Get broadband for £4 a month - but hurry!

by Cliff D'Arcy on 28 September 2010  |  37 comments
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The UK's best high-speed, low-cost broadband service is now just £4 a month - but there are only a few hours left to grab this deal.

As a freelance journalist based at home, my broadband service is absolutely vital. Indeed, without fast, reliable broadband, I’d be completely sunk and my income could dry up within days.

Brilliant broadband

Therefore, it’s essential that my broadband is fast, reliable, competitively priced and provides round-the-clock support. For me, there’s no point in having a cheap service that lets me down, nor do I want to pay for the nose for Internet access.

Alas, in April 2009, a disaster struck which tested my technical and financial skills. My existing Internet service provider (ISP) went bust, causing my broadband to switch off overnight. Without wasting any time, I began shopping around for a new Best Buy broadband service.

After doing my research, I decided to make Plusnet my new ISP. I chose Plusnet for several reasons. First, it has been providing Internet access since 1997, becoming an independent division of BT in 2007. Second, it has won a stack of industry awards for its great-value service. Third, it offers the cheapest broadband-only deals in the UK.

This tale has a happy ending, as my switchover to Plusnet took less than a week and I’ve been a happy little surfer ever since, with nearly 18 months of fault-free service.

Free broadband for four months

My latest research shows that the best-value broadband-only service around is still Plusnet Value’s 20Mb package. Indeed, ignoring special offers, this package works out between £30 and £80 a year less than broadband offers from AOL, Orange, Sky, TalkTalk, Virgin and other leading ISPs.

The good news is that Plusnet Value is free for four months and then £6.49 thereafter. However you only have a few hours left to get this deal as it is being withdrawn at close of play today.

Here are the full details of this wicked deal:

Without this special offer for September, and using your own modem, the normal first-year cost for Plusnet Value would be (12 x £6.49) + £25 = £102.88.

However, with four months free and no activation fee, the price plunges to (8 x £6.49) + £0 = £51.92. That’s a first-year saving of £50.96, or almost 50% off!

Best of all, if you split it evenly across the 12 months, it comes to only £4.33 a month.

The technical stuff

You’ll need a Plusnet or BT landline to get Plusnet broadband. Although Plusnet offers a 20Mb service, your mileage may vary. Your connection speed will be affected by where you live (cities fare better than rural areas), your distance from the local exchange (the closer, the better), the time of day, and the number of connections to your service.

Also, only customers within a low-cost ‘market 3’ exchange (about 80% of households) get Plusnet Value broadband for £6.49 a month. Those outside of these areas will pay £6.49 for the first three months of paid-for broadband and then £12.99 a month.

In common with many ISPs with fair-usage policies, Plusnet uses ‘speed throttling’ to control its traffic, which slows down your connection at busy times if your usage gets too heavy. Personally, I’ve never noticed this slowdown, but big-time bandwidth bandits need to bear this traffic management in mind.

And finally...

Plusnet is one of the most popular ISPs in the UK, so this special offer won’t last. If you want Best Buy broadband at a bargain-basement price, then be sure to apply today by 4pm.

In summary, you’d be mad to pay £15+ a month to get online, when you can get 20Mb broadband free for four months and only £6.49 thereafter!

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