Welcome to the Official Plusnet Usergroup

The Plusnet Usergroup (PUG) is an independent group of users from Plusnet, MetroNet, Free-Online and Force9 using the whole range of products and services with a diverse and varied degree of knowledge and expertise. (The doors are open for a volunteer from Madasafish to join us).

The group was conceived in April 2004 with the aim of being an independent and officially recognised group of individuals working with each other and with Plusnet to ensure that the products, services, support and facilities are the best we could ask for.

Originally launched in 2004 and totally revamped in December 2005/January 2006 this site is aimed at providing all users of Plusnet, Free-Online, Force9, MetroNet and Madasafish with the latest Plusnet family news and updates, information on our activities, progress reports as well as a way of contacting us if you feel there is some way that we can help out.

Latest News

Residential Customer Support goes 0800

Calls to Residential Customer Support are often lengthy, and at busy times involve waiting for an agent to become available. Whilst calls to the 0845 number have been free at all times to customers of Plusnet's Talk home phone service this was not necessarily the case for users with other phone service providers. In the latter case call costs could be significant. Great news! From 2nd August 2011 Residential Customer Support moved to Freephone 0800.

Users needing to contact Residential Customer Support can now call 0800 432 0200 at no cost when calling from a UK land-line. Unfortunately those using mobiles (or other networks) will still be charged. However, these users are not forgotten. Plusnet have announced they are taking steps to acquire an 03 number; calls to this will be deducted from inclusive minutes on mobile phone plans - or be charged at UK land-line rates.

Business customers will continue to call 0114 296 5182 for Business Customer Support.

Posted by spraxyt on Thursday, 04-Aug-2011 22:21 PM

Fibre Flies In and Refreshes the Product Set

The long awaited launch of Plusnet fibre products took place this morning (19 Apr 2011) heralded by a flight of pigeons racing from London to their home loft in Yorkshire. See Plusnet Fibre Pigeon Race - The Results.

The new products Value Fibre and Extra Fibre come alongside a refresh of the product range (see FAQs) which PUG are pleased to see reflects feedback from users provided through the forums. Essentially the existing Value and Extra base products continue, with unchanged pricing and bandwidth limits. Pro is discontinued as a stand-alone product and replaced by a £5 per month Pro add-on available on both Value and Extra. This is great news - it provides a choice of two products with Pro speed profiles (line speed) whilst retaining the base product's bandwidth.

With Value the Pro add-on effectively provides the long-requested Pro-Lite product with Pro speed profiles at an entry level price.
With Extra the add-on provides the Pro experience with 3 times the bandwidth of the stand-alone Pro product but at the same price.

Fibre comes as a second add-on costing £10 per month but requiring an 18-month contract (reflecting commitments Plusnet have to enter into with BT Wholesale). Set-up charges might also be incurred - see Fibre FAQs. Download speeds for most users are expected to exceed 30Mbps, though this depends on distance from the cabinet. Upload speeds will be capped at 2Mbps.

Value Fibre comes with 40GB peak-time (8am to midnight) bandwidth, Extra Fibre with 120GB. Off-peak usage continues to be free.

The Pro add-on may also be added with Fibre, again retaining the underlying product's bandwidth.

Together these two base products and add-ons provide 8 combinations with the following price points.

Product	Price		Bandwidth
	Market 1 & 2	Market 3
Value	£12.99	£ 6.49	10GB
Value Pro	£17.99	£11.49	10GB
Value Fibre	£22.99	£16.49	40GB
Value Fibre Pro	£27.99	£21.49	40GB
Extra	£17.99	£11.49	60GB
Extra Pro	£22.99	£16.49	60GB
Extra Fibre	£27.99	£21.49	120GB
Extra Fibre Pro	£32.99	£26.49	120GB

With all products extra bandwidth will be charged at £5 per 5GB.

Expected speeds for the new products and add-ons are given on the Plusnet website here - click the product names to expose this information. Note that for fibre products traffic shaping extends an hour into off-peak hours. PUG's Product Comparison Tool requires significant updating to accommodate the new product set and this is in progress.

Posted by spraxyt on Tuesday, 19-Apr-2011 14:20 PM

Business Products to get ADSL2+ with Annex M Option

Alongside the residential product changes due tomorrow (19 Apr 2011) Plusnet have announced (ADSL2+ and Annex M come to Plusnet Business) that ADSL2+ will, for the first time, be offered on Business products. No changes are planned to the core Business Option 1, 2 and 3 base products but new sign-ups will be provisioned on ADSL2+ where estimates show improved connection speeds should result. This is, of course, subject to their exchange being 21CN/ADSL2+ ready. Upload speeds will be uncapped as standard offering up to 1Mbps upload speeds.

On each option three additional services will be available, Enhanced Care, Prioritised Service and (new to Plusnet) Annex M.

The current Enhanced Care service will continue. This option costs £8.50 (ex VAT) per month and details can be found here.

Prioritised Service is currently known as Max Premium, the name change reflecting its extension to ADSL2+. This service is standard with Option 3 but costs £7.00 (ex VAT) per month with Options 1 and 2. Details can be found here. For all users this option provides a prioritised service across the BT Wholesale network. For 20CN "up to 8Mbps" maxDSL users upload speeds are increased from up to 448kbps to up to 832kbps; 21CN "up to 20Mbps" ADSL2+ users will be be provisioned with up to 1Mbps upload as standard.

The new Annex M service (available in ADSL2+ exchanges with Annex M enabled) will enable users to potentially achieve up to 2.5Mbps upstream by sacrificing some of their available downstream bandwidth. Clearly this is targeted at businesses where upstream speeds are a key business driver. This service will cost £10.00 (ex VAT) per month. A FAQ is expected to be published alongside the launch.

Though initially targeted at new sign-ups existing users are not forgotten. The rolling programme of bulk residential upgrades (Faster Plusnet Broadband, for free) is being extended to include Business users. Plusnet have assured users they will be directly consulted before their services are migrated.

Posted by spraxyt on Monday, 18-Apr-2011 12:29 PM

Previous 5 News Articles

Douglas Clark Passes Away
New Product Set, New Comparison Tool
James Bailey returns to Plusnet
Plusnet to offer something Extra
Plusnet launch PHP5 based CGI platform

Latest PUG Issue Tracker News and Issues

Newest 10 Items in the PUG Issue Tracker

Latest Additions to the Site

04-08-2011 Residential Customer Support goes 0800
19-04-2011 Fibre Flies In and Refreshes the Product Set
18-04-2011 Business Products to get ADSL2+ with Annex M Option
26-07-2010 Douglas Clark Passes Away
14-04-2010 New Product Set, New Comparison Tool

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