Gigaclear Reviews

During the 18 month contract, we experienced a fast but high latency service. Connection to some regular sites required verification which was not required before and some sites couldn't be reached without TOR, and ping rates could have unexpected large numbers, even to local sites.
Mail traffic dropped. (we use private mail servers) and some on line RPGs won't connect due to CGNAT. Generally we tolerated the minor, worked around the important, and were happy with the service. Even though we still had loss of service over Christmas!
Then came renewal.

Gigaclear wouldn't discuss renewal until one month before E.O.C. Nor would they provide a list of their fixed IP scope. (Necessary because G.C. IP addresses have a permanent black listing and fixed IP Would be pointless if the assigned address is also blacklisted.)

They contacted us near the contract end and offered a renewal at 27% above our current rate; (40% above the advertised new customer price.) but they still avoided providing information about fixed IP addresses. So while others claim "same price renewal" we were told "not allowed."

This year we began finding outbound emails blocked and couldn't connect to services such as GITHUB. Error: "Suspicious activity detected. Try another network" Ot

Well I thought it was about time I dropped a review of the Gigaclear service, especially as there seems to be a bit of uncertainity for the future of the company at the moment. I've been with them for 29 months, and the services has been awesome at times, but shocking at others. I'll break everything down like the other reviewers to try and keep it structured. Ordering - Once the service was live, ordering through the website was easy, straightforward and clear, but this is where the provisioning service falls flat on its backside and you can see that they are not the most organised company when they go live in a new area. Installation - The timescale from placing the order to live date was 12 weeks. This included surveys, 3 x failed installations, 3 x false in person surveys and I too had to escalate to the senior mangagement team to get resolutions to my installation. Speed and reliability - Now that they've rolled out IPv6 on my part of the network the service has developed more problems with reliability, network is close to capacity with only 30% of the village signed up, which is worrying to be honest. We've had 3 complete network outages here, where it's last more than 24 hours. They really struggle to respond to issues until they fall over, even though you can see them coming.
Overall they are good if they are your only option for FTTP, but it seems its hit & miss.

Time to add some balance vs the OTT harsh stuff, others have put up. Am a software dev, wfh = Need a solid, fast network!

Ordering: Yes, it took ages to get them to come and hook me up. Had to write to CEO to get some action. In their defence, according to him, they were slow because of enormous demand. Hobbled by their own success, it seems.

Installation: Once it's coming, you are a halfwit to stand and watch jobsworth subcontractors take the easy route to where the router will be fitted. Do a recce! You know where the streetside pot is, and you know where you'd ideally like the indoor kit to be located (clue - you already know the best place for a WiFi signal that the rest of your devices can pick up). So make your own plan, and do the preliminary work yourself (dig channels, lift slabs, lay protective tubing, etc).

FTTP: Brilliant! Opted for the 400Mb service and consistently have it exceeded. Yes, really. Hardly ever get an outage, and when physical fibre damage did occur (thanks to another agency's clueless ground workers), it was rapidly spliced. A couple of times when infrastructure work was required, was always notified by email well in advance. It's always overnight. In short, rock solid.

WiFi: Yeah, it's LinkSys. Not the best. Buy your own, guys!

Compared to several other ISPs I've known, Gigaclear is pure gold. It needed saying, so I said it.

Seeing lots of Gigaclear comments which are inconsistent. Here's what We've found.
Yes: Installation was quick and efficient. (once the service was available.)
Yes: cable is just below the grass level in the garden. (worrying)
No: It's not always fast. (but this is complicated. Keep reading)
Yes: they use CGNAT which shares IP addresses.
No: They don't use IP6 (which would improve service.)
Yes: The use a LOT of caching. (Trick to make service look faster and reduce server load)
Yes: The Linksys wireless is below average. (And it sends out a hidden SSID which can't be switched off)
Yes: They somehow NEED CDN services. Some pages just won't load without it.
Yes: wireless is good if you're in the same room or room above.

