Thinking of switching to BT.

Zhane

Hiya.

With last months Eircom bill, i have decided to try and find a cheaper alternative, BT Ireland has a package for €46 a month, this is considerably cheaper to what i am paying Eircom each month. We dont actually use the phone that much, but would still like the option, and i take it this €46 doesnt include the calls?

Anyway, basically what im asking is, what is BT Ireland like as a service? Is there wireless broadband reliable? And what is the compatibitly like with Macs or does it matter? Is there any other charges a month besides the €46 + calls?

Thanks

smellslikeshoes

A lot of people on these boards have been complaining about BT lately, might want to have a look through the last two or 3 pages or this section.

SeanW

BT just resells the €ircom product at a discount. BT Broadband services come in 3 flavours, Broadband Only (your line stays with Eircom while BT runs a BB service on it), Broadband And Talk (BT provides broadband, takes over your line, gives you a bundle discount on line rental and charges you per-minute on calls), and finally Broadband And Total Talk (as above, but with a calling plan attached).

Each of the above comes as either 1MB, 2MB and 3MB broadband the same as Eircom (and as such you would get the much discussed upgrades when and if Eircom ever gets around to it).

I've been using BT B&T for 3 years now. No complaints in billing, tech support, or anything else. But some people do (have complaints) and lots of them.

Little-Devil

They also have a new product called LLU which is between 3MB & 8MB. This BT adding there own hardware into the exchanges and have 100% control over. I have a friend who has BT for more then 4 years and not one complaint either with billing or support.

I would second what has already being said and read through previous posts about BT before signing up.

dub45

Given their previous behaviour - well documented on here -

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2054952665

and their latest attempt to introduce a 'call balance charge' withthout any basis for such a charge BT simply do not deserve any recommendation.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055106377

and we should never forget the deposit debacle - give us your money but dont expect a receipt or any conditions for return etc etc:(

I would not recommend them to my worst enemy (not that I have any of course!:))

There is a very good chance that you will at some stage have problems with BT.

For example:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=56284703&postcount=124

What price your sanity?

ct5amr2ig1nfhp

I have to say that I've never had any problems with their Broadband service. I rarely if ever had any downtime. Good pings. Really great service.

However, I have found their Customer Service and Billing Department to be absolutely dreadful. After a recent billing issue took 3 months, 10 or more monkeys and Comreg to get sorted, I decided to switch.

For calls, be aware that BT round to the nearest minute and this can increase your bill quite a bit (especially as most people now have voicemail). I think Eircom still charge per second, not too sure about the others.

dub45

Yes this is the sad thing about the BT debacle - no matter how many complaints there are about billing it is always acknowledged that the bb service is consistently excellent but sanity is precious!

Solair

From a technical point of view they're OK, nothing amazing, but they're reliable enough.

However, if your bill does go wrong, you've a problem with direct debit or you need to move house. All I would say is good luck to you!

Their residential "Customer Care" (laughs hard) team is consistently useless and has been for many years.

Tech support's quite good though.

Their offers aren't all that great and are quite comparable to others on the market, so I'd say shop around a little more before you settle with BT.

If you're after high speed broadband, check if smart's available in your area. Just no comparision at all!