Plusnet Broadband: Falling behind competitors

[#1]

I have been a customer of Plusnet for over 10 years, I have seen a lot of problems that sometimes took months to resolve, these were not a problem with my connection but with the service offerings and it was the investment to fix it that put it right or just the change in policy, so here we are again.
I recently got my exchange updated finally a speed improvement and thanks to some great people in Plusnet Customer Support my speed increased from between 5 and 6.5gb to around 13gb.
Now downloads are quicker and I was able to get more done, I do not have usenet or p2p, I do not watch movies online nor do I download music, but last month I ran out of bandwidth and had to pay £5 for an extra 5gb which I had to frugally conserve because the "View my usage" does not work for me.
I could bang on about getting this fixed but actually it is not the problem, the problem is the usage allowance itself.
In this day and age with high resolution everything files are much bigger, every website you visit wants to improve their look so they use bigger images, videos are encoded at higher resolutions and Youtube defaults to HD if the video was uploaded at that resolution.
Plusnet seems to recognise the need for more capacity with the fibre product, it gives 120gb, but according to the distance in my "last 10gb warning" email and my "sorry you used it all up" email, it took just 2 hours to download one sixth of the monthly allowance.
Today I downloaded some zipped videos for use on a website, it was 800mb and took a few minutes, that is 1.6% of my monthly usage in a few minutes.
If everyone else was the same I might think that I should cut back or try to download overnight but then I saw an ad for Sky Broadband
It costs £7.50 a month for Sky Subscribers or £10 a month for non subscribers but only after 6 months of free usage.
So even if I was not a Sky customer it would cost me less than half what Plusnet is charging me and not have any of this limited nonsense. 
In addition to the no monthly usage cap we have no slowing down speed at peak times and free and unlimited broadband from hotspots. (see details below).
So here we are again, Plusnet it seems is behind the times in terms of the competitiveness of the service offering and Sky make a compelling reason to jump.
Now I know that Sky is not available in every exchange and that puts you back onto a BT product, lower bandwidth etc, but that is not the point, my point is that 60gb is not enough, I really don't think 120gb is either.  I am paying for the top package of what is available at my exchange and considering what the competition are doing isn't it time Plusnet removed the cap completely.
Also look how unfair it is that if my exchange had fibre then for £3.50 more I would get 120gb (60gb more) but now if I go over my 60gb allowance I get charged £5 for just 5gb, at the very least they should offer the same bandwidth allowance for Broadband Extra as Fibre.
And finally, how is it that a subsidiary of BT has to charge me £12.99 for line rental and arch enemy Sky charges only £12.25
I hope someone at Plusnet is listening because it is becoming compelling to jump ship for many users and unlike before we will not wait because the savings are too great.
Details of Sky Unlimited offer from Sky.com/justbroadband

Features
    Unlimited internet browsing and downloading with no monthly usage cap
    We won’t slow your broadband speeds down at peak times
    Free and unlimited internet when you’re out and about
    with WiFi Hotspots from The Cloud
    With no usage caps, it’s ideal for Sky Anytime+ TV on demand
    Inclusive evening and weekend UK# calls with Sky Talk Freetime
    Comes with Sky Wireless 'N' Router - our best ever wireless router
    24/7 technical support
    Download free Parental Controls on up to 3 PCs at home
    12 month trial of McAfee Internet Security Suite
    You can usually switch to Sky Broadband in just two weeks
    Unbeatable customer satisfaction for Sky Broadband
    when compared with BT, Virgin Media and Talk Talk

[#2]

i understand your way of thinking, basicly trying to get as much as possible for nothing we all want something for nothing ;0 I just want to say that i know of friend who are with sky and a few of them are waiting for contracts to run out in order to jump ship, these are the main reasons.
Slow connections
Poor support
I think these are the most important, im not trying to put you off but cheaper does not always mean better

[#3]

Well, as you have been with Plusnet for the past 10 years, you could have switched to the Unlimited product back in 2009, but then you wouldn't have been allowed to switch to ADSL2+.

[#4]

ukste 
This is about competition, people can say the same thing about Plusnet but it always comes down to the system of having to get everything right.
I know someone who has been with Talk Talk and had big problems but these turned out to be BT cabling on the outside of the house, we were able to get through to the MD and they escalted it rapidly and kicked BT into action.
ejs
I did sign up for unlimited broadband and then we went trhrough that whole unilimited argument
I just went to Talk Talk and and even their basic product which costs  £3.25 for 6 months and £7.50 after is unlimited. So it seems that i was right, Plusnet is simply not competing.
AND Talk Talk charge just £9.50 for their line rental.

