Speed

Will this explain why the 8mb link we pay for, runs at about 5mb in the day and 300kb in the evening? Are the bank throttling them?

At last!

It couldn't happen to a more deserving company.

Pity the poor persons who have Tiscali accounts, but what about all those companies who have their business lines through them? Vanco (now Global Reliance Com) used Tiscali when they sold bandwidth to UK businesses.

Couldn't happen to a nicer company.

Once had Tiscali as an ISP, biggest mistake I ever made. I was without connection for nearly a month before they eventually let me go to another supplier because they were unable to fix the problem at the exchange.

Thumbs up to them going down the pan, not to the company themselves...

No wonder why

Tiscali are shit - easily the worst ISP in the business (although BT and Vermin Media are close). They deserve to die to be honest.

Good riddance!

I was with Tiscali once, absolute nightmare!! Service was never great and if you ever wanted to move away from them, boy they make it hard!! Also don't ever try and call them if you need any help or have a query....they never answer and are useless!!

It's sad however that they will take Nildram and Pipex with them. Nildram were a very good company until the takeover...a nice small-ish ISP with good service and customer service. I guess this is what happens when a large ISP offers lots of money to takeover a small ISP!

AT LAST TISCALI GO DOWN... WELL LETS HOPE

BURN TISCALI BURN..... Its true what they say... What goes around comes around!!!

I for one will not lose sleep over this

My very first (non university) email address was a @lineone.net address- one of the first UK companies Tiscali got their claws into. I shall never forgive them for dropping the newsreader supported forums in favour of a web based set up.

Shame...

Think of all those poor redundant call centre workers in India who might be out of a job.

Good

they were the worst ISP ever imo.

and so to me

i have been with tiscali for years and have no reason to criticise the service i have recieved.

Shitscali

Years ago I used to recommend Pipex and Nildram all the time, great little companies. Then Shitscali came along and the service levels went down quicker than a twenty dollar whore. And as for trying to escape it's clutches, what a nightmare. I've moved nearly everyone off them now, thank goodness.

Nasty nasty nasty company.

Reap what you sow

I have been a long-time Pipex customer - from the early days of DSL. Great service, customer help on the VERY rare times i had occasion to call was superb. I was even a shareholder so did well out of them. Then along came Tricksally - abysmal service, numerous drop-outs (line and staff), price hike and a usage cap that is crap> billing service was abysmal for several months. Good riddance I say, now where's me coat - I think i left it here with a slip of paper with my MAC code in the pocket

Not Surprising

If the way they run their service is anything like their corporate activity.

Had them when I first went ADSL, I stayed 5 weeks, got told not to download more than 50mb in an evening, had sub dial up speeds. Went to f2s, left when it was announced they bought Pipex. Had my phone with them, they forgot to charge me for 10 months, admitted it was their fault so I got 10 months free calls, which was nice.

abandon ship

This is one company that totally deserves to go under.

Without a doubt tiscali and it's recent acquisitions are some of the worst I have ever had the misfortune of dealing with. Wasn't always the case - nildram and even pipex were ok before tiscali got hold.

If you are a customer leave now - there are far better options.

I'm surprised

by all the negativity towards Tiscali. I have been with them for a couple of years now and have never had a single problem. My 8mb line is always up and running at 7mb, which is fine with me. No one ever gets the advertised speed of broadband lines, not unless they live in the exchange.

Billing has always been spot on, and when I recently added Homechoice and phone to my package, I did it all online and it was all installed within a week and working perfectly. The installer even offered to tack the wire to my skirting boards, which I didn't take him up on as I haven't entirely decided where to put the router yet.

I really hope they don't go down the drain, as I am quite enjoying only having to pay £2 extra a month for TV and Phone, saving me £11 that I don't have to pay to BT, and another £20 I don't have to pay to Sky.

Judging from the comments on here, looks like I am the exception rather than the rule! (story of my life)

Mine's the one with the Tiscali bill in one pocket and the £29 pound I am now saving every month in the other

HA HA HA HA HA

With another "major" ISP going the way of the Dodo, is this news also another nail in the Phorm coffin?

*hopes*

Ciao Bruto!

Vaffanc**o!!!

Aargh - don't want to lose my email addresses

I've had two 'dial-up' accounts with Lineone, now Tiscali, that date back to me using them for dial-up on my Dreamcast and Psion Series 5 (Lineone had a virtual ISP called psion.net that Psion recommended) back in the late 90's. It'd cause me some disruption to lose the POP email addresses associated with these accounts. There has seldom been any problem on these email accounts in 11 years, so I can't really complain about Tiscali.

I suppose that I should use this as a warning and switch email accounts for me and the wife around now as these addresses were never guaranteed, and I pay precisely sod all for them as I've had DSL with Zen for 7 years.

Bugger.

I was with Toucan with excellent download speeds. Now have been sold to Pipex and download speeds have halved.

Time to go methinks...

Pipex

I was with Pipex but got rid of them as I was having major issues with my connection, dropping off on a regular basis.

Real glad I moved on, could see where they were headed 3 years ago when I dropped them, their customer service went from good to complete shite in a matter of months.

