experiences then that's only fair to get the brogues back out again. However, never dismiss those heels in the future.

£37 isn't as attractive as £21/month.

Edited to ask if your calls are included in the £13/month BT bill?

OllyK

Unfortunately the Talk Talk website is lacking in detail, I can't confirm if they supply dedicated fixed IP addresses and include Domain hosting, 250MB of web space along with CGI, FP Extensions and Database support in with their Free price, or how much extra they charge to supply it.

Make sure you compare apples with apples - I'd be surprised if Talk Talk offer the same service for free that I get from plusNet.

Ahhh - found something:
Not quite 250Mb and unlimited email addresses is it?

OllyK

It's £40.53 per quarter to be exact
Yes - that's the total bill with Caller ID and 1571 as well.

Spoon

Of course if that's what you require then it's no good for you. That wasn't the originally topic, simple broadband access was. Comparing was never an issue.

OllyK

I like to make sure I know what I'm getting - even if it is free. Just because it's "free" doesn't mean it's any good.

Can anybody find what Talk Talk are stating will be their contention ratio?

Be careful if you use P2P a lot as well - read their fair usage policy: http://www.talktalk.co.uk/talktalk/s....BBFAQ#faqfair

The full 16 pages of small print are here but I really can't be bothered to look through it.

Chrisgr31

Currently have my calls with Talk Talk and also been caught by them charging for calls to an engaged number. Cost us £5 for those calls to the National Insurance office and still minded to cancel our Talk Talk account over it!

If I read the blurb right the service isn;t available until Juky, and all the phone numbers and postcodes I tried came up with a "SOrry there is an error" message so don;t know if I can get it yet anyway!

However think I will wait and see what the other ISPs offer as they are bound to do so soon. I would expect AOL, BT and Sky to introduce some new offers soon