Kitz Forum
Broadband Related => ISPs => Topic started by: chenks on September 25, 2016, 07:38:00 PM
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thinking of jumping from the sinking ship that is plusnet, and moving to vodafone.
currently got ADSL from plusnet, but would move to 80/20 FTTC.
the street cab is about 30 feet way, and the pole is in my back garden, so should get pretty close to 80Mbps.
are there any vodafone fibre customers here?
how are they as an ISP? any horror stories? any good stories?
do they throttle?
do they block certain sites like BT and Sky do?
what's their router like? i currently use a billion 8800NL. have it configured with various ports forwarded and DDNS configured.
i understand i can't use my own router as it's hit and miss if vodafone will give you the required user/pass or not.
i need to able to set various static internal IPs via DHCP.
i'd also prefer to be able to set it to use google DNS rather than ISP supplied DNS.
i currently have a static IP, but i know vodafone don't offer them to non-business customers.
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What sites do BT & Sky block that other ISPs don't? I'm not aware of either ISP blocking individual sites that all ISPs are court ordered to, e.g piracy sites like thepiratebay
to add, Vodafone will now give any customer their username/password so they can use their own modern.
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yes BT and Sky block as per court orders, but those court orders only apply to the specific ISPs they are placed against.
for example, piratebay isn't blocked on plusnet, and isn't blocked on many other ISPs.
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See http://www.ispreview.co.uk/review/top50.php
Do you ever need any support?
Some good ISPs give you static IP addresses still, and don't block anything at all, not even the unelected IWF list. For example http://aa.net.uk/kb-broadband-unfiltered.html
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Only need support if something good wrong obviously.
But rather than just a list of "top 50" I'm looking for actual real life experience comments from those who are currently using Vodafone
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As I understand it, Kitz, our leader, is also considering* moving from Plusnet to Vodafone. So you are not alone. ;)
* Such a move would only occur after due consideration has been given to how the proposed new service operates.
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Digging around, you might well find individual user reviews on Vodafone. I note the low score for support on ispreview, but possibly ‘who cares’. Afaik Burakkucat has never needed to trouble his ISP and in the past I never used to contact Demon, ever, before I moved to my current ISP yet now I am needing a lot of handholding because of my personal circumstances. Also BT seem to be going through a bad patch (they, or locals, keep breaking things) compared with previous years, so prompt aggressive support is a must for me. (I noticed them digging outside my house in a former troublespot, which is either a good thing or a bad thing.)
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If Kitz is thinking about it, then that's a big plus for them obviously. They must be doing something right. But we are all different animals and have different priorities, so it's worth comparing aims too, obviously.
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User Chris T is on Vodafone FTTC,
http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,18536.msg333796.html#msg333796
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Yep Ive been looking around but not set the ball in motion yet. If you search on total monthly cost (http://www.kitz.co.uk/isp/broadband_price_comparison.php?price1=0&price2=99&speed=5&package=2&contract=0&bbtype=0&sort=displaytotal&sortdir=asc) rather than headline grabbing subsidised broadband they come out quite well.
I phoned up vodafone to ask some questions, first line couldnt answer them, but they straight away passed me through to tech support.
They confirmed I could use my own router. They use their own backhaul (ex C&W LLU). There is no escaping the £49 set-up fee though even if you dont want their modem and its only migration. They only answer he couldnt find.. and he did try was I wanted to know which DLM line profile they use. *
Im looking because I need to cut costs and Im not pleased with Plusnet's response times to tickets.
I have one thats been outstanding now for over a month that has still not been looked at properly. All Ive had is 'escalating' and then when it was they didnt even bother to read it properly, so now its back waiting another reply. Queue times are dreadful and the worst its ever been.
I'm also looking at Origin (http://www.kitz.co.uk/files/jump2/jump2.php?isp=originbroadband) - This search (http://www.kitz.co.uk/isp/broadband_price_comparison.php?speed=5&package=1&contract=0&bbtype=0&price1=0&price2=99&submit=Perform+Search) on line only threw up some interesting results. Pulse8 do line rental for £13 so that's something I've considered.
24/7 support. No setup costs. Static IP available. Part own network which is expanding, but also white label Plusnet where they dont cover. Had problems in the past when DR went bang, but that wasnt really their fault. Aside from that they seem quite good so I may give them a punt. Dont expect that broadband only deal for fibre max to be up there much longer. Static IP is £1.49 pm but when I said 'ouch' they said they may be able to do something about that.
