Broadband Guide

Leased lines

Tuesday 24 January, 2012

Running a business that uses the internet heavily? Need a high-speed web connection with guaranteed bandwidth that you don’t have to share with anyone else? Then a leased line could be the solution you’re looking for...

What is a leased line?

A leased line is basically a private internet connection. With a leased line, your business will be directly connected to the internet without having to share that connection with any other businesses or home users. Having a dedicated connection means that the speed you pay for is the speed you get - guaranteed.

In contrast, with a common garden business broadband connection, you may be sharing bandwidth with up to 20 other connections at the same time. If everyone is online, this means your internet connection will slow down - but not with a leased line.

Does my business need a leased line?

If your business relies on the internet to run, then a leased line could be for you. This is because any downtime would have a serious impact on everyday operations. However, having a leased line would mean your business gets a high standard of service availability, data transfer and internet security.

Leased lines are especially suited to businesses that:

• Run business-critical applications over the internet
• Regularly send large files or commercially sensitive data
• Host a website, web application or email server (the computer in your network that acts as a virtual post office)
• Need to tailor their speed depending on demand, e.g. online retailers during peak buying seasons like Christmas
• Stream content online
• Need greater resilience and security than broadband can offer

What are the benefits of a leased line to my business?

Guaranteed high-speed internet - As outlined above, reliability is one of the main benefits of a leased line. Some providers offer 100% availability, meaning your business will always be online. This effectively eliminates the risk of losing revenue through downtime.

Service guarantees - As if that isn’t enough when it comes to reliability, any leased line provider worth its salt will back-up the availability they offer with a service level agreement. This is a contract that means you will get money back and compensation if your service ever falls below an agreed level.

Flexible bandwidth - Essentially, this means that your business only pays for the internet capacity it needs, meaning it can be tailored to suit busier and quieter periods.

Truly unlimited data usage - Leased lines do not come with a fair usage policy attached.

Internet telephony - If your leased line comes with a quality of service that allows the transport of telephone calls, you can use it to support your business telephone network, meaning you can save money on calls while maintaining call quality.

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What speeds are available on leased lines?

Depending on where your business is based, the technology you have access to, and which provider you choose, you can get speeds ranging from 2Mb (the national average broadband speed is 6.2Mb) to a whopping 10Gb with a leased line, which is over 400 times faster than superfast broadband.

Another advantage of having a leased line is it means your internet connection will be symmetrical - you’ll have the same upload and download speeds. While traditional broadband lets you download much quicker than you can upload, a leased line allows you to send data as fast as you can download it, which is ideal if your business regularly sends large files.

As mentioned previously, a leased line will also allow you to scale your bandwidth to suit your needs, meaning you can raise it or lower it depending on when your business is busy.

Ethernet leased line access

Most leased lines are provided via fibre optic cable, which transmits data at high rates and long distances using pulses of light. However, leased lines that use ethernet technology are more affordable for many businesses.

Ethernet in the first mile (EFM) lines use bundles of copper wires rather than fibre optic cable to cut costs, which makes them as much as 65% cheaper than a traditional leased line while still providing dedicated internet connections offering speeds of up to 10Mb.

The cost of an EFM line, as with a traditional leased line, will depend on the speed you want and the length of line, while availability will be determined by where your business is based. Compare packages to find out what is available to your business.

Another advantage of EFM lines is they can be installed more quickly than fibre lines because they use the existing telephone network. This means that an EFM line can be up and running in as little as 30 days.

Leased line security

A major benefit of having a leased line we have neglected to mention so far is that, aside from giving your business fast and reliable internet access, it would also offer you extra security.

This is because a leased line is a private connection between your company and your network and/or the internet, meaning that it bypasses public networks thus making your data transfer safer.

Some providers will also protect you from “denial of service” (DoS) attacks. This is when someone attempts to make an online resource, such as a website, unavailable to users, which can make it very difficult for a business to operate. A common method of attack is to saturate a website with traffic, causing it to crash.

Leased line support

Business internet providers know that being connected to the internet is very important to their leased line customers, so provide them with extra support.

Most providers offer their leased line customers a priority service line and dedicated technical support to ensure they remain online at all times. If you have a leased line and encounter problems, many providers aim to provide a solution within five hours.

10 things to look for in a leased line provider

Every leased line provider is different - they offer varying levels of service and the difference between them is often in the small print. Here are 10 things to consider when comparing leased line providers:

1. Target service availability
   Anything less than 100% means your business will be expected to be without the internet for a period of time. For example, 99.9% target service availability equates to 8.8 hours expected downtime per year. When looking at the service availability providers offer, take into account the labour costs, loss of sales/orders and decline in credibility downtime incurs - it could have a serious impact on revenue and profit.
2. Service level agreement (SLA)
   When it comes to the level of service a provider is offering, always read the small print to ensure you’re fully covered, both for problems with the circuit and the network. Check that the SLA covers all of the solution, especially if some components are being provided by third parties, and make sure you understand the impact of this on the SLA.
3. Claiming against the SLA
   How much compensation will you get if you make a claim? Can you claim the moment a fault is reported, or do you have to wait until a certain number of hours have passed? Remember that the longer the claim time, the more damage is done to your business. It could also mean the provider’s engineering resources are stretched.
4. Payment
   Keep your peepers peeled for upfront connection costs and any hidden fees. It can also pay to check whether there is any difference in price when you choose to pay monthly or quarterly. Some providers charge significantly more to pay monthly rather than annually, for example.
5. Contention
   Contention ratio is basically the relationship between the demand on an internet connection and its bandwidth. With a leased line you shouldn’t have anyone else sharing your bandwidth. Check the small print to ensure the circuit and any internet traffic is “uncontended” from the customer’s site all the way out to the internet and that this is confirmed in writing.
6. Room to grow
   If business is suddenly booming, will you be able to raise your bandwidth quickly and easily? In quieter periods, will you be able to lower it to save money? Be aware of the costs and timescales involved in altering bandwidth.
7. Installation and delivery
   Find out who installs and delivers the service - some providers use third parties for this, which can have an impact on performance and response times. Check the SLA for the applicable payments for delayed delivery.
8. Latency
   Latency is the delay between the original request for data and when the data actually starts to transfer. Poor latency means the applications your business uses will be less responsive and users accessing any websites you host will experience slow loading times. Confident providers will quote real-time latency stats online.
9. Symmetric and asymmetric access
   Make sure your traffic profile fits your business’s pattern of internet usage. If you upload more content than you download, your leased line should accommodate this so you aren’t paying for inbound usage you don’t need.
10. Added extras
    What are you getting free of charge? A router, online usage reporting and protection against security threats are examples of what you might be offered, or what you might ask providers to throw into the deal. Ask about anything you are offered free of charge. What is the specification of the router provided? What specific security threats are you protected against?