Sunday, August 13, 2006

I never thought I'd be impressed by an ISP...

I was delighted to hear about the explosion of competition triggered by LLU and the entrance of the likes of Carphone Warehouse into the UK residential broadband (ADSL) market. Competition is always fantastic news for consumers and the price pressure that CPW's "free" offering has applied to the market is a delight to behold.

However, as good as CPW's entrance into the market is, I consider it entirely something that is good for other people. As soon as it was announced, I knew there would be stories of "unexpected demand", "delays", "customer services issues" and all the rest and I decided I wanted nothing to do with it.

However, I wasn't sure what effect their entrance would have on other ISPs. Would they reduce their prices to match? Would they try to compete on other aspects of the service?

My ISP at my previous flat was freedom2surf. We'd had no problems with them but they were quite pricey. For the sake of convenience I decided to stay with them at the new place (I couldn't transfer the account over but they did at least keep the direct debit payment information the same).

What amazed me was how quickly they got the new connection up and running. The connection was up and running within about three days of BT activating the new line - far more quickly than their ten-day estimate and my guesstimate of 5-6 days.

Wow....

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