UPC phone service - opinions wanted please!

livEwirE

Hi all,

I am considering getting UPC broadband and phone. My OH is not too keen on the phone service as she has heard a couple of horror stories from two people saying it was a constantly offline and dropping calls. Can I ask anyone who is using the UPC phone service is it good?

omahaid

It's reliable enough ... but for some reason there are some number it wont ring. It's actually quiet odd, I cannot ring my wifes mobile from the UPC landline, go figure (It's so rare I ring it I haven't contacted UPC yet, so I don't know why it is happening).

patrickc

no real problems with it, been down maybe 3 times for no more than a day in the last 15 months.

D'Peoples Voice

when I'm on a call, it won't divert people to my voicemail,
it just keeps ringing and ringing,
so they assume no-one is there and don't ring again
- which can be a positive sometimes

But rarely lets me down when i need to make a call, electricity power cut aside...

jay93

Some people have issue ringing certain numbers on the Three Ireland network but other than that i have not heard anything bad about the UPC phone service.

Belfunk

I had nothing but problems with it. I could make calls no problem however people would ring my mobile asking me was i out of the house that they've been trying my landline all day. The phone would ring on their side but not in my house.

I suspect this happens to a lot of people they just don't know about it.

justme7136

1 problem at the start, being working fine now for about 6 months.

mark17j

I have UPC phone over a year now and no problems whatsoever - I am very pleased with the service. there is no difference in line quality to eircom. I would never go back to eircom or pay their line rental.
UPC all the way

STForSale

Have it for a couple of years now.
It has been down numerous occasions, for a whole weekend at one point.
Also have intermitent problems dialing numbers.
No a big issue for me but if your on the phone alot or run a businees from home I could not recommend it.

Asking19302

Found UPC phone. broadband and basic tv package to be just a little more expensive than Eircom phone was. Have not noticed any difference in phone service other than the fact that it fails during a power failure which did not happen with Eircom.

livEwirE

Going by the replies here it doesn't sound very stable or reliable at all:eek:

squonk

I've had the case also where people rang my mobile asking was I out of the house because they couldn't get through to me on my home phone. I also have an issue at times where calls seem to go dead for a few seconds and then come back. It's like the other party hangs up but obviously the haven't. After about 5-15 seconds, communication is restored. They're only OK but I don't use the landline a whole lot os it's a 'handy to have' rather than an essential. Incidentally I tent to have a lot of broadband usage during the evenings so this might contribute to my call issues but it's still poor.

mark17781

squonk wrote: »

I've had the case also where people rang my mobile asking was I out of the house because they couldn't get through to me on my home phone. I also have an issue at times where calls seem to go dead for a few seconds and then come back. It's like the other party hangs up but obviously the haven't. After about 5-15 seconds, communication is restored. They're only OK but I don't use the landline a whole lot os it's a 'handy to have' rather than an essential. Incidentally I tent to have a lot of broadband usage during the evenings so this might contribute to my call issues but it's still poor.

16-3 are recommending it OP and so would I...
It has never let me down, only once when there was a powercut in the area. squonk that maybe the case in Galway, but it works grand here in Dublin for me on the new 100mb fiber optic lines.

livEwirE

Thanks for all the feedback, I think I've made up my mind, it appears the majority of people are happy with the service.

ScouseMouse

I have it about 6 months and the only problem was I didnt keep my old number. I rang them and it was sorted withing one hour.

Been down at random times on random days, nothing major, but wouldn't say it's reliable.

gabbo is coming

RVP 11 wrote: »

Been down at random times on random days, nothing major, but wouldn't say it's reliable.

Blueface is reliable, cheaper, can be used from SIP enabled phones like mobiles - but requires a bit more setup....

Bebop

I am also thinking of switching my landline from Eircom to UPC,
I have a broadband only package with UPC so the phone would only cost a few more Euros, but what I really want to know is;

What are the call charges? I don't make many calls from my landline so how much would I really save?
And can I keep my number?

mark17j

Bebop wrote: »

I am also thinking of switching my landline from Eircom to UPC,
I have a broadband only package with UPC so the phone would only cost a few more Euros, but what I really want to know is;

What are the call charges? I don't make many calls from my landline so how much would I really save?
And can I keep my number?

The way mine is set up, (Anytime World) I can call UK and USA at no extra cost Off Peak, think there's a minute limit per month, but I never go over, and I call those two destinations allot - this also includes Irish landine numbers
I have 25mb broadband and phone for 42 a month - and my bill never goes over 46 euro per month, I rarely ring mobiles on it, but the rates are not bad. you don't pay line rental.

Edit Yes you can use your eircom number on the UPC network.

iano.p

Have it a year now and works all the time. Never had a issue with it

livEwirE

Just thought I'd reply here myself after getting it in and using it for a couple of weeks now. It is working fine and I would recommend it, no outages yet:D

colm_mcm

Mines been perfect, but then I don't use it a lot

Crann na Beatha

This post has been deleted.

zenno

The main problem is when the broadband goes down so does the phone so you are left with no communication unless you use a mobile phone and this has happened quite a lot in the rivervalley swords area lately, although tv is still working when this happens. I have also tried numerous times to call a number only to get a dead connection and you have to try a few times to get it to work or disconnect the whole router and phone power supply and reconnect it to work.

In all honesty it seems to be more stable as time goes on as last year and before was really bad so i'd say they are always upgrading to get it stable.

Also this can happen if you use your own phone and not the upc one as for some reason some phones have a problem with the setup.

Alun

This the main reason why, despite having UPC BB recently becoming available in my area, I haven't made the switch. Until recently we had UPC digital TV (now have Saorview + Freesat) and it would regularly happen that the TV would be off for a good portion of the day (analogue as well, so in effect a complete disconnect.) That's simply not acceptable as both me and the missus regularly work from home. At 7Mbit/s, Eircom might be a whole lot slower, but we've not had a single minute of down time in over 10 years here, and to be honest I've more need of reliability than speed at the moment.