Line Rental a barrier to DSL takeup

watty

Over three-quarters of respondents to an online survey by Digiweb have said an increase in line rental charges would discourage them from getting DSL broadband.

In addition, nearly all of the respondents (96 per cent) said they would be unwilling to pay for any future increases in the cost of line rental, while 25 per cent said they were unaware broadband could be accessed without a landline.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/08/08/line_rental_cost_discouraging/


In June of this year, Eircom announced it was to increase the cost of line rental by €1.18 to €25.36 per month. The telecoms operator said the average phone bill will increase by 3.6 per cent as a result of the new charges. The price change came into effect on 30 July.

Comreg will freeze Line Rental increases till September 2008. Hardly a major response.

thebman

There are some muppets! Not only are they allowing the increase, they are basically saying you can't increase it again until this time next year.

What the hell is wrong with those idiots!

damien

Watty, do you not have a conflict of interest by posting that?

thefinalstage

It doesn't really matter if he does. Hes just pointing out something thats interesting that happened to be carried out by Digiweb.

PixelTrawler

Its hardly news though.

I laughed when I read it on ENN - talk about stating the obvious. Line rentals a killer on the pocket - shock:eek:

In other news, when things get more expensive, people buy less.

(I'm not having a go at Watty for posting it, I might add, just ENN for printing stories on what must have been a slow news day).

watty

damien.m wrote:

Watty, do you not have a conflict of interest by posting that?

I had started reading it on The Register in a lazy fashion, then realised it was Ireland and then that it was a Digiweb survey.

I don't get sales commission and my boss said once that on broadband forum he wasn't sure sometimes who I worked for.

It's good to see such stories getting exposure because the line rental is a problem, even for wholesale LLU. Why do so few do LLU? because you can't competitively offer enhanced services due to wholesale line rental.

Lines have fallen from 82% before privatisation and now maybe less than 70%. It's of benefit to all consumers and every ISP if line rental was comparable to EU norm. Smart does not really make money out of DSL, hence the losses. Magnet has deep pockets and now concentrating on fibre.

I think anyone might have put the link to the story. I was posting links like that before joining my current employer. TBH since IOFFL is not active I nearly didn't bother.

SkepticOne

I think it is fairly clear that Eircom are merely trying to extract as much as possible while true competition (not reselling DSL) is still fairly thin on the ground. Of course, Eircom realise that this will only hasten such competition though that will not be a problem for short-term investors like Eircom's current owners who will probably try to flog it to the governent when the time comes.

PixelTrawler

True, I suppose, the exposure is good, although I fear it'll do little to reduce endless line rental increases.

thebman

A cool down in the economy will put more focus on increases in line rental.

When people realise how much its costing them.

Until then, most people will just pay it blindly while they can easily afford it.

mike65

This is a slightly sideways thought, has the hash that is eircom encouraged competition? I dunno the current count, but there seem to be quite a few
non-eircom ways to get BB these days. One could argue that ever rising line rentals and the legacys' tardiness enabling exchanges has created a fertile environment for alternatives.

Mike.

Blaster99

Yeah but isn't it funny that no ISP has touched its prices (at least not downwards) since eircom last changed their packages?

cgarvey

watty wrote:

Over three-quarters of respondents to an online survey by Digiweb have said an increase in line rental charges would discourage them from getting DSL broadband.

Right, but those same respondents are visitors to a site called No Line Rental operated by a primarily wireless ISP. It's not rocket science to figure out that the findings will be extremely biased, and not representative (given the percentage of BB connections that are DSL based, according to ComReg quarerlies).

I think the 96% figure all but nullifies the findings, TBH, as it's clear to the most casual of observers, that only a tiny portion of those users will actually be "unwilling", and not pay the increase thereby terminating their subscription. I mean if that 96% figure were true, then the next ComReg should see a massive sway from DSL to wireless. To date, that's not been the case, and I doubt the sway will be much different next time 'round.

As for watty's conflict of interest, I'm happy enough that's he's been impartial enough in the debate (and generally is).

Liam Byrne

Bear in mind who the survey was done for.......wouldn't you be kinda surprised if a survey for a wireless operator found that line rental wasn't a problem ?

damien

watty wrote:

I think anyone might have put the link to the story.

