BT and Cable group phone leads the way

[m419]

It appears that the number of residential service providers is getting slimmer every year!

Not suprising when companies such as BT offer free or discounted calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers as well as Virgin Media with their Talk Anywhere plans.

tripple and quad play offers are also to blame for this too.

This is what was available in 1999:

BT
Cable companies
Cable and Wireless via BT line with a Dialer unit
One Tel via BT line with/out a dialer also via cable line with a dialer
1366 indirect access

And in 2004:

BT
Cable companies
NTL Freedom
Virgin.net Loudmouth
Virgin Home
Bulldog Broadband (Cable and Wireless)
Wight Cable
Toucan
Tiscali
TalkTalk
British Gas
One Tel
Tele2
pipex
Primus
18866
Wanadoo Wireless and Talk internet phone

Tele2,One Tel and British Gas homephone services where all snapped up by TalkTalk.

And in 2009:

BT
Virgin Media/SmallWorld and Wight Cable (Cable companies)
Virgin Media National(NTL Freedom/Virgin.net)
Sky Talk
Orange Homephone/Orange Internet
Tiscali
TalkTalk

Theres more,but as you can see the popular ones have decreased!

The real reason is, the best value and efficient service can be obtained by BT and the Cable companies! Especially by my experience.

Voip is no good! You cant use it during a power failure,the sound quality is crap and its dependent on too many resources such as electricity,pc and internet.

Another thing that has been announced in the last year, BT is now able to charge service providers what ever it likes for using its equipment and its network. Virgin Media are set on using BT Wholesale for switching and routing certain calls made on its network and it will be a Voip system which will save the company and customers money. A fifth of the UK use Virgin Media phone lines and thats exlcuding the smaller cable groups.

When it comes down to it, BT,Cable firms and Cable and Wireless are the main providers in this country and will be the last ones standing. Most of all the other firms depend on the above 3 anyway.

Whats everyone elses views on this and what providers have you stuck with for years???

[kpanchev]

Have been using voip for the last 3 years, would never go back to the bloodsucking telcos...

[Maggy]

I make as few phone calls as possible on my VM landline and I mainly text on my PAYG Vodafone or I email.

I think most people are keeping in contact by mobile judging by how many people I find loudly shouting into the parasitical gadget glued to their ear as I shop in ASDA..:rolleyes:

[m419]

Well Voip usage doesnt seem to be materialising either. And furthermore, its because of this cheap discount and freebie craze that has lead to slow development of BT and cable networks, nobody looks beyond the word free, they all went to TalkTalk for that free broadband offer,but they didnt realise how bad the service was and that it was an 18 month contract! and it wasnt free, you had to be on the maximum call package.

[zing_deleted]

Does anyone else remomber Localtel and their ISP Screaming.net that was the first free internet provider I had. Worldonline bought them out and in turn I think they were bought by Tiscali

---------- Post added at 21:15 ---------- Previous post was at 21:10 ----------

http://www.theregister.co.uk/1999/08/31/screaming_net_takes_legal_cudgels/

interesting report on Screaming.net from 1999

The first free ISP

[LondonRoad]

I make as few phone calls as possible on my VM landline and I mainly text on my PAYG Vodafone or I email.

I think most people are keeping in contact by mobile judging by how many people I find loudly shouting into the parasitical gadget glued to their ear as I shop in ASDA..:rolleyes:

...........or on the train, my particular bugbear especially since I'm on a low level train that spends 60% of the time in tunnels. A typical conversation involves :
1. I'm on the train
2. I might get cut off cause there's a tun.... Hello ... Hello
3. Redial
4. We got cut off there because.... Hello ....bloody thing. HELLO
5. Hello.. bloody tunnels keep cutting us off. Just phoning to say I'll be home in 15 minutes..

Same individuals frequently doing the same thing :shrug::banghead:

I've tried to develop a withering look but it doesn't seem to penetrate the cranium density. ;)

[Hugh]

Have been using voip for the last 3 years, would never go back to the bloodsucking telcos...
And whose IP networks do you think the VOIP calls go over? ;)

[BenMcr]

And surely you can only do VoIP properly with Virgin (or 3G), otherwise you have to pay 'the bloodsucking telcos' line rental?

[kpanchev]

And whose IP networks do you think the VOIP calls go over? ;)

Yep, but then I don't pay 11£ for the privilege to have a phone line....

---------- Post added at 12:09 ---------- Previous post was at 12:07 ----------

And surely you can only do VoIP properly with Virgin (or 3G), otherwise you have to pay 'the bloodsucking telcos' line rental?

And why do you think I'm with Virgin? ;)

[Paul K]

Voip is no good! You cant use it during a power failure,the sound quality is crap and its dependent on too many resources such as electricity,pc and internet.
Unless you have a straight bog standard plug in phone you will find a lot of house phones require electricity now and if it's a widespread powercut your exchange may well go down if the back up generator doesn't kick in properly.

[m419]

I have a spare corded phone just incase the electrcity goes off! Also if you have an electricity prepayment key/token meter, expect the same problem!

Usually when we have had a powercut the phone has stayed on,cable and BT although the lighting in the phone boxes goes off.

[nutellajunkie]

Have been using voip for the last 3 years, would never go back to the bloodsucking telcos...

HERE HERE my friend :) Voip is great, if im not happy, I change to something else, easy!

[m419]

Well I suppose if it makes you happy!

I no longer see the point of getting Voip now, since the blood sucking telco's are lowering the costs and sim only deals offer the whole lot for about £30.

The reason Voip providers dont charge line rental and calling feature costs is because they have no networks to maintain or manage unlike BT and Virgin Media!