The reason Im concerned about that is since my last cross-talker came onboard and we had a lot of thunderstorms, Ive sailed quite close to the wind a few times and if I was on Standard rather than speed it may be difficult if I ever got interleaved. DLM seems a bit broken right now... and I still have the weird error spike at around 10.30 am each day thats been going on for the best part of a year.
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i did look at Origin a while back, but i believe they are simply a plusnet reseller, so decided not to look any further into it.
interesting that you got them to say you could use your own router.
read on their forum that getting the required user/pass was troublesome for some.
my billion 8800nl supports both ADSL and FTTC, so if i could keep using that it would be a fairly seamless transition.
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>>> interesting that you got them to say you could use your own router.
Need to get through to their tech support in Glasgow.
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We have had Vodafone Connect since September of last year, overall the actual service has been great – both phone and internet connection just works. We pay for up to 17Mb (ADSL) but we are getting a constant 20/2Mb connection over a capped VDSL connection that is synced in the router at 40/10Mb (we are about 200 meters from the cabinet. I guess Vodafone have chosen not to use any legacy equipment in the exchanges where fibre is available. I also guess this why they originally stated that only the supplied router can be used but this rule for non-capped tariffs seems to have been relaxed.
The supplied router is mixed bag, the original firmware was terrible with a dogs dinner of an interface that needed both to be logged in to the web interface and mobile app to do anything. However the latest firmware is much better is much better allowing option that you would expect on most routers such as being able to change the DNS servers.
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I'm debating moving from PN too. Do VF offer a static?
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they only offer it on business packages.
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@kitz Sometime if ever you have nothing better to do! you might include uno and perhaps others in your isp list. I would say that uno are very good value if you want excellent support. The prices on their web site don't include vat.
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at £30+vat for unlimited 40/10 i think i can safely say they are not anywhere near my radar :lol:
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@les70
Uno is one that I had considered adding. I've just totally re-written the broadband prices section so that hopefully once an ISP is added, its a bit easier for me to maintain individual product prices. Things have changed a lot in the broadband industry since it was originally written ~10 yrs ago and I wanted to do something that showed proper all in pricing not just the headline figures which aren't necessarily the cheapest.
Right now I'm currently rewriting the rating system which badly needs updating.
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The ISP pricing stuff must be an absolute pig to put together, your work much appreciated.
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anyway... can be bring this back on-topic?
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I briefly considered Vodafone before I eventually chose to move to Plusnet about 3 months back. They didn't have the current £28 pm with no line rental offer back then (for 76/20 fibre), but I could get £5 off as an existing Vodafone customer (which worked out to pretty much the same - £10 for broadband + £18-ish line rental).
But after having spent a bit of time on their forums, I decided against it. Back then, they absolutely did NOT allow customers to use their own equipment. Their own supplied all-in-one router had all kinds of limitations and a ton of issues. Things are a lot better now with recent firmware releases and most importantly, they are now allowing customers to use their own routers. They also don't appear to have any sort of traffic management/prioritisation on their network, which is good news. No option of a static IP, sadly.
If I was switching today, I would seriously consider them. But be warned, their billing system is a complete car crash. We switched our mobile numbers to them back in March, primarily because they have the strongest 4G signal where we live (and also because I was really annoyed with Three for killing off the legacy One Plan). Every month it was a random figure on the bill. It took numerous frustrated calls and chat sessions before they finally sorted it out.
Customer service is better, they are much more responsive and appear to be actively trying to revamp their image and look after their customers. Their forum is a bit of a dog's dinner though - they have a single section for all "pay monthly products" that include mobile contracts and broadband, and their first level (helpdesk) is a bit useless (but pleasant to deal with).
I don't regret moving to Plusnet though. Barring one major outage (caused by a power failure at Telehouse North), the service has been rock solid. I'm still on their "old" network and haven't suffered any of the packet loss issues that some people on their new network are struggling with. Plus I get a static IP (one-off £5 fee) and customer service is friendly and responsive. HTH.
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i can live without the static IP to be honest.
with regards to plusnets customer service, have you currently had to use it? as i'm not sure anyone could class it as "responsive".
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I wanted to know which DLM line profile they use.
Standard.
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i can live without the static IP to be honest.
with regards to plusnets customer service, have you currently had to use it? as i'm not sure anyone could class it as "responsive".
I've used it a bunch of times but having said that, I've not had any serious faults.
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from another thread
>> Plusnet charge £30 if you move to an LLU supplier
Yep, so migrating from Plusnet to Vodafone will incur an £79 fee that has to be paid. Dear do for migration :(
is this actually the case?
if it is then it sounds like plusnet holding the customer to ransom.
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Yep. ^
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well they can try and charge it.
i won't pay it though.