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Daniel
13th December 2006, 01:27
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=36316

Not totally unexpected but still newsworthy I think. In case you're wondering they've spelt connection wrong on purpose :p Articles like this certainly make you think twice about "free broadband" deals though don't they?


AN INQ reader who switched over to the free broadband service offered by France Telecom/Orange in the UK is regretting her decision. Technical support costs 50 pence per minute.

In order to qualify for 'free' broadband as a British Orange handset user , it's normally necessary to pick one of the latest 'animal' Orange tariffs which cost more than £30 per month.
The snag here is that these animal tariffs don't seem so 'text friendly' as previous Orange tariffs.
But her real compliant covers what happens when things go wrong. Those calling the standard Orange broadband helpdesk but have a 'free' connexion are told to redial and call a premium rate number which costs 50p per minute.
Regular broadband users don't have to pay this fee.
Submitting a support enquiry online instead seems pointless because the sender merely receives a classic reply instructing him/her to refresh Internet Explorer, etc.
The snag is that with monotonous regularity at the weekends access to Hotmail and Gmail mysteriously disappears. Only to be restored around 2 pm on the Sunday.
She can only speculate that something goes wrong with Orange's secure (https) connexions because the initial page will appear.
In her case, it's easily possible to attribute the problem directly to Orange because switching over to WiFi on the same computer (and using a neighbour's broadband connexion) instantly cures the problem.
You'd only need to spend about twenty minutes per month arguing with Orange over whose fault the problem is, to negate the advantage of paying nothing for the service. The horror stories emanating from those with 'free' broadband connexions are now enough to put new customers off any broadband service regardless of its price.

sxis
13th December 2006, 01:54
hi Daniel I've heard some horror stories among my friends about the same thing I've got the talk talk free broadband and from what I've heard I'm one of the lucky ones! I'm a computer thick head but the set up was easy and they had my phone line & broadband connection up and running in 21 days! i think the problem with some of these companies is they bite off more than they can chew!

Valve Bounce
13th December 2006, 02:03
http://www.optus.com.au/portal/site/personal/menuitem.9b38bb3dfffbeae30f7416058c8ac7a0/?vgnextoid=0d711c6bc7dd9010VgnVCM10000029867c0aRCR D

I'll probably go for the $AUD39.95 option. At 24 MBPS I think it is essentially a little faster than the 512 kbps plan I am on with another supplier, and I also get two months free in the year, so for the first month, I'll go for the most expensive option, then cut back later.

So, what do you think?

Daniel
13th December 2006, 02:22
VB. Let me stress that 24mbps is attainable only if you live in your telephone exchange. Depending on the length of your cable from the exchange, whether you're on a RIM, how good the cable is and a lot of other things you may get a better or worse connection but 24mbps is practically impossible :) Of course it should be faster than your 512mbps connection but I just want you to know that you won't get 24mbps. Depending on what you're directly connected to (ie a RIM or an exchange) you may not even be able to get ADSL2 just yet :)

Where I lived in Perth I was connected to an exchange which had ADSL2 hardware in it but inbetween me and the exchange was what's called a RIM which is kind of like a mini exchange which meant that I first had to wait for them to upgrade the RIM to do ADSL and even then although the RIM had ADSL2 hardware in it I could only get 1.5Mbps because Telstra only sold ADSL1 at the time.

So basically you want to check that Optus will actually be able to supply ADSL2 to you as you may end up with 8192/384 depending on your cirumstances.

real_illusions
13th December 2006, 02:27
BT are also quite bad when it comes to solving problems...they always want to the problem on us, therefore we would have to pay for any service people to come out or buy new equipment..since me and my brother know our stuff, we eventually forced BT into admitting it was their fault with some problems we were having with the lines.

Valve Bounce
13th December 2006, 03:04
VB. Let me stress that 24mbps is attainable only if you live in your telephone exchange. Depending on the length of your cable from the exchange, whether you're on a RIM, how good the cable is and a lot of other things you may get a better or worse connection but 24mbps is practically impossible :) Of course it should be faster than your 512mbps connection but I just want you to know that you won't get 24mbps. Depending on what you're directly connected to (ie a RIM or an exchange) you may not even be able to get ADSL2 just yet :)

Where I lived in Perth I was connected to an exchange which had ADSL2 hardware in it but inbetween me and the exchange was what's called a RIM which is kind of like a mini exchange which meant that I first had to wait for them to upgrade the RIM to do ADSL and even then although the RIM had ADSL2 hardware in it I could only get 1.5Mbps because Telstra only sold ADSL1 at the time.

So basically you want to check that Optus will actually be able to supply ADSL2 to you as you may end up with 8192/384 depending on your cirumstances.

I wouldn't worry about that daniel, because basically I'll be paying $10 less per month than I am with Netspace, and getting something a little faster than 512 kbps.

I live in Port Melbourne, and I suppose it won't be long before they install all the super duper gizmos that you mention above.

So what do you think?

Dave B
13th December 2006, 14:38
The so-called "free" Broadband services in the UK are not just poor value, but tend to offer terrible support.

When they work, all well and good. But it's when things go wrong that people wish they'd spent a few quid more per month.

When I was with BT Business it used to amaze me how businesses would panic about a fiver per month difference in telecoms charges. I'd always ask them what their company cars were, usually the answer would be Vectras, low-end BMWs etc. I'd then ask them why they didn't all drive Kias - that seemed to shut them up :p

LotusElise
13th December 2006, 15:35
I use the Orange "free" broadband service and seem to be quite lucky. I got the broadband package as a free upgrade from my ex-Freeserve/Wanadoo account, rather than as a freebie with a phone.
When I had some trouble with connection speed early on I was initially passed to the rip-off tech support, which is staffed by Indian people who are specially trained to talk very slowly and repeat everything you say, to maximise phone revenues. I hung up after a minute and then got through to the complaints department. Being firm but polite and reminding them that I was already paying for a service I could not use got me the national-rate helpline number, which I have stored for further reference.
I can't say I've had any tech problems after that (apart from downtime and login trouble for my webspace) and the service appears to have improved somewhat from the Wanadoo days, in terms of reliability.