But this time it was a Digiweb employee posting a story that was nothing more than a dressed up marketing flyer from Digiweb.

I was posting links like that before joining my current employer.

Good for you. Major difference now though, now that you are conflicted by being employed by a telco.

TBH since IOFFL is not active I nearly didn't bother.

What an absolutely lame excuse. Nearly didn't bother, yet bother very much when it comes to defending your employer on other threads. It doesn't matter if IOFFL is active or not or what forum you post your employers press releases on, the insidious way you go about defending your employer and boosting their business by posting postiive news stories about them while also defending to the hilt their vapourware products without disclosing your direct involvement with the company is disappointing and deceptive.

Would you not think it is fair to point out that you are employed by Digiweb or even stick it in your sig, since you have a considerable amount of posts talking up the company?

watty

Next time, seeing as you feel like that, you or Sponge Bob or someone can post the story then if it is connected with Digiweb.

PixelTrawler

Damien has a point Watty.

I've been reading your posts for a long time with interest, since you're generally one of the more informative people posting around here.

Normally your posts are unbiased and helpful. I was suprised though how postive you have been about 4G, to the point of getting excited at the prospect of it being rolled out.

Now I realise you're a digiweb employee, it makes a big difference how one would read your posts. Are you just talking it up, or is that what you really think - for instance.

It would seem to be only fair to note you work for the company rolling out the technology you are talking about/up.

Earlier I agreed the exposure of the story was good, now of course I realise the exposure for digiweb is good - I'm sure you can see how it looks.

watty

Ok, I'm sorry lads and made a mistake of judgement posting.

And I hope I'm not "talking up" the Flash-OFDM. It's not 3G/HSDPA, though utlimately has the limitations of ANY mobile system. I hate hype.

lucernarian

cgarvey wrote:

Right, but those same respondents are visitors to a site called No Line Rental operated by a primarily wireless ISP. It's not rocket science to figure out that the findings will be extremely biased, and not representative (given the percentage of BB connections that are DSL based, according to ComReg quarerlies).

I think the 96% figure all but nullifies the findings, TBH, as it's clear to the most casual of observers, that only a tiny portion of those users will actually be "unwilling", and not pay the increase thereby terminating their subscription. I mean if that 96% figure were true, then the next ComReg should see a massive sway from DSL to wireless. To date, that's not been the case, and I doubt the sway will be much different next time 'round.

As for watty's conflict of interest, I'm happy enough that's he's been impartial enough in the debate (and generally is).

Spot on. The survey is not a true reflection if it came from nolinerental.ie, regardless of who Watty works for.

It's patently stupid to ask if people would be unwilling to pay more for the same product than they have done (even forgetting it's the highest line rental cost in the world). It's amazing to me that it's only 96%. Most people will continue paying it however, regardless of their grumblings about Rip-offs etc.

I notice he didn't mention his employer when talking about Digiweb's so-called 4G product. I'll call it that if the ITU back it. That was a conflict of interest IMO, but that's not for this thread.

bk

To_be_confirmed wrote:

It's patently stupid to ask if people would be unwilling to pay more for the same product than they have done (even forgetting it's the highest line rental cost in the world). It's amazing to me that it's only 96%. Most people will continue paying it however, regardless of their grumblings about Rip-offs etc.

I wouldn't be so sure about that. The percentage of line rentals per home has been dropping at an alarming rate (for Eircom) over the last 3 - 4 years. It is something like 70% now.

It is particularly noticeable amongst young people, renting or first time buyers. Most of my friends under 30, affluent enough, don't have a phone line unless it is for DSL. Most of them don't even know what their land line number is (I don't). As these people get older, I don't expect this trend to change, so things are only going to get worse for Eircom.

If Comreg extended the Social Welfare free line rental scheme to mobile phones and introduced home phone over mobile services, eircom would be in really big trouble.

lucernarian

They don't have it at existing prices. The increase doesn't affect those people we all know who don't have a phone line. And about 3 or 4 years ago, there were IIRC 4 increases in rather short succession. This is the first increase in a while, so I don't see the rather dramatic drop of this decade being continued.

It will continually decline slowly, and an extra 1 per month won't be a huge factor. The other €24 might be:)

kaizersoze

bk wrote:

If Comreg extended the Social Welfare free line rental scheme to mobile phones and introduced home phone over mobile services, eircom would be in really big trouble.

