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Advice needed please about moving to a FTTP ISP

housemartin

Casual Member
Hello.

Sorry in advance for the long post but I want to try and explain my dilemma and problems in as much detail as I can.

I would like some advise please. We have not changed ISP's for nearly 20 years as we were with AOL Dial up then moved to Sky Broadband. I am looking to move from our current fttc provider (Sky Broadbroad) to a fttp provider because we have an option of providers to choose from either an altnet, openreach or virgin media. At the moment we are with Sky Broadband and have been paying to much in my opinion for a fair while to stay out of contract. We pay £55 per month for landline anytime calls (Sky talk anytime) and Sky "superfast" Fibre which is fttc but our max speeds for our area are 13mb per second and we get less than that so we are seriously looking at fttp broadband now it is active.

I have enquired about our local altnet ISP provider (lila connect) and they do full 1 GIG up/down for £35 with no in contract price rises and free installation (as a promotion) on a 24 month contract.

As a disclaimer. I am not here to discredit Lilaconnect in anyway I am only here to seek advice and to
air my concerns about what I have read online before I make a decision on tying myself up in a 24 month contract that I might regret at a later date.

I have been doing some research on Lilaconnect and it has raised a few red flags and concerns. There have been many many very poor review of there service including constant downtime and outages including "planned maintenance" and this has been increasing over time. As a disclaimer about there connection outages is information from other users via there reviews and comments I have gathered when doing research online from various places including Lila connects our facebook page, reddit and other review providers. There maybe many lila connect users that do not experience problems so I do not want to discredit the company on certain user review but they do seem consistent over many online platforms. Please see links to reviews bellow.



I have read the reviews on Trustpilot but personally I do not trust trustpilot for there reviews and the majority of the reviews for Lilaconnect are about the installation and not the long term experiences of there service.

Another red flag that concerns me that we have personally experienced from Lilaconnect is there aggressive sales tactics. I enquired a few months ago about there service and they asked for a telephone number which I questioned because we are ex-directory and I did not want to give my home number out and I was having problems with my mobile sim card so I gave them my mothers mobile number with her permission and strictly instructed them not to telephone that number which they said was needed for there records only. Since then my mother has been getting frequent calls from lilaconnect sales team trying to push us to have there service. I have constantly ask them not to telephone my mother number and I would contact them when I am ready to sign up with there service but they have ignored my requests. My mother is elderly and she does not need to be constantly harassed by a company pushing there services. This has also been noted on a number of places where people have been leaving reviews. Just to add I have not emailed them to remove my mothers number and I am going to be doing this because then I will have proof in writing that I have resquested this to be done. I understand why they do this though as they are a small altnet provider but it is still rather annoying.

I have asked friends and people local in our street who have had Lila Connect installed for there opinion of the service and they have said how good it is and I must get it installed closely followed with.... if you mention our name and address you can get a free month and we will also get a free month or so subscription. This does not give me much faith in there "honest" opinion of the service they are getting.

The good things I find appealing about Lila connect are the symmetrical down/up speed and the no annual price increases each year and it is a dedicated line from the cabinate to the property. Also the price per month is £35 for a 1 gig connection speed.

My other options are Virgin Media which have universally have had bad reviews so they might not be an option at the moment. Then there is Openreach Fibre provided by Vodafone and other ISPs including Sky who we are with at the moment. I could negotiate a deal with sky for there fibre but I want to use my own router and sky make it difficult to do that with there MER and DHCP Option 61 authentication requirements.

We will be keeping our Landline number because I live at home with my elderly parents and they need the landline because they do not have mobile contracts and are not very technically minded and do not have smart phones so the landline is a must keep option. I will be moving the landline number over to a VOIP provider and this is another reason why I am looking for a stable internet connection and provider because they need the landline for contact from doctors and hospitals because of there ill health.

I want to move away from our current Sky Broadband subscription with slow download and upload speeds and high prices but I do not want to move to an ISP and tie myself into a 24 month contract for a poor service and regret the move for the next 2 years.

So my question is (finally) what would you advise I do considering my thoughts above. Should I take a chance and move to an altnet provider (Lila Connect) and tie myself into a 24 month contract or should I go for one of the bigger providers like vodafone who use the Openreach network and are under ofcom regulations unlike the altnets. This is my quandry and dilema.

Thank you for reading and again sorry for the large post.
Housemartin
 
Last edited:
Check https://bidb.uk to see what is available in your area. Both OR (openreach) and VM (nexfibre) are good options, keep in mind that VM will charge you £6 extra to have symmetrical as an add-on.

Hell, their HFC product will be miles better than your fttc connection currently
 
Are there any other altnets available in your area?

They do typically offer great speeds and service for the price.
 
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@housemartin if quality/stability and support are important to you, then I would look at Openreach FTTP + ISPs such as A&A (aa.net.uk) or IDnet (idnet.com).
A&A also have affordable VOIP offerings, you can transfer your number to them.
 
Thank you for taking the time to read my post and for your replies.

@LordVerga I have looked at the https://bidb.uk and it confirms that we have openreach, virgin media and lilaconnect live. Thank you for the information about the extra charge with Virgin Media for Symmetrical speeds. I agree any package is better than what we have at the moment.

@TTJJ Sadly there are no other altnet providers available yet in our area other than LilaConnect. I hope this will change as time goes on and the roll out of fibre progresses. I am seriously tempted by Lila Connect despite there bad reviews but I am very uncertain about taking the leap especially after being with the same ISP for so long (over 15 years or more) I am rather anxious about making the change but it is something that I need to do whoever I decide to go with because it has to be better than what we have at the moment. Reading on this site that VX Fibre have merged with Freedome Fibre might mean later that other ISP's might be offering there services via Freedom Fibre and Lila Connects fibre cable (maybe). I agree that the altnets do offer great speeds for the price and that is what is tempting me to go with Lilaconnect and deep down I want to go with them but I am very cautious about doing that after reading the poor reviews.

