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O2 aims to be a “breath of fresh air” for UK broadband
(04-10-07) - Mobile phone provider O2 (www.O2.co.uk) has finally announced details of its upcoming broadband service, due to be launched on 15 October.
Having repeatedly delayed its launch, the company said it is aiming to net one million customers and make a profit on the new service by 2010, but also stressed that it would not follow in the footsteps of fellow bundlers Orange (www.Orange.co.uk) and TalkTalk (www.TalkTalk.co.uk) by offering any “free” broadband packages.
Matthew Key, O2 UK chief executive, said the new service intends to be “a breath of fresh air”. He said: “The UK broadband market is fuelled by price competition but customers are also frustrated over hidden costs, bad customer service and technical complexity.”
Cashing in on broadband providers’ recent bad press over the speeds customers achieve, O2 has said that it will check customer lines to ensure people are placed on the correct package, it added that “this will be checked up to one month later to ensure the package selected by the customer is appropriate and that they only pay for the package appropriate for the speed their line can support.”
The three packages to go live on 15 October will be:
The Standard Package at £7.50 per month for up to 8Mb
The Premium Package at £10 per month for up to 16Mb
The Ultimate Package at £15 per month for speeds of up to 20Mb
The packages will be available to both O2 pay-monthly and non-O2 customers but pay-as-you-go and non-O2 customers will be charged an additional £10 a month. Although they won’t have a set download limit, all of the packages will be subject to a fair usage policy.
O2 promised “to make broadband better,” by being simple to set up and use, offering greater transparency and focusing on after sales care. It will aim to “address the frustrations that have created dissatisfaction and create an overall service quality that sets a new standard in the market.”
Michael Phillips, BroadbandChoices.co.uk product director, said: “O2 is making some impressive promises and if it can keep them it will prove a popular addition to the UK broadband market. For O2 pay-monthly customers these packages offer great value at high speeds.
“If O2 Broadband can keep up with the good reputation and speeds of Be Broadband (www.BeThere.co.uk), which it owns and whose network it will use, it could well exceed its target of one million customers by 2010 - especially since it has 17.8 million mobile phone customers,” he said.
O2 Broadband will initially be available to 50 per cent of the UK and packages will come with a free wireless router, McAfee security and parental controls, and 24 hour technical support on a free phone number.
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