NTL worse than BT

[Ignition]

Originally Posted by tridens

Iâ₠¬ÃƒÆ’¢â€žÂ¢ve just given ntl 30 days notice bt line 14th May also taking my number with me i have had no problems its easier to change then many people think bt has done everything for me
Mainly because of the 25% increase on dialup its not worth paying £12.50 when you can get broadband for £15 to £18 Iâ₠¬ÃƒÆ’¢â€žÂ¢ve wanted to get broadband for a while 512k not 150k but ntl are uncompetitive on price e.g.
150k 17.99 12moths contract
Plus net £15 512k
£17.99 UN capped
Bulldog 512k £15.99
Also there is more choice on dialup on BT
Wise surfer support ntl £7.50pm 80h
Naims £9.99 168hpm 3hour cutoff 5 moths for the price of 3 £29.97
Even with the higher speeds ntl 1 Mb £37.99
Bulldog 1 Mb £24.99
2 Mb £37.99

Couple of things you forgot by the way - those are all cheap and slightly dodgy products. ok....

Plusnet's £17.99 package comes with various blocked ports as it's a light user package.

Bulldog's 512k £15.99 and Plus's £15 pm are limited.

Any ISP offering 168 hours per month for £29.97 is going to be a tad short on ports I'd guess - would love to see what their connection rate is at peak times.

Bulldog have a pretty poor reputation - £24.99 is less than BT charge them for 1Mbit so its' probably using the much maligned Datastream system which has shown considerable congestion issues in the past. Ditto the 2Mbit which must be a special offer or offpeak only on both?

Anyway you picked a weird time to leave considering that speeds are going up for free pretty shortly, however all the best with it!

[ackees]

If Ntl are raising their prices to force people onto the more expensive broadband that is a disgraceful policy.
Does this then mean that Ntl will discontinue dial up? Also once you are on broadband whatâ₠¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢s to stop them from raising prices to force you up to the more expensive options?

Ntl were a good company but they seem to be slipping, to raise prices by 25% shows a disregard for customers.
If they had said something like:
Standard dial up £10 two hour cut off
Extended dial up £12.50 4 hours before cut off or something then customers would have a choice and feel that the company was offering something useful for the price hike.

If there were others on the Ntl network then Ntl may say next year prices will rise by 50% but another company on the network could hold prices down then you would have some kind of choice.
With these price rises I think people are loosing trust in Ntl, it becomes scary to go to broadband on Ntl, they could just raise their prices by 100% and you would have no choice but to switch. If Ntl are moving over to the business end of the market and do not value the domestic end where profits are less they must say so, so we know where we are. I do not want to wast time playing silly games with marketing and cleaver pricing tricks.
I am an old fashioned customer I prefer to go with a company that is trustworthy and get on with life, Looking around each month for the best deals doesnââ‚ƚ¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢t suit me.
I am loosing trust with Ntl, I donââ‚Âà ‚¬ÃƒÂ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚¢t know what kind of wild price rise they might do next.

Broadband for £15 sounds attractive, also 3 hours before cut off sounds good too.

Is there someone from Ntl around here? Can someone from Ntl step forward and answer some points?
I need some assurances about the future on Ntl, also can they offer more options?

[ian@huth]

Wake up ackees, a 25% price increase does not mean that it is unwarranted or a rip off.

When NTL were giving FREE dialup access and then changed this to £10 was this a rip off or were they just moving to a realistic price for the product? At £10 it was still cheaper than other dial up ISPs charged.

Many products start life on introductory prices in order to get market share and then move to a realistic price within the marketplace.

Don't think of it as a 25% price increase but a realistic price after having had a long period of cut price promotion.

[Derek]

Originally Posted by ackees

If Ntl are raising their prices to force people onto the more expensive broadband that is a disgraceful policy.

Why? As it's been stated before Ntl is a company and not a charity. They would prefer customers to be on broadband and not dialup.

Originally Posted by ackees

Does this then mean that Ntl will discontinue dial up? Also once you are on broadband whatâ₠¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢s to stop them from raising prices to force you up to the more expensive options?

If prices do rise then customers can cancel their contract and move to another provider.

Originally Posted by ackees

Is there someone from Ntl around here? Can someone from Ntl step forward and answer some points?
I need some assurances about the future on Ntl, also can they offer more options?

Yes there are people from Ntl around here. Myself and various others.

[etccarmageddon]

Originally Posted by ackees

Does this then mean that Ntl will discontinue dial up? Also once you are on broadband whatâ₠¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢s to stop them from raising prices to force you up to the more expensive options?

dial up is an old techology - eventually it will become uneconomical to supply and you will have no option but to move to Broadband. just as 2nd generation phones replaced the original 'bricks' from the 1980s.

If there were others on the Ntl network then Ntl may say next year prices will rise by 50% but another company on the network could hold prices down then you would have some kind of choice.

only if other companies were offering a dial up package at a price similar to NTL's. but as stated previously other companies are offering it at around £15 and above - so if the NTL network was opened up you'd have other companies making NTL look cheap not expensive.

Looking around each month for the best deals doesnââ‚ƚ¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢t suit me.

dont exagerate - you wont need to shop around EACH month. if it doesnt suit you then you only have yourself to blame.

[ackees]

You are wrong ianathuth, as mentioned above it is a common loan shark trick to raise prices dramatically after you have got the customer. The initial offer was that because it was cable and they were not paying leases to BT they could give customers free internet with a 2hour limit, it was not marketed as a †˜limited offerââ‚ƚ¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢, it was marketed as a long term offer.
Take the broadband offer, free for a period of time then you pay the full price, nice and clear you know exactly what you will be paying after the introductory period.
Thatââ‚ ¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢s not how the original dial up offer was, it was clearly †˜if you come over to us we will give you free dial upâ₠¬ÃƒÂ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚¢
Now everyone understands that nothing remains free forever so when Ntl started charging it was not a problem. But with their recent price hikes it now looks like they tricked customers.
If they had initially come out and said: †˜our prices will end up about the same as BT or even moreâ₠¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢ (and if they keep going like this they will be more than BT) no one would have bothered making the switch.
They attracted customers under false pretences.
I would like someone from Ntl to step forward and give some clarity on the future, particularly on price rises.

[Stuartbe]

How the heck can they predict future price rises ????

No one knows what the internet market will be doing next week let alone next year !!!

What exactly are you trying to achieve with this thread. We know you dont like NTL that much is plain. Why do you not just move providers or switch to a broadband service. You dialup is not going to get any faster or cheaper !

... This thread is starting to make me

[Derek]

Yep me too. It's sounding more and more like a UDT thread by the minute.

Enough.

I am totally lost as to the purpose of this thread - you seem to be going round in circles ackees and simply throwing in statements you know to be untrue just to wind people up.

Closed.