Topic: Metronet

PlusNet have today announced the aquisition of Metronet through the purchase of Parbin Ltd. The deal, for for £1.7m in cash, sees some 16,000 subscribers of Metronet's services now benefiting from PlusNet's range of value add, such as VoIP and a 24 hour support helpdesk.

Voted "Top Dog" by the consumer authority Which, its unlear how long the Metronet brand will remain.

Something for nothing is always welcome, so cue Metronet's decision to tripple the included data allowance on their PayGoExtra service.

Metronet operate off a typically low headline monthly subscription rate, throw in a bundle of inclusive data allowance, charge if you exceed this, but cap the amount that you'll pay them in any given month. The result is that for many users, they're keeping their bills as low as possible.

With the new allowances, both new and existing subscribers to either PAYGoExtra500, 1000 or 2000 will be able to download three times as much, and we suspect that for the majority of its customers, will not be paying any more than the advertised minimum monthly price.

Earlier today, we reported on Metronet having been the ISP of choice from readers of consumer magazine Which ?.

MetroNet have announced a new series of packages available to customers called PayGoExtra.

The new connections keep the MetroNet philosophy of charging for data transfered, but as you'd expect from an 'extra' account more data transfer is included in the basic package, ranging from 5GB up to 30GB. The charge 'cap', which is the maximum a user will have to pay is also increased, but extra data transfer is available at the usual rate of  £0.00235 per MB
Users will have to do some maths to track of their usage to select the best package.

Details at MetroNet.

MetroNet have announced substantial price reductions on their  PAYG 'S' series broadband packages to bring them in line with the standard PAYG packages.
The 'S' connections have a lower contention rate of 20:1 compared with 50:1 for the standard PAYG connections, and have come in for the reduction in the monthly cost.

For example, the 2Mbps PAYGoS2000 service which had previously cost £47 for a 20GB usage allowance has been reduced to £27.99, and now the usage allowance has been increased to a massive 150GB per month. Although extra transfer is available, priced at £0.235 per MB, until a maximum monthly cost cap has been reached (£99.99 on the PAYGoS2000), but 150GB should be more than ample for the vast majority of users.

Heavy users may note that there is no Fair Usage Policy or peak/off-peak usage restrictions.

Full details can be found at Metronet.

MetroNet have revealed that the will be joining the BT Wholesale regrade trial with is due to start on 7th April 2005. They join Freedom2surf who announced their participation in the scheme earlier today.

The purpose of the trial is to allow ADSL users to migrate and regrade in a single order, rather than the current practice of migrating to an identical service and then regrading five days later. An additional benefit is the migration of DataStream products, which wasn't possible before.

MetroNet have also announced financial benefits with a one-off price of £9.99 for the migration and regrades, saving £29.97 on the standard BT costs of £19.98 for a migration and £19.98 for a regrade.

To apply under the trial users simply need to place an order via a MetroNet Account Panel.

<p wrap>MetroNet has announced that it has developed a web content filtering system for it's broadband customers, giving them the ability to blacklist and whitelist websites, block adverts.

Full details at Metronet.

Metronet, the original PAYG ISP, are celebrating the recent install of another 155Mb central pipe to BT (a strange reason, but true!) with a price reduction in their packages.
The PAYGo1000 has been reduced by £3 per month, the PAYGo2000 by £1 and the PAYGo500 has had it's maximum cost reduced by £1.

As previously there is an allowance of 200MB per month data transfer, thereafter you pay £0.00264 per MB up to the maximum figure.
An activation charge is £69.95 is payable, with £19.98.for migration if you already have an ADSL connection.

Full details can be found at Metronet

Broadband access has seen a rather dramatic change in respect from what was once an "all you can use" service, through the present day where the majority of ISPs today offer a metered service. Metronet, one of the first ISPs to realise that whilst the broadband access concept was the future, users would benefit from 'pay as you go' terms - a concept made famous from mobile phones, have reduced the pricing of their 2Mbit service to less than £20.

All of Metronets ADSL services come bundled with a usage allowance of 200MB per month, which could initially seem a little on the low side. However, charges for extra MB (from 201Mb onwards) are charged at just 0.225 pence (less than a quarter of a penny to the common man on the street). This equates to 10 3MB MP3 files per month costing just 67.5p.

Price capping further ensures that the monthly charge does not rise too high enabling subscribers to budget what, at most, their service is going to cost in any given month. In the case of the 2Mb service, the cap is £36.75. Metronet have equivalent offerings for their 1Mb and 512Kbps packages as well.

Details of PayGo2000 and Metronets other options can be found here.