Virgin Media to switch on Gig1 Fibre for 1m homes next month

[3dcandy]

But i just want 50/100mb at a reasonable and consistent price... Guess i will look elsewhere for that.

Again what is a reasonable price? £99 a month gets me consistent 500 meg downloads about 60 meg up with 2 x V6 boxes and loads of channels, home phone with unlimited free calls (within reason) and a mobile sim with free unlimited texts and calls and data (again within reason)

I don't see that as bad value myself - your mileage might vary

[Hoonigan]

Again what is a reasonable price? £99 gets me consistent 500 meg downloads about 60 meg up with 2 x V6 boxes and loads of channels, home phone with unlimited free calls (within reason) and a mobile sim with free unlimited texts and calls and data (again within reason)

I don't see that as bad value myself - your mileage might vary

£1200 a year is a lot of money, especially if you compare that to some European countries. A friend of mine pays €13 a month for 250 down and 100 up.
To some families, that could be the difference between going on holiday or not.

[3dcandy]

£1200 a year is a lot of money, especially if you compare that to some European countries. A friend of mine pays €13 a month for 250 down and 100 up.
To some families, that could be the difference between going on holiday or not.

exactly thus me saying your mileage might vary. We are satisfied, and comparing us to a european country is totally different we have had a lack of investment for years and BT with a monopoly for a long time as well.
We will never be like a european country, especially now because of brexit

[Robot]

This is like funny news! We have in Bucharest, Romania, (and most of the country) 1 Gbps Fiber from 7-8 years ago, at 7 pounds/mo at most...

[Reapsy]

I'm on Virgin and was downloading the Division 2 patch at 10MB/s not too shabby

[IAmATeaf]

This is like funny news! We have in Bucharest, Romania, (and most of the country) 1 Gbps Fiber from 7-8 years ago, at 7 pounds/mo at most...

Prices in the UK are unfortunately set according to what the company thinks the public will pay. For example a full Sky satellite package here in the UK will cost well over £100 a month, in India I can get a full package for around £7 per month. Granted it’s not the exact same channels and programs but it just shows you that prices are set according to what they estimate the market will tolerate.

[gagaga]

This is like funny news! We have in Bucharest, Romania, (and most of the country) 1 Gbps Fiber from 7-8 years ago, at 7 pounds/mo at most...

Prices in the UK are unfortunately set according to what the company thinks the public will pay. For example a full Sky satellite package here in the UK will cost well over £100 a month, in India I can get a full package for around £7 per month. Granted it’s not the exact same channels and programs but it just shows you that prices are set according to what they estimate the market will tolerate.

For TV yes, but our internet costs are cheap for a full-fat western country where most of the properties are houses (so expensive to pass) and old and arranged in irregular streets with no proper trunking that can be used (more expensive again). Doing business in the UK is *expensive* - the absolute cheapest you can employ someone is £20/hour once you count wage and costs.. and most of the people involved in implementing and maintaining these services will cost multiples of that.

I live in a small town - i've a choice of virgin, the various openreach powered options (10+) and 4G from 4 networks. All will give me 50mbps+ at a reasonable price (I pay £40 a month for 380mbps+phone on Virgin and £16/month on 3 for unlimited 4G as failover). You can get unlimited 40meg+ for not a lot over £20 a month, router included. That's CHEAP.

Romania is cheap because their economy costs *a lot* less to do business in - plus the shiny fibre network was paid for through EU development funding (funded funnily enough by Brussels skimming the VAT on UK internet service ) and cheap development loans.

Full fibre to the premises UK wide would cost billions of pounds - hundreds of pounds per property. When people are complaining about paying £20 a month for fast internet, they're not going to pay double that for 1 gig when the vast majority don't need it or understand what it is in the first place. We'll get there are routine maintenance and upgrades mean replacing dated copper with fibre makes sense, but unless there are incentives from goverment it's going to take time. And remember, that magic government funding comes from the same people who didn't want to spend more than £20 a month in the first place.

[3dcandy]

As above and when brand new properties are being built without any decent broadband provisions it makes it very very hard....

[Robot]

For TV yes, but our internet costs are cheap for a full-fat western country where most of the properties are houses (so expensive to pass) and old and arranged in irregular streets with no proper trunking that can be used (more expensive again). Doing business in the UK is *expensive* - the absolute cheapest you can employ someone is £20/hour once you count wage and costs.. and most of the people involved in implementing and maintaining these services will cost multiples of that.

I live in a small town - i've a choice of virgin, the various openreach powered options (10+) and 4G from 4 networks. All will give me 50mbps+ at a reasonable price (I pay £40 a month for 380mbps+phone on Virgin and £16/month on 3 for unlimited 4G as failover). You can get unlimited 40meg+ for not a lot over £20 a month, router included. That's CHEAP.

Romania is cheap because their economy costs *a lot* less to do business in - plus the shiny fibre network was paid for through EU development funding (funded funnily enough by Brussels skimming the VAT on UK internet service ) and cheap development loans.

Full fibre to the premises UK wide would cost billions of pounds - hundreds of pounds per property. When people are complaining about paying £20 a month for fast internet, they're not going to pay double that for 1 gig when the vast majority don't need it or understand what it is in the first place. We'll get there are routine maintenance and upgrades mean replacing dated copper with fibre makes sense, but unless there are incentives from goverment it's going to take time. And remember, that magic government funding comes from the same people who didn't want to spend more than £20 a month in the first place.

I didn't want to be rude - and I understand the situation very well - but I can't help but wonder when I hear the low speeds and the prices you pay for it... Romania would be a second-tier country, but at least, when it comes to the internet and communications, we have very high speed (I think the 5th place in the world), fiber optics with very low latency and, not at last, reasonable small prices! I pay about £20 (110RON) a month for three 4G phones with unlimited internet and calls, 1 Gbps fiber internet (900/500) and a landline...

[3dcandy]

I didn't want to be rude - and I understand the situation very well - but I can't help but wonder when I hear the low speeds and the prices you pay for it... Romania would be a second-tier country, but at least, when it comes to the internet and communications, we have very high speed (I think the 5th place in the world), fiber optics with very low latency and, not at last, reasonable small prices! I pay about £20 (110RON) a month for three 4G phones with unlimited internet and calls, 1 Gbps fiber internet (900/500) and a landline...

Hi Robot - people in other countries sometimes wonder why we have this issue. Back when broadband had just started there was one operator and they still control about 90% of the market of the connections to homes and businesses in the UK. Any supplier has to pay them a fee and once there are 2 sets of fees for each connection it quickly ramps up.
The price has always been high, and until someone can come along and literally slash costs so everyone moves it will remain so