People who move to another supplier

[#1]

well afarid the exprince my sister had and my self phoning them on 2 ocasions differs greatly to the exprince of users of 02 here.
yes they answer the phones quick( well if they didnt then what the hell had they bein doing for all that time in the phone indursty so no surrpise they answer quick)
but i have posted about my exprince with o2 on here before.
when i tried to transfer my sisters o2 account on to my phone line to save her having to pay the get out of contract fee which had 3 months left to run and the 2 ocasions i rang o2 to make sure we could do a house move on the 02 account using my plusnet mac code i was told yes and i even asked for there team leader guy to confirm this and was told yes but guess what you ring them up with the mac code to find out they had lied to me.
thank god they did as i was ready to pack my xbox up for the 3 months i would of had them on my line.
gd luck paying the contract fee if you need to leave in the 12 months for any reason. its hell of alot more than it costs to leave PN in the 12 month contract period. and even after paying them there blood money they have the cheeck to ask for the router back
read your contract there is hidden charges left right and centre.

[#2]

Hi Spider,
I have put my answers to your post in italics.
Ok, I am confused by your post. I take it you are saying if Plusnet improve on your current service with O2 then you come back to be a customer? 
Probably not.  I doubt if they can better the O2 offering in terms of cost, speed and customer support.  If they do, then I ought to come back.  However with computers, if things work, I find it best to not change them.
To take each point in turn.
1. Possible, possible but the only way to stop people jumping ship to the next ISP that is cheaper is to be either free or actually pay customers to stay. 
All you need to do is to be cheap enough to be interesting, say £2/month less.
2. Possible, but very subjective and dependent on a lot of issues and expectations. 
For me not subjective at all, but very clear.  PN = about 6 Meg, O2 = about 15 Meg.  This is just tough for PN as they are unable to offer ADSL2+.
3. Well that really depends on how you define the cap. If we are going for as much as feasibly possible within a 24 hour period without any speed restrictions then I can't see how that will work with point 1. 
I expect that my usage will be on the normal to low side as when with PN I only exceeded the limit for 1 month. 
How can you improve on an O2s brilliant support? For that one I only can see another ISP being able to match it not better it. Of course I would expect all the customers of that ISP is get the same brilliant service, irrespective of the problem phoned in about. I would prefer to have a 100% good service rather than a 90% brilliant one as I am guessing the remaining 10% would be a lot of ranting to get things done. 
The only way to be certain about customer support is to measure it.  Which magazine (Sept 08) gave PN 4 out of 5 stars.  They gave O2 5 out of 5 stars.  My experience is that O2 are noticeably better.  In all my phone calls, I would rate the response as good.  In the one case when I was lucky enough to get a second level support person it was excellent.  No ranting necessary.   
Investing in infrastructure is a costly option. Now if the service as to be cheaper then you need more customers to cover those overheads. With more customers you need more investment in your internal structure and so the cycle continues till you go bust.  Not necessarily.  Which gave their best buy to one of the most expensive suppliers - Zen internet.  They cost £17.99 per month.  I don't agree with Which.  But that is another discussion . . . 
Regards,.................Topher

[#3]

Hi ASBO DOG,
Thanks for your question.  My reply is in italics
so OP how much does o2's broadband and mobile phone contract/pay as you go cost you a month?.
does it still work out cheaper than PN and a cheap phone contract/paygo off your own choice.
With PN I was paying £9.75/month.  The O2 offering is £7.34/month if you have an O2 mobile.  This is a saving of £28.92 per year.  However I opted for the ADSL2+ service to get faster speed not available from PN.  This costs £9.79/month, so I am paying 48 pence a year extra to go from around 5 Meg to around 15 Meg.  In order to keep the £7.34/month I have to top up my pay as you go O2 mobile with a minimum of £10 every three months.  As I don't use the mobile much, I expect this to be OK. 

gd look with o2's dns severs. as when my sister was with them i was for ever connecting to here computer to change the dns to openDNS servers as half the web would not load. And not one snip of information on the website about the status of there network.
o2 have no staff members on there forums which i find gd here as i like to ask a question and get on with my day and find question answerd by PN staff and customers when iam not busy and have time to check. All without having to spend time with a phone attached to my ear. 
In my opinion it is easier to make a phone call and get a competent answer on the spot rather than type a ticket or forum post and have to wait for an answer.  But this is a personal matter - as you say each to his own. 
but each to there own. i to know pN is not for every one.
its simple if you want to game,skype ect at any time of the day with out any network slow downs,exchange conntetion which last time i read o2 forums was a hot topic for most o2 users unlucky to be on an exchange with this problem then PN suits your needs. 
I dont have any experience on this.  I use Betamax VoIP providers and make phone calls with no problem.  Cheaper than Skype too.     
if your not to botherd about your isps network preforming perfect 24/7 and uploading and downloading all day every day with risk of getting your  thoughput thottled for going over that unpublished usage limit then O2's right for you. 
My very limited experience with O2 is 100% availability.  I would expect ADSL2+ to be more reliable than the standard ADSL.  Time will tell.
shall i go on to o2 forum now and start a simler theard and take bets on how long b4 it gets removed by o2.? 
Yes please.  I will go and have a look.
Regards,................Topher.

[#4]

Didn't fully scrutinize the mobile part of the deal so it was interesting to know what it involved i.e. topping up with PAYG minimum of £10 per month. Like you, I rarely use my mobile - in fact I have to ring home once a month to keep the connection.
In this event, would it not be fair to say that you actually can add £3.33p to the £7.34? This would equal a total outlay of £10.67 per month, slightly more expensive than PN? However, as you say, for you it would be money well spent for the extra speed.
Perhaps you can make a better appraisal of comparisons after experience of a few months with the service. Would be interesting to know, although as I said before, I am quite satisfied with the full package of telephone and broadband and also prefer the simplicity of just having  one bill.

