Be sold to Sky...

[enismirdal]

I understand that Be broadband has been sold to Sky (first I heard about this was when they wrote to me and told me though, so good on them for keeping their customers in the loop). Apparently Be is being subsumed and will exist no longer, and Be customers will be moved to Sky.

I went with Be precisely because I didn't want to buy my internet from a big faceless company with dubious ethics, indifferent customer service and a bad reputation. I don't particularly want to be a minion of the Sky empire. I'm therefore planning to jump ship the moment I become a Sky customer, if not before.

Where should I go next? I am pretty certain I am not going near TalkTalk, BT, Virgin Media or Sky. I understand o2 broadband, being owned by the same people as Be largely, is going the same way: into Sky. At the moment, Plusnet sounds like it could be the best option. But I'd like personal recommendations.

I don't particularly care how much it costs if it's good (well, as long as it's less than around £20 per month). I want a decent speed (10Mbps or better), unlimited downloads, GOOD customer service (don't care whether the call centres are UK or international, as long as the staff are competent and knowledgeable and I can follow them on the phone without needing all my spoons).

Our phone is currently with Post Office (basically a BT line, but without having to deal with 12 month contract boringness) - no problems with them so far. Anyone tried their broadband?

tl;dr: So, folks...who is the best broadband provider? Reliability and top-notch customer service are my main criteria.

ETA: Oooh, John Lewis does broadband! What's the buzz on them? Any good?

Comments

[cjwatson]

I use Zen, who have had excellent customer service any time I've had to deal with them (my only extended outage was entirely BT's fault, and as far as I can tell Zen wrangled them as well as could be expected). They're geek-friendly and also get consistently good reviews in Which magazine, which seems like a pretty good job at covering the spectrum.

[eveiya.livejournal.com]

I'm with Zen as well, have been since 2006, and can't fault them. They're not the cheapest but they're definitely the best ISP I've experienced either for home or work.

Don't think they offer unlimited, however - I believe all their options have monthly download limits and you pay more for a higher allowance.

[enismirdal.livejournal.com]

Getting a lot of recs for Zen, so might well go with them. It's a bit of an increase on what we're paying at the moment but I'd generally rather get a good service!

To be honest we're not insanely heavy users, but our TV reception is pretty poor so we use iPlayer most days (sometimes streaming 2 shows at once) - so I'm guessing we use in excess of 50GB per month, but haven't actually got data on this. So a package that would support up to 100GB a month would probably be fine in practice.

This is looking like a good option... :)

[cobalt-skye.livejournal.com]

If you have an Orange or T-Mobile (EE!) phone, it might be worthwhile going for EE broadband or a package with them. I've just moved and, apart from the landline transfer speed, am currently happy.

[enismirdal.livejournal.com]

We are both o2 at present and I don't have any plans to change mobile any time soon. But good to know they're currently OK as a provider.

[rjw76]

I like Plusnet because they are from Yorkshire, like me, and more rationally because their callcentre is in the UK and everyone in it speaks fluent English. It's depressing when that's a notable plus point :(

[ilanin.livejournal.com]

Plusnet are wholly owned by BT, as are the John Lewis provider, Greenbee - see here, so if you have an objection to BT I do not understand how Plusnet are any different. My experience of Plusnet is reasonable speed, terrible uptime.

[rjw76]

I've had two days of downtime in seven years with Plusnet, and they were caused by a BT engineer failing hard, if we want anecdata :-)

My personal reasoning for being happier with Plusnet (or Greenbee) is that while they're owned by BT they are easier to get in contact with, don't send you to callcentres with people who don't speak fluent English or palm you off, and it's often easier to cast Summon BT Engineer if you have a quasi-independent ISP to do it for you than having to contact BT directly. A layer of insulation from the fail, perhaps?

[enismirdal.livejournal.com]

My objection to BT specifically is less the big corporation-ness and more the fact that they're just not very good (I am a shareholder, so I suppose I could perhaps try to rectify this...). It seems most of the "big" companies are engaged in a permanent war to poach customers off each other and as a result the existing ones apparently complain of being rather neglected/undervalued. And it seems like the smaller companies have better service by and large. If there was a big company with top-notch customer service, good uptime and decent speeds, I wouldn't mind.

[hairyears.livejournal.com]

Wot he sed. We use Zen, and I wholeheartedly recommend them.

[emperor]

http://www.aa.net.uk/ are my ISP, and they're great.