Pay As You Go Broadband » pay as you go broadband

Orange broadband moves to BT

deena — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 13:30:18 +0000

Orange currently has more than 800,000 fixed line customers but plans to ditch their own problematic fixed-line broadband – which covers around 65% of the UK - in favour of BT. Although Orange has invested millions in broadband equipment and telephone exchanges; their customer base has been declining and their commercial performance rated as poor. In 2009 of 17 ISPs Orange was rated as 15th in the Service and Reliability Awards.

BT will take over Orange’s fixed-line business and a proportion of Orange staff will move over to BT as part of the re-organisation. The Times suggests the move to BT will increase Orange’s network coverage and free up their resources to invest in its broadband products and improve customer services.

Tell us what you think about this latest development?

Mobile broadband providers -connection speeds vs reliability

deena — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 12:28:58 +0000

Be aware that 1GB of data = 400 emails + 28 hours of internet surfing + watching a dozen short video clips.

Mobile broadband is easy to access, if you decide to sign up to a contract you will get either a small USB modem or a dongle that plugs into your laptop. Chose a data allowance that meets your needs because if you go over your allowance you will get hefty charges. If you buy online and you are not happy with connection speed or reliability you have a 7 day cooling off period when you can cancel your IP. Mobile broadband will not replace a fixed line connection for most users unless you are a light user or a student who does not require a fixed line.

Before deciding on your provider check 3G coverage as mobile signals can be patchy in rural areas and blocked in some city buildings i.e. such as basement flats. The number of WiFi hotspots is growing rapidly and connecting to these will save you money (BT claim to have one million hotspots in the UK).

The latest reviews of mobile broadband providers indicate that BT are the tops for reliability, connection speed and value for money. Go to BT to check out their latest deals. Virgin Media are also rated well but appear to be less reliable than BT with regards to losing connection when you are on the move. O2, Vodafone and T-Mobile are rated as average – though T-Mobile are less reliable but gain on good customer service. Orange and 3 have the lowest ratings with poor reliability and average connection speeds.

Although BT appear to offer the best all round service including value for money and customer service, all the providers mentioned in this article offer freebies, deals and incentives – so before you sign up for a contract it is worth trying PAYG to test out broadband services in your area.

For more information, visit the broadband provider’s websites;

Best short term broadband

deena — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 19:41:12 +0000

If you want a short term deal for broadband only three providers offer deals lasting three months or less.

1. AOL is the cheapest, charging £4.99 a month offering up to 8Mb speeds and 10GB download limit. The minimum contract is one month and if you stay longer than 3 months you will pay £9.99 a month. Check it out on the AOL website.

2. Be Broadband will offer you a faster 24Mb service with minimum contract of 3 months at £24.43 a month as well as line rental. Visit the Be website for more details.

3. The cheapest mobile broadband provider is 3 charging £15 a month for a minimum of one month. It offers speeds up tp 7.2Mb and a 3GB monthly download limit. Note that the mobile network used to access the internet is not as reliable as a landline service. Visit the three website for more information and deals.

Note that Plusnet have a similar deal to AOL at a slightly more expensive £5.99 a month for 8Mb speeds and limit of 10GB. Click on the ad to the right for more info.

Choosing your payg mobile providers

deena — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 19:40:15 +0000

A good 3G signal which gives you faster mobile internet access, video messaging and downloads and the ability to watch TV on your mobile is essential. Currently 3 www.three.co.uk and Orange www.orange.co.uk have the most extensive coverage across the UK. However, O2 have announced plans to build 1,500 new mobile network sites across the UK in 2010. O2 suggests its focus is also on being number one for customer satisfaction.

However, all pay as you go deals are not created equal and switching can save you money and may provide you with a better service too. PAYG users are often poorly catered for when it comes to advice on choosing between PAYG deals. If you are a low PAYG mobile user (making 5 mins of calls and approx. 15 texts a month) you might save £20 per annum by switching from a big player to a company like Asda who offers a flat PAYG rate of 8p per minute and 4p per text. The most expensive PAYG rates are around 22p for calls and 12p per text. Moderate users (about 40 mins of calls and 40 texts a month) could save £100 a year by switching from the most expensive to the cheapest. If you are a high user (making 300 call minutes and more than 100 texts monthly) it might be worth paying on a monthly contract or Sim-only contract.

PAYG mobile deals change rapidly so its worth shopping around and considering the smaller providers like Tesco (visit www.tesco.co.uk ). They offer calls and texts at half price for five nominated phone numbers which might suit your usage mode. Alternatively, T-Mobile and O2 offer cheaper rates after the first few minutes of a call so useful if you often make long calls. Check out www.t-mobile.co.uk and www.o2.co.uk

If you are a high user and want to stick with PAYG make full use of PAYG incentives. For example, if you top up around£10 O2, T-mobile, Virgin Mobile (visit www.virginmedia.com ) and Vodafone at www.vodafone.co.uk all offer ‘free’ minutes or texts – the more you top up the more free time you will get. Vodafone does some really good free weekend deals so worth checking them out. Remember that if you top up less frequently than once a month many incentives will not be available to you. Tesco has the best top-up incentives as they offer ‘free’ credit in exchange for topping up by a minimum amount a month. A £10 top up will get you £10 free credit while a £15 top up gets you £30 free credit.

Source: www.which.co.uk

Student Savings on pay as you go mobiles

deena — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 16:10:09 +0000

Money is tight when you are a student. Why not consider switching to Orange for the following 5 great reasons?

1. £10 free credit.

Switch to Orange, use your old number and they will give you £10 free credit. You will need to know your previous PAC network code before visiting www.orange.co.uk

2. 1 in 3 chance to win

Every time you top up you could win a prize with Bright Top Ups: a one in three chance to bag laptops, texts and maybe a holiday.

