The Price of Loyalty

[#1]

If Like me you have referred friends and family over the coarse of several years - You better watch out if your friends decide to move to the new (BT ) Options ie Option 2
service because even if Plusnet are getting the same amount of money from your friend each month ie old style account £14.99 and option2 £14.99 you will end up getting just 25p a month referral discount compared to the 50p a month you used to get. Now isn't that really Nice of them !

[#2]

Plusnet could quite easily pay 50p for BBYW option 2 by putting up the price to £15.24.
The allowances and expected speeds are different: BBYW option 2 gives you more for the same money so the margins are different. Expecting Plusnet to give the same referral amount is totally unreasonable!

[#3]

Err the older plus account still gives you 8mb and unlimited usage subject to fair usage policy so switching to the new option accounts might not be as good value as you think !
I should know I've stayed on the old Plus account - So Now tell me I'm being unreasonable .

[#4]

The old account was not suitable for heavy downloading - P2P is totally different on the new account for example.

[#5]

Firstly let me point out that I am an IT professional of 30+ Years and do not need an education in P2P or any other aspect of the capabilities of the Options accounts
the point I'm trying to make here is that the old plus account is £14.99 a month and has plenty enough breadth that I have not felt complled to change to the new options accounts.
and even if there was a good reason to change like the fact that you don't get a fixed IP address on the old account ( but you did at one time ) I would say the fact here is that Plusnet get £15 a month for either account , are you telling me that the referring member should pay for referring a friend when it's supposed to be the other way around.
I would refer a lot more people if I felt that I was going to get at least 50p a month per referral and that I wasn't only going to get 25p because I'm subsidising Plusnet .

[#6]

Perhaps in addition to 30 years as an IT professional you'd spent 2 weeks on economics you'd release that if the profit margin on an account is significantly lower, Plusnet can't afford to pay as much for referral.

[#7]

Gentlemen,
I don't think I need to remind either of you to play nicely.. do I?

[#8]

Hey No You Don't need to tell me to Behave - Having spent two years in management accounts and 30 years as an IT Professional working for small and large companies - I'm now 50 Years of Age and this guy is entitled to His opinion. I've been a loyal customer and supporter of Plusnet (Free-online) from the time when we were paying for Dial up. 
Now if Plusnet are selling a service where the margins are worse than they used to be on the older accounts (which I doubt very much,) then I would be very surprised. Plusnet can offer lower priced services and in large Volumes but they can't give 50p referral discount instead of 25p ! I just don't buy it
If someone can show me the figures then I might be persuaded but for now I'd like to say that I'm just Not Happy with the Loyalty shown to customers who have referred friends and relatives a £15 spend is a £15 spend and reduction in the referral rate just adds to the profit until people like me decide that they feel their loyalty is being abused and vote with their feet and take their internet and phone accounts with them oh and their friends might well follow .

[#9]

Do any other isp's offer refferal's and if so how much do they give u for reffering?

[#10]

You might find this article of interest which goes into great detail about the costs involved in running the PN service
http://community.plus.net/blog/2008/02/28/how-uk-isps-are-charged-for-broadband-the-cost-of-ipstream...
A little while ago I did a little research myself as I had the idea of starting my own ISP, as soon as I saw the price of the centrals I nearly faded away  
Let alone the routers and upstream bandwidth and of course the colocation facility costs so is it any wonder that PN have to reduce their loayalty payments?

[#11]

Something dosn't stack up :
http://community.plus.net/blog/2008/11/12/need-extra-cash-for-christmas/

[#12]

They probably set aside an acquisition budget.
I suppose the more customers they get, the more they can give back in terms of reducing subs or increasing loyalty bonuses.
How many subscribers do PN have at present.
I can see why you are rather miffed but to be fair, surely you would agree that PN are better to deal with than most other ISPs and I'm sure you've dealt with a few in your career.

[#13]

hey Tech Guy - Yes your right and thats why I've stayed with Plusnet and recommended them and this is why it surprises me that they have done this to their Loyal customers.  As I said at the end of the Day they can choose their pricing policy and we can choose to vote with our feet and wallets. It's been good to receive referral payments for my efforts and thats one of the reasons I've stayed up until Now - What a shame - Perhaps the referrals manager could review this , I'm sure it's just an oversight . But I just wanted to let everone know and perhaps this will start off the review that is badly needed .

[#14]

Perhaps yes.
I'm sure there is a really good reason, remember that times are tough for all businesses at the minute, when things turn better I'm sure the good folks at PN will reward those that have stuck with them.
Since going online at home 8 years ago and going broadband in 2005 I've paid a lot more for a lot less service.
PN are the best ISP on the market bar none in terms of value and most of all service and support in my opinion.
Hang in there, I'm sure there's something in the pipeline.

[#15]

Totally agree with your penultimate comment!
And I really can't believe there's such a fuss about just 25p a month. Or to put it another way, little over one pint of beer a year.