TalkTalk

I have used many different in the past, and this isp has done everything right so far! After changing from BT, only because I had to use them at a rented place. Now I have my own place again I used TT. High speed and low ping. 10Mb download & 1Mb upload. Not 1 disconnection. Got the deal with bundled phone service. Wireless router is good quality and very low loss of signal/speed. I don't use there email or webspace as I use my own.

I was a vey happy F2S customer and have gone through the whole pipex > tiscali > opal > talkTalk buyouts.

Broadband is now getting very flaky due to the fact that I'm on the old F2S server that TT now want to close down.

I might have stayed with TT Business (yes, I'm *that* lazy) but TT Sales are intent on trying to sell me the broadband/phone package and are not interested in anything else. So as I'm only interested in broadband only I've switched supplier.

I don't want to say who I've switched to as I don't want to see them swallowed up by TT the way that others have.

I initially joined Pipex (as it was known at the time) in early 2002 from Clara Net (dial up) and AOL (dial up) before that.

Initially (before the bad days of Tiscali and then TalkTalk) it was excellent. When Tiscali took over Pipex, it started to slowly go downhill but it was still acceptable.

As soon as TalkTalk took over Pipex/Tiscali, it became rubbish. It became unbearable slow and completely unacceptable. They also appear to bandwidth throttle/"traffic shape"/block websites as they see fit (eg. Photobucket was inaccessible via TalkTalk for about 2 or 3 days where I could access it without any problems on my O2 mobile phone network).

The last straw came when TalkTalk were about to move me to their billing system and change my broadband package's details, where it's price would increase to £15.31 per month (from £14.99 per month) and from unmetered to 40Gb a month. I simply thought that it isn't worth paying any more for a rubbish service that it going to be limited as well.

On the plus side, I managed to get hold of their cancellations team last Sunday (23rd October) after 6 repeated attempts (I got disconnected the first 5 times) and asked for the MAC code. I stopped them straight away as soon as they tried to offer me a "deal". I received the MAC yesterday (26th October) on the answerphone and I did not hesitate in using it on Xilo's website.

I have decided to ditch TalkTalk and join Xilo after reading the very positive reviews on here and I hope that my experience with Xilo will be a lot better than rubbish TalkTalk.

I moved from Virgin (Cable) in December last year because of the mess they were, (at the time), making of dumping everyone's email onto Google. I wish hadn't decided to opt for TalkTalk.

The fact that they failed to deliver a modem router as promised should have been a warning, but they did at least give me a £60 discount when I started talking about cancelling my contract, (I was still within their 30 day cool off period).

In fairness to TT my broadband & phone have been very reliable with virtually no problem, but their customer support is so appalling as to be verging on criminal. I've made the mistake of ringing their customer service number twice. Never again. It's impossible to decipher the unintelligible foreign accents of the staff at TT call centres. On both occasions I've hung up in sheer frustration from trying unsuccessfully to make any progress. It's like trying to wade through a swamp in the Amazon jungle wearing flippers and carrying a double decker bus on your back.
When I've had an issue to be resolved I've gone to the Members Forum, I takes a few days for it to be picked up, but it has at least been resolved.

The other main issue is that TalkTalk are spying, in what many consider to be an illegal fashion, on all of the traffic to & from my pc, (hello Dido Harding, are you listening?).
I don't like being spied on.

Enough's enough. The only reason I am still with TT is that I'm not going to fund their coffers any more than I absolutely have to, by cancelling my contract and paying the fees concerned.
Guess what my Christmas present to myself will be.

I'm currently with TalkTalk after leaving Plusnet. I get about 18mbps and quite a sound, reliable connection. But when I called to check my bill had been paid (I couldn't see it on my statement), the foreigner went on rambling for about 4 minutes about different things. He just wouldn't give me the straightforward answer (Have you received payment for this month's bill? Yes we have), that's all I wanted. I waited on hold for 1hr 20mins for that rubbish. I still stand by the great connection I get though. Go with them if you have a LOT of patience and tolerance for others. Unfortunately, I just do not have that much. Go with AOL if you prefer easier support.