[#5]

I was a Plus Net customer for years.  i then made the mistake of going to Sky.  I am now back with Plus Net and very happy again.  Sky made me loads of promises liek in that ad but failed to deliver on any of it.
Have a look for some of my threads with the stuff Sky did to me.

Having said all of this, I love Plus Net but I think they need to move with the times on usage and give us better usage options on all formats.

[#6]

We will certainly take your comments on board.
We're always reviewing our products and prices and when we have information about whether, if or when we may be changing our offerings we'll let you all know. We will always try and be as competitive as we can while striving to achieve excellent delivery and service of our products.
Chris

[#7]

BRABUS
I feel the same way, I would not have stayed so long with Plusnet if they were not doing something right, but money is tight and when both Talk Talk and Sky are offering unlimited for far less it is compelling.

[#8]

Talk Talk are an awesome company.  When my wifes 82 year old grandad who is really good with technology rang them because he had issues with a faulty modem they told him he was "too old to use the internet" 

[#9]

chrispurvey
Thanks Chris, I hope you will forward this to your Directors because you can be sure that if I am here complaining there are others who will just switch and these will be the reasons why.
The problem is that if the history of the last 10 years is anything to go by it will take too long for them to respond and they will lose a lot of customers again before they change.
If you compare Plusnet Broadband Extra and Plusnet Fibre Extra, the price difference is £3.50, that would cover the increase of speed to 38mb, so the very least you (immediately) should do is up the Broadband extra to 120gb and then consider the issue of unlimited broadband which obvious has an impact on your contracts with BT.
Paying £5 for just 5gb really grates me when you are offering and extra 60gb for £3.50
It is not as if I am on a "value" product with Plusnet, I am on the best you can deliver for my exchange and even if I were on a value product the £63 annual price of Talk Talk for their "essentials" product which is unlimited would save me on the £215.88 a year I am paying you (excluding line rental, if I go over my limit and use just 5gb it is going to cost me another £60.  So chances are I will save over £250 a year by moving and Talk Talk are in my exchange now. 
With Plusnet, customers can get cheap line rental by paying a year upfront but with the the high cost of Broadband they probably can't afford it, yet with TalkTalk broadband costs £3.25 per month for 6 months so with the saving made on monthly rentals the payback for the paying the annual rental upfront is made back in just 4 months and I save over £250.
Now here is another compelling thing, if I then come back to Plusnet I get 6 months line rental at half price, assuming that I use my savings to pay for the Plusnet annual line rental it and that by that time Plusnet has increased its data allowances My annual cost for Broadband AND line rental is going to be £275.99
I am currently spending  £371.76 a year with you on Broadband and Line Rental, actually £431.76 a year if I go over my limit just once a month.
So unless you make the change in data allowances you are asking me to pay £431.76 when I could be paying £178.50.
With mobile phones, laptops and iPads I can only see the data requirements increasing, so I can't ignore this.
Plusnet making a change in data allowances quickly (by August) would at least show that you are listening.

[#10]

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Plusnet making a change in data allowances quickly (by August) would at least show that you are listening.

Designing new products isn't something that can be done quickly, there is *a lot* to consider doing this.
Have you taken a look at trials.plus.net (the extra usage link in there) yet? It may help whilst we don't have a different alternative to offer you.

[#11]

Chris you can't argue with the logic of the maths.  It is almost like the old bank advert "new customers only".  I thought Plus Net wanted to retain customers hence the referal scheme?  How can we refer people when we are thinking that your directors need to listen to their customers.

If they wanted to set up a customer panel like many big firms do to gauge their customers thoughts then I am personally happy to participate if it helps Plus Net and also other customers.  I am sure most customers are like me and we are not wanting something for nothing but we don't want to be paying CD prices and getting vinyl records 

[#12]

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If they wanted to set up a customer panel like many big firms do to gauge their customers thoughts then I am personally happy to participate

That's the point of this forum BRABUS

[#13]

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Chris you can't argue with the logic of the maths.  It is almost like the old bank advert "new customers only".  I thought Plus Net wanted to retain customers hence the referal scheme?  How can we refer people when we are thinking that your directors need to listen to their customers.

I'm not arguing with the maths It's not my place to work out product economics either though!.
We *are* listening to customers, we feed this type of comment directly into our products and leadership team on a regular basis. Unfortunately to launch a new product isn't a trivial matter hence trying to provide you with an alternative in the meantime.

[#14]

Oh damn I must have been hiding under a stone again as I seemed to have missed the alternative - what is it please?

[#15]

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Have you taken a look at trials.plus.net (the extra usage link in there) yet?