We'd be interested to hear from any Direct Save Telecom customers (new or old) as to what they think of Direct Save Telecom.

Is their Option 4 product a good deal and what sort of customer service do you get from them?

Cheers

Jason

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Jason Lloyd
moneysupermarket.com
0800 298 5770

" We're here to help you find the best deal and avoid the pitfalls through sharing knowledge and experiences."

Hi Jason, Glad you got the ball rolling. I'm out of contract at present and was thinking of trying DST as well as looking at other options. They seem to have a good package. But although they say only 28 day contract they have a £50 disconnection fee, which does not go away, regardless of how long you are with them. But take the £50, the £40 connection fee and the modem instead of W/router away, are you still left with a good deal? I would like to hear some opinions. Cheers, Reluctant Switcher.

Well I have been with them for start of Jan, phone side is ok, for me. Broadband side not so good, been getting slower as the months go, not sure if it them or just internet. Also they say upto 10 email address i have been waiting for one for two months still no email address setup, phone lots of time, they say yes should be working next week.

Also make sure the Direct Debit is setup right as a friend did not set it up right, they cut his phone off (he was in hospital at the time) and it been three weeks + , getting it back able to make calls. 

I give DST 6/10 for BB & phone 9/10 & Customer service 5/10

Thanks RFM I hope you've done a full customer review as yours was really useful - anyone else out there with some thoughts on DST?

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Jason Lloyd
moneysupermarket.com
0800 298 5770

" We're here to help you find the best deal and avoid the pitfalls through sharing knowledge and experiences."

We have had an absolutely appalling service from start to fiish, with problems with BB service, email addresses, webspace billing. Always someone elses fault. Charges for services that I didn't have. READ THE SMALL PRINT ! 28 day contract is NOT what it seems. If you leave the broadband before 12 months there is a £50 disconnection fee  in addition to the £40 that you have already paid to get connected. The 28 day rolling contract figures do not apply on the BB until after 12 months! Prices on website don't include VAT, though they imply they do (some prices further down the page include VAT the ones in large print don't)

Recently I have been helping somebody to setup their network using  Direct Save Telecom Broadband as the ISP. There were no significant problems and all is now up and working.

 However, I noticed that although the connection speed is a nominal 8mbs, the actual throughput was about 16K/sec or at one point 800 bytes/second. The throughput seems very variable; sometimes it's good, other times less so.

 Have others seen similar issues or found a work around ?

 TIA

 

 

What test did you perform to get that throughput figure?

I attempted to download an update to Avg Antivirus. Nornmally Avg updates itself when the computer is started but the update timed out. I then attempted to download the update by hand and the throughput figures were reported.

 Other sites visited (e.g. bbc.co.uk) where also very slow. The throughput was pretty much the same for a computer connected via ethernet cable and a wireless PC. Even contacting Google was slow.

 That's about it really.

 

It's perhaps not the most accurate test possible; all tests use HTTP protocol and yu dont appear to have switched machines. If you can lay your hands on a laptop to take round and test too, and use a variety of protocols; time the sending and receiving of a huge email (send it to yourself), use bittorrent to download openoffice, anonymous ftp to mirror.ac.uk and download something big, try a few broadband speedtest sites.. etc

 Taking a look at the machine;s config might help too; check that no proxies are in use and that proxy discovery is off. If intermediary hardware is used like a router, remove it, etc..

 

AVG? urgh..

I was a subscriber with this company on the option 4 scheme,compared to other businesses they suck big time.I changed to Sky for my broadband and then kept my phone with DST.

I then went to option3,things were going fine until this summer,however,I told them I would be away for about 2 months and would they leave the phone on.Unfortunately,I owed them £30.60 for my bill in July ,August bill was  £44.40 the amount wasn't paid they disconnected me.I have tried 4 Emails to get the problem resolved and nothing.

On top of this they have now included a bill of £36.05 for a disconnection service ( restricted incoming ).They want a total of £111.05.

I am not happy at all,being disabled with no phone is a disgrace.I would not recommend these people at all.

DON'T DO IT!!!!  I sincerely hope you haven't signed up with DST...biggest mistake I ever made!

You will have no end of trouble....

 

In answer to your question - I don't think DST can spell good! They are awful!

 The sad thing is that they have the most amazing Sales team! I couldn't believe how marvelous the Sales service was! Also can't believe I got suckered in by it.....once I had signed up nothing worked and unfortunately the other departments are that bad that I don't believe they exist!

The broadband never went live when they said it would.  There were problems because I had a tag on my line.  They didn't bother to tell me this though - I had to ring them to find out. When my package arrived I set it up but it never worked. I called them to help - but they are only open during the week when I am at work so they couldn't help me which was very useful.

I cancelled my non-existent service with DST.  I first complained in March - I have used their online customer service, well lets say I tried to use it 3 times but never got a call back.  I have spoken to customer services, I have sent registered letters, emailed the director, I have called again - I have requested a deadlock letter too.  Now 8 months down the line - I keep being told on email that the Customer Services Manager is dealing with my query.  No such luck!!! They have not even written to me once saying that they are looking into it.  I called them to sort out my bill - I told them I was willing to pay my phone bill - less the broadband charges that I had paid between March and July and they said they would call back . Not surprisingly they never did!!!!

I have now received a debt collection letter as I haven't paid them!  I am furious that after all this time they have just ignored me which is highly frustrating! I followed their whole complaints procedure and have heard nothing back.

If I had to rate DST I would give their Sales team 10/10, customer service 0/10, broadband 0/10 seeing as it never worked!

 

 

Join the club! I myself have also had appalling not existent service from DST. I have had no end of problems with them...I have been trying to sort a query out for 8 months and they can't be bothered to reply to my letters!

Waste of time.....

Direct Save Telecom seams like a family run business. Nothing wrong with that if it was a restaurant, a pizzeria or something. But you can not run an ISP this way, with naïve and untrained staff that know absolutely nothing they are talking about and who all seam just arrived in the business, probably reccommended by the uncle, the owner of the business.
They are currently not able to provide BB connection to the whole of South London, and they don't even know why!! The reason behind it is that they are not the "real" isp. They are actually reselling BB accounts that they buy from Eclipse ( http://www.eclipse.net.uk/). The point is that if there is a problem in the network, they absolutely never know what the problem is, because their so caled "customer support" has to call Eclipse's customer support before giving you anything close to an explaination. And they can't anyway, they can't tell you when the service will be up again, they have absolutly no clue, lost in their own failing business. No customer care, no care for the customer, no idea of the business. Direct Save Telecom sucks and will bring you down, in trouble, telling you that it's not their fault... forget Direct Save Telecom and go somewhere else. If you got Virginmedia on Cable (only if it comes on Cable) choose them. I experienced both and I know what I am talking about.

their is no such thing as one month contract, they charge £50 if you decide to cancle your contract, if you move address they will charge a further £50, dont even bother mentioning the connection fee, which could be upto £90. the broadband speed was meant to be 8MB but it hardly hits 1.5MB, their customer service stinks, extremely rude staff, please do yourself a favor, just AVOID AT ALL COSTS. thanks.

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