3. Magic Numbers

Choose your three best mates to chat to for up to an hour for just 20p. Visit www.orange.co.uk to top up by £10 a month.

4. Phone Fund

For every £10 you top up Orange will currently add an extra £1 towards a new pay as you go phone …. usable at any Orange shop. Plus, £10 off all pay as you go handsets costing £29 or more.

5. Orange Wednesdays

Treat a friend to a night at the flicks with 2 for 1 cinema tickets every Wednesday. Text FILM to 241 or visit www.orange.co.uk for details.

Pay as you go – hot January offers from Orange

deena — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 15:37:02 +0000

January is sale time and the right time to save on pay as you go phones. Visit www.orange.co.uk to see their great bargains – including some half-price pay as you go phones! For example, get a nifty Nokia 2730 with MP3 player and FM radio, for just £49 + £10 top up

Alternatively, save £10 on a handsome Alcatel OT-708 with touchscreen. When you buy either of these phones with Dolphin, you will also get free internet browsing -for Facebook, Twitter, Bebo and more … visit www.orange.co.uk/shop

Orange was named Best Network Operator at the 2009 What Mobile Awards … Orange had the highest average ratings and the most 5-out of 5 ratings of all the networks. They were also voted the UK’s Number 1 Mobile Broadband provider in YouGov’s latest dongle tracker report. Over 2,000 mobile broadband users took part in the survey. Orange now has the biggest 3G network, covering 93% of the population ……. this means we can use our pay as you go phones to keep doing the things we enjoy!

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010

Half price pay as you go broadband with o2

Robin — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 17:46:41 +0000

Pay as you go mobile broadband is now half price! O2 broaband is now offering half-price mobile broadband on it pay and go broadband service. The offer is avaibable until midnight on the 17th November 2009.

The price of a pay as you go mobile broadband dongle with o2 is £14.67 for this limited time offer – that is a bargain!

Pay as you go daily price = £2 for upto 500MB of downloads
Pay as you go weekly price = £7.50 for upto 1GB of downloads
Pay as you go monthly price = £15 for upto 3GB of downloads

All the deals offer unlimited Wi-fi access.

Visit the o2 website to take advantage of this latest discount deal.

Solving broadband dongle problems

deena — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 13:52:47 +0000

Some users of the 3G mobile broadband dongle with a laptop have found that their browser seems unable to display any web pages at all. What, if anything can be done?

The Problem

Although mobile phone networks market 3G data-connected dongles as ‘broadband’ they are usually slower than wired broadband. The speed of the 3G connection and its ability to load web pages is affected by your location and how busy the network is at any given time. 4Mps is needed for landline broadband and the speed of your 3G connection in built up areas will probably be between 1Mbps-2Mbps.

The Solution

Try your laptop in different rooms (your home may have connection cold spots).

Invest in a mobile phone signal booster – expensive stuff! (visit the Cell Antenna website for more information).

Try the new Opera 10 web browser (free at www.opera.com ). It uses automatic compression to keep web pages loading quickly.

Finally, some websites offer an alternative mobile version that can be viewed on a laptop by entering a slightly different address. For example, for Facebook go to m.facebook.com.

Mobile broadband sales are slowing

Robin — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 21:06:33 +0000

Only one month after Tesco announced record sales in pay as you go mobile broadband, sales appear to be slowing. Latest industry figures show that since students have gone back to university sales in mobile broadband have slowed down.

The whole broadband market had been following the growth of mobile broadband – it was deemed that mobile connections would replace fixed broadband connections (at the home of office). Business users in particular were lined up for taking up mobile broadband – because of the flexibility it would bring business users whilst they were out and about.

Now that the uptake of mobile broadband is waining, the fixed line operators have rushed out to re-position themselves. The consensus – at least publicly and currently – is to affirm that mobile broadband was never seen as a replacement for fixed-line broadband, instead it is seen as supplemental;

BT broadband …

“We certainly believe there’s a role for mobile broadband. But we’ve always marketed our mobile broadband as a way of taking your broadband out of the home, rather than as a substitute for fixed broadband. For a stable and reliable broadband service, we believe fixed is best.”

Carphone Warehouse (owners of TalkTalk, AOL and Tiscali broadband) …

“We get a sense that the mobile broadband thing has peaked. We are seeing some of those people begin to realise that the bandwidth you get on mobile is so much less than you get on a fixed line. Mobile broadband is increasingly a supplementary rather than a substitutional thing, and an increasing proportion of Carphone sales are of pre-pay dongles. I carry one around with me and am also surprised now how much free Wi-Fi is available: on the train, a lot of hotels have it, bars etc. I’m using Wi-Fi more when I am out and about than mobile broadband.”

Virgin Media …

“We’ve always said that mobile broadband is complementary to fixed line not a replacement.”

Original article was on the Guardian website.

Pay as you go mobile broadband costs less than contract broadband

Robin — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 20:16:38 +0000

The question is, “Does pay as you go mobile broadband cost more or less than contract broadband?” Well it depends on who you ask. At first glance it simply doesn’t figure why a pay as you go deal would cost less than a contract. Afterall, what would the benefit of the contract offer? – cheaper prices you’d hope.

The guys over at Broadband Choices have had their calculator out. They reckon that just £15 can buy 3Gb worth of data download – around 2000 emails or three full length movies. Not a bad deal.

For £15, you could get 3Gb of downloads on the Orange and O2 mobile networks. Or 5GB from the network operator “three”. Three, T-mobile and O2 also offer strict pay as you go mobile broadband deals.

For further information;

Visit the Orange website (or the Orange product page)

Visit the O2 website (or the O2 product page)

Visit the Three website (or the Three product page)

Visit the T-mobile (or the T-mobile product page)

Visit the Broadband Choices website