PlusNet has recently revamped its services, repriced and rebranded its Broadband packages. After a shaky period last year, where the ISP attracted a fair share of criticism for substandard customer service, connection delays, and all-round bad performance, PlusNet, now owned by BT, seem to be determined to win back the reputation they once enjoyed.
Aside from offering now-standard speeds of 8Mbps, and clearly defined download caps of up to 40GB, PlusNet are also offering customers a unique unlimited overnight usage policy - anything that is downloaded between the hours of 12am and 8am doesn’t count towards your monthly limit.
“We want to encourage people to use it overnight when the network is empty but paid for. It’s zero cost to us to offer that for customers for use of non-quality-specific functions like downloading,” says PlusNet product director Neil Armstrong.
Speaking of monthly limits, there is no set length of contract – all the packages run for one month, which is much more flexible than a 12 or 18 month straitjacket, although whilst PlusNet do not charge mandatory activation fees for new or migrating Broadband customers, this is conditional on customers staying with them for 12 months.
Also - and this is a real plus - customers who stray over their monthly limit, unintentionally or not, customers can opt to either pay an extra £1 for every extra GB over the limit they go, or choose to have their speed temporarily reduced. The extra option to customise monthly caps for an additional 75p per GB per month is surely a welcome change to the punitive measures doled out to customers by other ISPs.
PlusNet seem keen to differentiate themselves from the bigger companies who try to hook customers in with offers of free secondary services, or Broadband as a freebie alongside one of their parent services.
Echoing O2 UK CEO Matthew Key, in lieu of a converged O2/Be service, said that customers “associate free [Broadband] with substandard,” albeit in a more colourful fashion, Armstrong said that “sensible people know ‘free’ is b*ll*cks,” and that PlusNet’s “aim is to be the best tier 2 provider,” referring to the ever-shrinking state of the UK Broadband market and it’s crowding out by larger ISPs – tier 1’s by definition here.
Being owned and partially funded by the biggest tier 1 of them all – BT – can’t hurt, especially when plans to give PlusNet customers access to the BT Home Hub, and free Wi-Fi minutes, along with other plans to introduce a faster ADSL 2+ service which promises speeds of 24Mbps.
Needless to say, PlusNet’s assisted re-entry into the market with new flexible packages and greater freedom of use, may see customers having the last laugh as the big tier 1’s battle it out with expensive ad campaigns and offers of substandard ‘free’ services.
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