Quote:
|
Originally Posted by ackees
No I am not a troll (I have herd this term , it would be great if you could give a full explanation of a troll †“ I assume it is an impostor sent to cause trouble), and I am serious about the fall in the services that Ntl provide and the way they are raising their prices without improving services accordingly. There has been a steady erosion of the benefits for which I joined Ntl.
|
There can be many reasons why NTL would raise prices above inflation. They may have (probably had to after defaulting) promised increased dividends to Bond holders*, their other costs may have risen beyond inflation (fuel, taxes, rent etc) or they may be trying to persuade their Dial up subscribers to get 150K broadband (which is only £5 more, and is three times the speed). Another reason for a huge price increase is that (and I don't have any figures to back this up, so I could be wrong) NTL may be losing Dial up customers (to both their own Broadband and competitors), therefore the cost per customer goes up by greater than the cost of inflation.
I can only speak for myself when I say this: I joined cable in about 1998 when we still had Cable & Wireless. Cable & Wireless were unprofessional (the engineer came, installed the cable, plugged in the box then sodded off leaving me to clear up the mess he had made and rewire the box so it worked properly) and did not deliver what they promised (to the consumer anyway, the backend stuff is apparently brilliant). NTL came along and within a few months they delivered Broadband and have actually been a whole lot more professional to me than C&W ever were. 1Mbps Broadband is looking a bit overpriced now, but it is still cheaper than a lot of ADSL providers for the same speed.
*It may seem a waste of money paying Bondholders higher dividends, but if they don't get what they want, they pull their money out. If this happens, NTL is dead.
Quote:
Now the issues are greater than hop over to this or that service because they may be a £1 less or they offer sweets with their package. I want to explore these issues and I want to hear what others have to say on it.
<snip>
Can Ntl improve or are things going to get steadily worse as they have been (anyone who has been with ntl any length of time will realise that they have got worse).
In a sense it is a wider industry problem (but because I am an Ntl customer I raise the issue here), thatâ₠¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢s why switching may be of no use ultimately. I am beginning to believe the systems set in place that forced the opening up of UK telecoms (and ultimately allowed Ntl to exist) are being abused and may need looking at by the government.
|
There are a lot of ways that NTL can improve and (on the technical side at least) they seem to be trying. There are also areas NTL needs to look at (customer relations being one).
You claim that switching comms providers may be of no use ultimately. If that is the case, why open the network as it would be useless for anyone to switch providers?
I think increasing competition on networks has worked to lower prices (I know it has, when I first started using the Internet back in 94, we had 14.4K modems and had to pay £15.99 a month to either Demon or Pipex (plus a few others). This did NOT include phone charges (which could be anywhere up to 60p an hour). Phone charges (if you use one of NTL, Telewest, or BT's schemes) are also lower.
My point is that I believe that the market can regulate it's own prices.