Thats already been done by the DSFA.
http://lists.welfare.ie/pipermail/press/2007-May/000078.html

Capt'n Midnight

wouldn't it be nice if we could get naked DSL here

Sponge Bob

is there not a BT LLU variant with no number ???

cgarvey

In summary then,

The only people to think the survey may have solid findings are 2 posters assoicated with wireless companies, but haven't declared so. All the other posts are either questioning the survey or dismissing it.

SB, BT certainly used to do so (circa 2002), but I don't know about now.

So to respond to the various PMs, many of whom, too, have a vested interest, I'll be deciding to enfore rule 7 of the Basic Rules in the forum charter. Whilst watty has a wealth of experience in the field that extends far beyond his employer and his views aren't always those of his employers, I accept (despite what I said earlier or, rather, to compliment what I said earlier) that there needs better transperency in debates like this one.

So Watty (and the other poster who works for a wireless telco, unless I'm mistaken, or out of date!), I'll thank you to include a link to your employer in each post or in your signature (indicating the name of your employer). I think that's the fairest thing going forward, and allows continued valued input.

I don't think there's anything untoward going on (I mean Watty won't have much to gain out of this thread, nor Digiweb for that matter), but now appreciate that full disclosure is appropriate going forward.

If that's not acceptable to anyone, somebody fire me already!

Liam Byrne

To be fair, I think everyone knows that the line rental cost is an issue, whether it's causing end-users to go to wireless or posing problems for the feasibility of providers like Smart who, given the prices they charge, can only be barely making a profit.

Paying €24 a month to a company for a line that we already paid for when we invested in the old Telecom Eireann via our taxes and then some people even paid more for shares is nuts.....

So, like all commissioned surveys, there's probably some truth in it, but it's probably best to factor in who commissioned it when interpreting the results....if the thread title was "ComReg survey shows that broadband rollout is working" you'd probably get people spotting the self-interest a mile off (unless you accessing boards.ie net via the Leinster House criticism and reality filter, that is! )

oscarBravo

I've always assumed everyone was aware of this, but in the interest of full disclosure: I'm the CEO of WestNet, a wireless ISP.

cg, if the banner in my sig doesn't make that plain enough, I'll be happy to mention it in any future posts where it's relevant.

cgarvey

Liam Byrne wrote:

So, like all commissioned surveys, there's probably some truth in it, but it's probably best to factor in who commissioned it when interpreting the results

Amen

cgarvey

oscarBravo wrote:

cg, if the banner in my sig doesn't make that plain enough, I'll be happy to mention it in any future posts where it's relevant.

I wasn't talking about you, but if you could, that would certainly remove any potential ambiguity. Where it's relevant, like you say.

Solair

The only company who can really potentially have a substantial impact on this is UPC, the crowd that have purchased Chorus and NTL. They're doing a pretty hefty network upgrade and they can actually take on eircom head-to-head as they've got wires running into most people's homes, at least in urban areas.

Even if this is purely urban warfare, i.e. played out in Dublin, Cork, Galway etc. It will have a major impact on eircom's line rental prices as I could see quite a lot of people dumping their eircom line if there were a reliable cable phone service + broadband at a decent price.

Even a slight undercutting of eircom's prices would be enough to pull lots of people over.

Wireless services are all very well for broadband but, so far I don't think digiweb's services are an adequate replacement for a landline. I have heard plenty of people complaining about latency etc, coming across as delays and echoes on calls.

At least with cable infrastructure, that can be eliminated if it's done right.

The mobile companies will also obviously have a major impact on eircom's bottom line as more and more people just don't bother using landlines at all anymore.

If most of your calls are mobile to mobile, it's usually far better value to use a mobile to do it, particularly if you're on contract as you'll usually get the calls in your inclusive mins.

I think eircom's goign to have to re-think this line rental milking strategy as it's only shooting itself in the foot. Long term it just means loss of customers.

mike65

UPC reliable? Aye, there's the rub.

Mike.

Capt'n Midnight

Solair wrote:

It will have a major impact on eircom's line rental prices as I could see quite a lot of people dumping their eircom line if there were a reliable cable phone service + broadband at a decent price.

one big problem is the time it takes to port the phone no. across.