[#5]

Poppy, Hi,
It is not £10 per month.  It is £10 every 3 months, but I think you spotted this because you say it is equivalent to £3.33 per month.  You might consider leaving your mobile next to your home phone and use the mobile for the odd call.  In this way you will get the benefit of the money you spend on the mobile.  If you forget to do the top up they will send you an email to remind you.  If you still don't top up they will charge the higher amount until you top up.
Excuse me if I am stating the obvious, but you need to check that your exchange has the faster service (ADSL2+) before you switch for the higher speed. 
I will make a note in my diary and put an update here in 6 months time on how I find O2 in the longer term. 
Regards,..........Topher.

[#6]

For me the mobile is a bit expensive, even for odd calls as I have the all-inclusive package from PN and less than £15 per month for all calls except the 08s is good value for money.
As regards to the speed, my exchange won't be enabled for 21CN until March of next year, but as I said, my current speed is absolutely fine for me - usually in the high 5000/low 6000 kbps and very stable so I am in no rush at all.
Anyway, just thought of another question which I would be interested to know the answer to. It is about coming off an unbundled line. At the moment if you leave companies like Tiscali and TalkTalk this can incur a charge to go back to a normal line. I wondered if it is the same with O2 after the initial contract period had expired.  Sometimes little details like this are hard to find on websites. Certainly I wasn't told this when I very nearly became a TT customer a few years ago.

[#7]

I don't think the charges are the same for all the LLU providers, because:
TalkTalk take over both phone and broadband to their equipment.
Tiscali I think are the same (whereLLU'ed)
Be (and O2 whereLLU'ed) only take the broadband connection to their kit
Not sure what any others (e.g. Bulldog etc.) do
So, not only are different providers having to get different cables moved (and kit connected) but it even varies by exchange for some.
And I guess the "migrate out" charges also vary as the work is different depending where you are going from and to.

[#8]

Hi MuppetGrinder,
In January (23/1) we were discussing my move to O2 from PlusNet.  One of the subjects was O2 imposing a cap on usage.  You said. . .
sure there is a cap:- " However if we feel that your activities are so excessive that other customers are detrimentally affected, we may give you a written warning (by email or otherwise). In extreme circumstances, if the levels of activity do not immediately decrease after the warning, we may terminate or suspend your Services." (lifted from the Fair Usage Policy) they just don't tell you what it is, and leave it open to variability at any time. (also note that they don't simply cut back on your P2P services if you go over the limit, the actually kill your connection.
I found this small print (which I never normally read) a bit worrying, so yesterday I was concerned that I had been downloading too much.  I had been looking at the odd video, I had been making lots of VoIP phone calls, and listening to my new Wi Fi radio.  I called, and was told there was no flag of excessive use on my account and in fact O2 have never contacted any customer for excessive download since they started the service.  So I am going to forget the problem of too much download. 
I would be interested in your comments. 
Regards,..............Chris.

[#9]

Poppy,
I said I would let you know in 6 months how I found O2.
The honeymoon lasted well, but then I had a very tricky fault.  My normal 18 Meg speed would drop to 4 or 2 Meg or sometimes completely stop.  The solution was to re-power the modem router, then it went back to 18 Meg.  This would happen 5 to 10 times a day.
I spent a long time on the phone repeating the story many times, getting up to second level support, O2 running 24 hour line tests, doing a 'lift and shift' but I got nowhere because no one in O2 'owned the problem'.  Finally I asked a 2nd level guy to own the problem.  He agreed.  Now we are getting somewhere.
Unfortunately I can't tell you the end of the story because I am abroad and can't test the line until I return.
I am sure that if I had not had the misfortune to have the difficult line problem, I would still be in my honeymoon period.  Note that Which Magazine have now given O2 one of their white plaques as a sign of their good service.  I am going to stay with them for the moment. 

[#10]

Thanks for the feedback. You are very patient with the company. If I had this type of instability it would really wind me up - probably because I just switch on and the broadband is there, always stable and reliable, at a speed that is OK for me.
It is such a problem getting things done when you are passed from pillar to post so you did well to get someone to 'own' it. Hope it all improves now.

[#11]

I contacted O2 and was advised that cheap broadband is available to those with an O2 phone....no problem so far......then I gave them my postcode and the story changed.

Quote

We've estimated that your maximum download speed is 0.5 meg. You're outside the network area that O2 Broadband covers, but all is not lost. We can offer you our O2 Home Broadband Access package. £17.13 for O2 mobile customers £22.02 all other customers 12 month contract applies

I get the same thing with PN too, £6 a month more than those with a postcode in "busy" areas

[#12]

well  i moved from talktalk to plusnet and im quite happy with the service that they provide,first class customer service  no drop in the connection at least plusnet warn you of possible delays when up grades are about to take place last xmas talktalk was updaating server in york and left me with no broadband for days thats why i changed couldnt get a straight answer from them and all i can say is thank god for plusnet

[#13]

Hi silverfoxy,
Thanks for the feedback, we appreciate it
Did you know that you can subscribe to the Service Status via email or RSS? It saves you checking back to see if anything is happening that way. You can sign up here: http://usertools.plus.net/

[#14]

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[#15]

thanks for the reply so am i reading something right you do mobile as well for 6.00 per month or have i lost the plot