Changing ISP and TV provider OR looking after the pennies

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

I've been with Talk Talk since 2012 and using Sky TV for over 16 years (no sports or film subscription)

Prompted by a friend, over the weekend I have prodded both.

Sky gave me £5 off my monthly bill, a new 2TB box and the movie channels. OK, so it's for a year and then the price goes up, but this time I've stuck a note in my diary to review.

Talk Talk weren't keen on giving me anything (well, £2 a month off). So I've just signed up for BT Infinity at £9 a month less. I was paying £40 and now it's £31 a month for unlimited downloads and speed "up to" 38 Mbs but guaranteed to be 27MBs. Those figures include line rental.

The moral of the tale is that we should be shopping around for this stuff.

No doubt I'll be told that everyone does, but I didn't.

[Buttonman]

See the wife does that and we now have EE for TV and phone and orange for internet.

The internet  is cheaper but slower too. The TV looks the same and is cheaper but every so often I go looking for something like the Discovery Channel or BBC2 England and it isn't there. basically it's Freeview with a set top box and a couple of bells and whistles. Think we save £16 a month but I was happier with the Virgin package - £200 a year happier nit sure but inretrospect I thnk we should have gouged Virgin for a better deal.

[Banners]

If you have Sky TV, is Sky broadband not free?

We moved away from a Virgin area six months ago, the first time I've been without cable since around 2002 I think. I was initially tempted by BT for TV, phone and internet, but went with Sky for the TV and phone when I realised that having BT cost more as it would mean having to buy Powerline adapters in order to run the network to the TV, whereas the Sky box has wifi.

We were offered Sky broadband for free, but relying on my internet connection for my home business, and being wary of some horror stories about Sky's broadband, I opted to go for Zen who I had seen had been widely lauded as the best you can get. Sure, it's expensive, but their brand seemed to represent utter reliability and brilliant customer service.

Fair enough, the ~36Mb internet connection is fine and I don't often notice the slower speeds compared to Virgin where we had ~120Mb. However, our phone line is often noisy, and after making me buy some filters and a new handset, Zen want me to agree to pay £130 before they'll send someone out from BT to check the line, which I refuse to do. This is not the service I expected (especially on a business tariff) from Zen, nor the service I believe I am paying so much for.

So, Zen have proved to be a disappointment. Once the 12 months is up, I think I might just go with Sky all-in and save the money.

Or, is Sky broadband really as bad as I've heard?