Tech support do seem to respond, but don't volunteer much in the way of technical information. General impression is support dept are over taxed.
Overall found to be a good value service so far, but with some significant flaws to work out over time.
I give it four/five at present.

Terrible. They sent some one to install but there was an issue. I contacted them 3 days ago to let them no but still no update. I asked them to provide me an email update at the end of the day but they did not. Now my existing provider has cancelled and I have no wifi in the house. We have people who WfH so this is a major issue. They cannot tell me when someone will come to fix the issue.

Gigaclear have been pretty good so far. They were quick to get the installation done; the engineers who came round probably didn't dig down far enough for the cable but it's OK for us - just a narrow trench in the lawn. Speeds have remained good - 200 to 330 Mbps as a rule. We've had around three outages that I know of but they haven't lasted more than an hour or two and we can survive on mobile data while the fault is being sorted out. I don't like their pricing policy of heavy discounting for the contract length and then a huge hike thereafter. Will try to negotiate a more reasonable price when our contract is at its end - this April. Router works fine and more Linksys nodes are available on eBay at around £30 to £35: they're easy to set up provided you use the Linksys app and not a web browser interface. Wireless speed is excellent: around 200 Mbps between nodes. My old laptop can't keep up on WiFi so I use Ethernet via a mini switch, as it never leaves the office.

My experience relates to installation and has highlighted repeated failures by senior management to provide even a basic level of customer service.

• Failure in communications, both internal and external.
• Systemic failures in business processes
• Lack of accountability
• Failure to manage subcontractor teams effectively.
• Failure by senior managers to respond or prioritise clear breaches in agreed customer installation dates.
• Lack of representation of senior managers during office hours
• Failure to deliver on behalf of commitments and grants made by the UK Government to rollout faster broadband across the country.

I suggest that anyone who has had similar experience lodge a formal complaint with OFCOM, write to their local MP in regard to UK Governments commitment to roll out of faster broadband and fibre and continue to post their own poor experiences on social media, so that other potential customers can avoid wasting time and effort with this company.

How could a company compete for prime installation in my area, and then run the show like a cowboy outfit. I was told several weeks ago my service would go live, but they sent an engineer 2.5 hours away from me to carry out the install only to be told they needed specific permission from the property owner to make a few little holes to route the cable into my flat? Now several weeks on, I am still in limbo with some guy calling me from a mobile phone seeming to understand perhaps a little bit more than the call centre but even he has gone cold turkey on me! I am not impressed and a lot of hype, major roadworks impacting locals and for what???

I went for the 500 Mbps connection with two Linksys-WHW0301GC-UK-Velop_UG_LaunchEdition units. I am very disappointed with the Linksys units as they are a really dumb mesh system.

I cannot back up the config, so if anything ever went wrong, I would have to set it up from scratch. My TP-Link router and even my Sky router can be backed up. I Am looking at trying to use my TP-link router to replace the Velop units as I have quite a complex setup with 30-40 devices, fixed IP, port forwarding that takes ages to set up if it ever had to be done from scratch.

The speed is very good, anything connected by ethernet sees the speed at the router, 506 up and 540 down, so pleased with that. Wi-Fi somewhat slower, at 200+ Mbps.

Horrible company to deal with. We ordered 900Mbps, 99% of the time it is considerably less, between 300-500. Apparently ringing up and saying its slow isn't good enough, we tested initially using the Linksys app and Linksys router they supply but apparently this router they supplied can't be relied upon to generate accurate results, so we have to find a device with an ethernet port run the speed tests and report back to them. For this I used my corporate grade high spec Thinkpad that I use myself for bandwidth tests (I coincidentally install fibre myself for cctv and access control systems) and supplied the requested tests and hey presto they contact us yet again saying it must be something on the laptop making it run slow. Needless to say we would not recommend them. We are stuck with them now, but the customer service is horrible and we hope once our speed issues are resolved we never ever have to contact them again.