It would also eliminate 'opportunist' additional costs, such as imposed by price comparison websites.
An interesting side-track topic. OFCOM seem to encourage the use of certain comparison websites. The compare sites are big business and they make a decent income. They get paid far higher 'bulk' commision rates. Its why they can give cash-backs. They also only deal with ISP's that will pay commission. Yet these are the sites recommended by OFCOM -
linkAndrew from TBB has moaned before about the unfairness of this and its a problem also experienced by Mark of ISPr. I cant say what their situation is, but I know from clawbacks that I see, that people may start off here looking at ISPs, get info... and then move on to the cash back sites, who then get paid commission, whilst mine will get clawed back.
Yet the independents such as TBB, ISPr and myself have overheads - UK hosting isn't cheap, I know I dread certain times of the year. I've mentioned before that its a concern and I know the same applies to TBB who also need it to pay salaries.
As the broadband compare sites grow it takes away the opportunity to cover any running costs and could cause the demise of sites such as this. My time I put in for free but I cant afford to pay huge hosting bills.
A few years ago, I looked at using broadband choices to suppy compare info, they take a large chunk of anything you generate and are quite strict on their terms about ISPs you can mention and how many sales you have to generate. As Eric could confirm, I backed out at the last minute as I didnt feel that this was what this site was about and it wasn't the direction in which I wanted to head. Like I said Ive seen Saffy mention a few times that its a problem for them and ISPr too.
afaik we are the only 3 sites who try hold out and will cover not just commission paying ISPs. It made me laugh just yesterday when one of the big compare sites said it couldn't find any Sky products.
(Possibly because theyve just recently had a change of affiliates? - new logo out today btw)I put my time in for free... and believe me there's a huuuge amount of time that you guys never see, so no wages to pay and the mods also do a grand job for free. However I cannot afford to pay several thousand £ out of my own pocket which it takes just for running costs. There's 2 people that do help out so I'm not moaning too much, but it is a problem for the independents especially in the age of ad-blockers.
So in effect its the compare sites (and OFCOM backing them) that is also encouraging this switch ethos.
/rant
.. and also a heads up that I will have to look at alternatives
eg because the site doesn't run on fresh air and false accusations of being paid by BT Openreach
If(/when) it transpired beyond doubt that companies were making unfair profits, govt would be forced to act upon it with new legislation, rather than side-stepping the issue by encouraging people to think the problem could be solved by switching.
Its all back to front. If you are happy with an ISP then there should be no need to change. It does not encourage decent CS when its all about driving new users, which IMHO is going wrong at the likes Plusnet.
When you offer dirt cheap 'new customer only' deals and free broadband, then something has to give.
Churn is not the best way to maintain a business if you don't care about the customers once you have them.