I've left

I finally left Nildram a couple of months ago after being with them since they were good (i.e. pre-Pipex), and I'm with Be now. They're so much better it's unbelievable... Good online control panel that lets you choose speed vs reliability, fast (16Mbit - really, most of the time), a good IRC channel and forum for support, good phone support and best of all, cheaper.

Can't really think why I stuck it out with Nildram for so long...

Of course, Be could easily go down hill, but I'm enjoying it right now...

DON'T GO!

Well the good news is existing Tiscali users aren't going to end up with a worse provider in the shape of Sky.

The bad news is I was just in the middle of migrating to Tiscali.

Do the boys at Google fancy being an ISP

Too bad for Nildram customers...

Myself included. Been with Nildram for donkey's years (5+) and never had a single problem - and no outages that were their fault (rather BT). And they've never tried capping my transfer either, or doing funky things with BitTorrent traffic, etc.

Let's hope they get bought up by someone else. Quite happy for Tiscali to go down the pan - used to be with them for dial-up and they were rubbish. Just hope they don't take Nildram down with them...

Not least because I don't want to have to teach my folks to use a new email address...

3G

Provided you can get it a 3G card in your server an a limit to services that use it (SMTP collector on limited attachment size) is a reasonable contingency plan for a micro business. Many people would find it hard to get dual redundant lines int their office (PS JCB is a trademark although in the dictionary as a digger see PSION and net book issue, other types of mechanical digger should also be considered)

Gutted

I am deeply moved by this. Who would have thought a crap ISP whose sole selling point is that they are really cheap would have run into trouble considering how tight the average UK broadband punter is with their cash?

Another pile crap high, sell crap cheap ISP, the biggest of the lot could be going, fantastic.

Sorry to all those people who might find themselves having to pay more for broadband internet and telephone than 4 pints in a London local now.

RE: Hmmm By wildmonkeyuk

"Paris - Well even she has enough brain-cells to steer clear of tiscali as an ISP."

Quite, but do you have the brain cells to come up with an incredibly witty and funny Paris Hilton remark and complete the caper by remembering to actually select the icon before submitting?

You, sir, are Milhouse.

Jolly Good

Like many here, I was with LineOne in the DialUp days, Tiscali bought them and killed them.

I was with Pipex BB, no complaints, I even took out a second 12 month contract to get my monthy fee reduced by £5, then Tiscali came along and slashed my 8Mb speed to 300k.

At least now I'll be able to waltz away from my 'contract'.

I work for openreach...

,,, so contractually can't recommend BT Broadband!

I'm glad to see there are a few...

.. people who, like me have had an absolutely flawless service from them. My 8Mbit connection actually is 8Mbit, and regularly achieves the appropriate real life download speeds, even in the evening. It seems reliable too...

To the person who reckons I should get my head looked at, I suggest that, like all ISPs / exchanges / phonelines / usage, there are good stories and bad stories. I chose Tiscali because I passionately hate BT, as every interaction with them is painful, expensive and drawn out.

Broadband and phone for £15 - BT charge you £10 a month (soon to be £11 I note) just for the phone. Reckon I've saved at least a fiver a month (more like a tenner for an unlimited connection) for the last 2 years...

Another Nildram user

We've been using Nildram to provide ADSL to our remote sites for years now, and while it's true that there was a bit of decline after Tiscali took over, more recently they've been great, very reliable and easy to talk to. Fingers crossed they get bought by a decent outfit.

Nildram used to be awesome

Since they were bought by tiscali my regular 2.5MB+ connection has dropped to 800kbps on a regular basis. No one seems to know why or care so I'm hoping they go under. If they do i'll be forced to get off my lazy arse and find a new provider...

Goodbye Tiscali.... We'll miss you.... NOT !

Jumped ship from Tiscali to PLUSNET Pro package just before christmas, alleluya, what a difference a decent ISP makes. I was getting around 2.5meg download maximum and less during peak times, now I get a rock solid 4.5meg download and I'm over 2 mines from the exchange.

All those who are happy with Tiscali, you're fooling yourselves, jump, and jump NOW !

Oooops!

Anyone see The Gadget Show yesterday? They gave a very favourable recommendation regarding Tiscali's phone and broadband package. Red faces all round there then me thinks, don't these people do any sort of research other than listen to the corporate drivel that they spout. Trouble is a lot of people will be under the impression that the presenters actually know wtf they are talking about.

Shortage of idiots?

Difficult to feel any sympathy for the corporate entity - I used to have F2s as an ISP - it was bought by Pipex and started to fall apart - but it was striking just how fast the service went downhill once Tiscali got involved. I bailed out as Tiscali bought Pipex. I guess as Wall Street found out the world is beginning to run out of idiots to buy crap products.

Need help ? Want a decent ISP ?

I've been recommending KeConnect to my customers for years and they are superb. Constantly No.1 on www.thinkbroadband.co.uk for speed, reliability and customer service.

They do packages from £9.99/m but most of my customers go for the £19.99/m package. If you want something dirt cheap, then look elsewhere and give them a miss, but if you want to avoid another Tiscali then they're the one in my upinion.

You can migrate fast and free to them once you've got a MAC from Tiscali. Enter it here: https://signup.keme.net?ref=BROCO and you'll be with a company who won't let you down and will give you the best customer service you've ever experienced.