@Lucian Thank you for your reply. I have looked at A&A and IDnet and they have had some very good reviews for there service and support. The only deal breaker at the moment with regards to those providers is the monthly price but as they say you only get what you pay for and as you said if I am looking for support and stability then the extra payment is worth it but at the moment our income is rather tight. With regards to the VOIP service from A&A I am seriously considering them to hold our landline number while we make the transition to FTTP then maybe getting a unlimited minutes sim on a rolling monthly contract and a basic dumb mobile with big buttons for my parents for outgoing calls.

After being with one ISP for so long making a change is very daunting and with the added problem I have with anxiety it makes making difficult descisions all that harder but it is something I am going to have to do.

Whatever I decide I will keep this thread updated on my experiences of making the jump to a new ISP.

Thank you all for your advice and replies it is most appreciated.
Housemartin
 
What I would put more weight on in all of this is the experience of your neighbours who have already signed up for the service with Lilaconnect and appear to be broadly happy with it.

Don't be too concerned that they're mentioning a referral code, with a glass half full view, that means that the communication from the ISP to their customers has been pretty good that they have remembered there is a referral scheme. Telcos communicating clearly... That's rare!

If you can, ask some more people in the locality about uptime and service.

You note that Virgin gets plenty of negative comments. And it's fair that they do, because their customer service when stuff goes wrong is poor. But generally their network is reliable and I would suggest that unless the local Virgin infrastructure is overloaded then Virgin can be a set and forget service that just works.

The other way to look at this is what's the risk? Obviously Lilaconnect is a bit of an unknown quantity, you've seen some reports of service unreliability, but the cost is reasonable but maybe not cheap for your budget. If you did suffer outages do you have decent 4G/5G service and capacity on your data contracts to keep you connected? Could you suffer some reliability problems?
 
@housemartin

If I were in your situation I would probably look at a "full fibre" upgrade with Sky or BT.

The reason for this suggestion is that I believe Sky have a included and supported phone service with full fibre (many other ISPs don't).

BT can also definitely offer this and is arguably the best solution if you are happy to use their router.

You CAN get your own VoIP provider and use that over another Internet service (I have that arrangement) but for simplicity with older users having everything from one provider has an attraction.
 
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Vodafone who use the Openreach network and are under ofcom regulations unlike the altnets. This is my quandry and dilema.
Sorry to pick on this bit, but it's something that does bug me. I've heard a friend of mine say this before and it's just nonesensical.

OFCOM are a regulator. they regulate the industry, not the provider.
Some cheap two-bit provider sells you a dodgy service, OFCOM will still be involved if things go south.

The voluntary codes of practice that some providers sign up to you can ignore, because as soon as Covid hit, Virgin suspended everything voluntary anyway (including compensation for outages).

If I were in your situation I would probably look at a "full fibre" upgrade with Sky or BT.
Agree here - Any of the BT Retail providers (BT, EE, Plusnet - for the cheaper deal) would be pretty hassle free and require no real contact with Sky, and you could do this online.

If FTTP is available, you're with Sky, and they're billing you that much for what you get, I'd already have a pretty negative opinion of them for not offering you a better deal.

I want to move away from our current Sky Broadband subscription with slow download and upload speeds and high prices but I do not want to move to an ISP and tie myself into a 24 month contract for a poor service and regret the move for the next 2 years.
Whilst a "contract is a contract" if they are not providing their half of the deal agreed then there will be ways out. Even if it means taking your complaint to ombudsman.


For ref Plusnet looks to be <£40 for their 900/100 package currently. This will be a ridiculous difference.

Almost anything you pick is going to be better than your FTTC connection I suspect.
I would rather deal with BT/EE/PN support than Virgin.

I would avoid Vodafone - the issues with their network may not impact you but I question their competence.
The site has a good comparison for BT provided networks pricing.

Aquiss is another well reviewed provider who will serve over BT, if service is paramount. What I would say is once you have FTTP the likelihood of you needing to contact support is significantly deminished. I have had one BT FTTP outage of any note, which was my local telephone exchange being on fire.
 
You CAN get your own VoIP provider and use that over another Internet service (I have that arrangement) but for simplicity with older users having everything from one provider has an attraction.
I don't agree with this bit? the VOIP isn't being paid for by the parents, once it's setup you won't have to touch it and the phone will work "like normal" ?
 
My take on the post is that reliability and resilience are high and this includes the phone line. There are differences between VoBB (centrally provisioned VoIP to router) and VoIP (router/ATA) and these need to be considered. Although an ATA is easier to protect with power and provide alternative data service to it during failures.
Sky and VM do not charge for their line and i/c. BT Charge (varies).
All charge for an O/G call package.

If the choice is a small vertical ISP based on a fledgling Altnet to get the best price then I would recommend backup (failover or balanced load) to say mobile broadband. Like insurance you don't know how good they are until something goes wrong.

Remember some ISPs are doing a good job but many are sailing close to the wind.

If the OP has been surviving on FTTC then a speed leap and symmetrical may be a like rather than a need.

Plusnet is the best basic no frill FTTP.
If voice needed it is EE or Sky
If you want your own kit go with someone like A&A, Zen etc.

Take annual rises into contract comparison and review in 18 months when hopefully networks will be more mature.

Other options available but it will depend on the actual data and call usage.
 
Thank you all so much for your valuable information and replies it is very much appreciated and has given me something to consider and think about.

Kind Regards
Housemartin
 
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