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One month FTTC

Are there any one month offers for FTTC as yet?

We will be moving shortly, the area we've picked is cabled, and that's what we'll be going with (if all goes through OK)

That comes with a 30 day guarantee, so if it's congested, then FTTC becomes an option. The property can get it. We could cancel cable outright.

However while cable puts up this offer, no FTTC ISPs appear to. Ideally, because of the 30 day cable timeframe and how long it normally takes to get a phone line set up, I'd order cable and FTTC together to be able to try them together.

If cable proves fine, we can cancel the FTTC.

If cable isn't fine then we don't have a delay while we wait for BT to get going. I cannot imagine ordering a phone line and broadband via BT and having it working fully in less than about five or six weeks without having to make lots of chasing phone calls and part project-manage the whole affair myself, it's never happened before.

Given my disastrous experience with broadband, I'm taking the cynical view that both might be poor, so I might have to pick the best of the two e.g. if I have 50 Meg cable and it's congested but runs at say 26 Meg bursting to 50 Meg that's probably preferable to a FTTC line which can't even achieve 26 Meg anyway. (Estimate is 20Meg)

And to see the two compared, I have to order them both and cancel one of them.

To try cable appears to cost nothing or near-as.

Looking at IDNET it's 12 months only so the cost to try is (is this really right??!!) approximately £1,097. I'm not sure if that includes the "telephone line", if not, that's another c. £85 as well.

I know I can cancel if the line doesn't manage the quoted 20Meg. Though I'd hoped it would do better especially if we find we need it. But a month to month would be cleaner and I don't want some row over "well, the broadband can be cancelled, but you're stuck with a landline for a year even though you don't posess a landline handset and never even wanted one".

This makes me think I should just go for the cable and hope, and if it is poor, then cancel and later look to the FTTC option, but it would leave us with a potential gap in service. But I think that's our only (sensibly affordable) option here.
 
Unfortunately, the 12 month minimum is something set by BT Whoresale and the ISPs can't do anything about it, so at present the answer is "No".
There have been a few vague rumours that this may change, but "looking at the possibility" and making that possibility a reality are two different things - personally I wouldn't hold out much hope of the situation changing this side of hell freezing over.
 
It does seem that BT are absolutely determined to never have me on their network anywhere by never providing any useful modern services over it, and when I finally do find somewhere where it looks like they can actually supply a broadband service, there's a huge sting in the tail.

The idea that I'm going to sign up for 12 months for a service that's entirely dependent on the quality of a 60+ year old bit of copper or aliminium wire is madness when I have an alternate choice of a much more modern and potentially much faster network.

Let's hope the cable is OK then; if not at least there might be one alternative which was the idea at that location. Thanks.
 
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ISPs have been crying out for shorter contract options but so far BT's huge investment has made it difficult to achieve. In the near future the possibility of a self-install FTTC solution might make monthly contracts viable, although the method employed could also have a big impact on speed, which may or may not be a good thing.

But for now there's no easy offer periods / short contracts with FTTC connections.
 
The ironies :) I have no interest in a phone line or television services. Though I think VM make you have a phone line now, silly really as we don't even have a handset.

BT have been complaining pretty well constantly about poor take-up.

Well, to get my custom here, and have VM lose a potential customer, BT need only do something vey simple - either replace the D side with fibre, or, give me a speed guarantee of say 30Meg down based on bonding together as many D-sides as needed at no extra cost to me. I'm not asking much, am I? I want to order "broadband", not "a phone line and maybe broadband as well".

And although it's not a major issue for me, the cost of the FTTC service is going to put lots of people off. Even the £85 for the phone line is going to turn off lots of customers presently with VM - why fork out more money for no TV service and potentially slow(er) broadband? Just doesn't compete. You'd have two sets of bills - the Virgin ones for the TV and the BT ones for the broadband and phone.

One provider is happy to set it up and give me 30 days to evaluate it.

The other insists on my money for a year before I even get to see what I've ordered.

Hmmm.
 
........Though I think VM make you have a phone line now, silly really as we don't even have a handset.

Nope Sky make you take a phone package (maybe thats where you have got mixed up regarding TV, Phone, Broadband bundling?) Virgin you can buy TV, Broadband or Phone all as individual products, you can take broadband or TV without having to move your phone to them.

PS: with regards to the 30 days thing, many of the bigger players give you a week to 30 days to cancel with no punishment (IE not having to pay the whole year contract to escape).
 
Yes you can take "standalone" broadband from Virgin Media, although often they lower the cost of a bundled phone line so much that it's almost pointless not to take one. Crafty.
 
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Yes you can take "standalone" broadband from Virgin Media, although often they lower the cost of a bundled phone line so much that it's almost pointless not to take one. Crafty.

Not as pointless as it first seems, some bundles look good value until you factor in the line rental cost which isnt included in any bundle prices as far as im aware.

Some though do give good value, but it depends on what you want.
 
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