Tag: three

Which? blasts telecoms firms for price hikes

Posted on January 11, 2024 by - News

Which? has told telecom firms to stop any plans to go ahead with ‘unconscionable’ broadband and mobile price hikes in April, even after the industry watchdog found the practice hurts consumers and set out plans to ban it.

Ofcom recently planned to ban the practice of inflation-linked mid-contract price rises, saying that they cause ‘big consumer harm’, but this will not happen before the next wave of expected hikes in April 2024.

Many providers seem ready to shamelessly go on – with next week’s CPI inflation news set to start the announcements of the latest round of shocking hikes for consumers. Many may have already suffered increases of up to 17 per cent last year.

Which? Has written an open letter to big broadband and mobile providers – BT, EE, O2, PlusNet, Shell Energy Broadband, TalkTalk, Tesco Mobile, Three, Virgin Media and Vodafone – telling them to cancel any unfair and unpredictable price hikes planned for April this year. The letter has been published as a full-page national newspaper ad this morning.

NTT DATA helps Three overhaul its IT

Posted on March 16, 2023 by - News

NTT DATA has assisted Three with the overhaul of its IT Infrastructure. The work focuses on sprucing up the connectivity between internal departments for staff and end users.

As the only operator that meets the ITU’s 2020 standard for full 5G services, Three is the market leader for network spectrum and download speeds. But many basic systems were still locked in the 3G network days, leading to the company using over 100 different systems, making it increasingly difficult to serve customers quickly and efficiently.

NTT DATA said it was brought in to optimise the cloud infrastructure and simplify the present ecosystem. However, due to dramatic growth in cloud services expenditure and the consumption of cloud services, there was an opportunity to drive down costs while overseeing consumption.

Law outfit Wiggin boosts telecom brief

Posted on December 13, 2021 by - Moving People, News

Media, technology and IP law firm Wiggin has announced that telecoms specialist Victoria Harris-Honrado has joined the firm as a partner. The hire is something to do with the arrival of Gordon Moir and his team in October 2020.

Harris-Honrado joins from 3 . Before her time in-house she spent nine years in private practice, including at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Hogan Lovells in Brussels.

John Banister, CEO, Wiggin said: “I’m delighted to welcome Victoria to the partnership. As the past two years have demonstrated, the telecoms sector is vital to all. It will only become more so as we move increasingly online, making connectivity critical to all elements of our lives, both personal and professional. I’ve no doubt telecoms will continue to be a key sector for us as we continue to pursue our vision of being the destination law firm for a digital world.” Whatever that means.

Ofcom gives 4G the thumbs up

Posted on November 13, 2014 by - News

thumbsupA report from UK comms regulator Ofcom said that the four operators who offer 4G in the country offers twice as much speed as 3G.

Ofcom conducted research in five UK cities where 4G was offered by network operators EE, O2, Three and Vodafone.

It measured download speed, upload speed, web browsing speed and latency.  Over nine million people in the country can now access 4G and Ofcom said this figure will increase as coverage increases and additional 4G enabled devices come onto the market.

Ofcom conducted 210,000 tests in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh and Glasgow. It pointed out that with only nine million 4G subscribers, “networks may be lightly loaded” and increased network congestion may dampen down the performance.

The tests showed that 4G download speeds were over twice as fast as 3G speeds, with an average for 4G being 15.1Mbit/s but for 3G only 6.1Mbit/s.

Upload speeds were even better, with 4G seven times faster that 3G.  Although there was less difference between browsing web pages, 4G networks have a lower latency than 3G networks.

Ofcom said that EE had higher download and upload speeds, while Three was better at web browising and latency.

Virgin Media kits out 150 Tube stations with wi-fi

Posted on November 4, 2014 by - News

londonundergroundSince the London Olympics, Virgin Media has been adding wi-fi to stations on the London Underground.

And today it said it has now kiitted out its 160th station.  It said that over 2.5 million gadgets are now registered on its network with over 3TB (terabytes) of data downloaded every day.

It said the most used service are at the Waterloo & City Line at Waterloo station, Kings Cross and Oxford Circus.

The service lets you access Transport for London travel information and news and some other stuff at no charge for subscribers to Virgin Media broadband, EE, Vodafone, O2 and Three customers.

Virgin claims that represents around 95 percent of people in London.

If you’re one of the five percent, you can get a daily pass for £2, a weekly pass for £5 and a two monthly pass for £15.

Phones 4U gets ads banned by watchdog

Posted on January 23, 2013 by - News

phonesPhones 4U has earned itself a ban over two adverts after the Advertising Standards Authority  (ASA) described them as “misleading”.

The retailer fell foul of the toothsome watchdog after people complained that its “upgrades 4u and u and u” ads, aimed at trying to show that people could upgrade with the retailer on any network and not the one they were signed to, were misleading.

They said that  the claims didn’t apply to customers on all networks, including Three and Tesco mobile, as the voice over in the comical broadcast ads suggested.

Both ads  focused on a range of “comical characters”, being told they could upgrade their phones despite their traits.

The voice over said:  “Listen up you lot. You can upgrade your phones at Phones4U”. The ad featured a number of characters with a range of habits such as smelling of fish, keeping a lot of cats and wearing gilets. The voice-over indicated that they could all get upgrades saying “Upgrades for you and you and you at Phones4U”. The on-screen text stated “T&Cs apply”.

In the second ad the voiceover said: “Listen up you lot. You can upgrade your phones at Phones4U.” A woman asked, “I’m scared of long-term commitment. Can I?” The voice-over replied, “I hear you lady. With our exclusive jump contract you could update your phone every 6 months … Upgrades for you and you and you at Phones4U.” The on screen text said: “T&Cs and exclusions may apply”.

When questioned by the watchdog, Phones 4U tried to plead its innocence, telling the ad police that the purpose of the ads was to tell customers that it was possible to upgrade their handsets at its shops. It said there was a common misconception that this could only be done with an existing network provider and that it aimed to show that it offered upgrades on the majority of network providers, even if the customer did not originally get the handset or contract from its stores.

However, the shop chain acknowledged that some networks such as Three and Tesco Mobile were not partnered with it, and so customers of these networks would not be able to upgrade. It said that it had covered itself against this claiming that its  “T&Cs apply” text showed there were exclusions, as well as offering further literature on its site to back this up.

However, the ASA remained unimpressed, claiming that the content in the ads suggested that everyone could upgrade as a result of the characters used. It said that while some customers would understand “upgrade” as meaning a new phone, they may not have expected to change networks to do so. And while Phones 4U had tried to cover its back with the on screen text referring to T&Cs, the ASA wasn’t convinced these made it clear that it was only possible to upgrade on certain networks.

As a result the company was ordered not to show the ads again in their current form.

However, the ruling is probably a drop in the ocean for the chain which yesterday announced that it would be expanding its services to the mobile network industry.

The company said it plans to launch its first mobile network –  “Life Mobile” – which will run as a mobile virtual network operator on mobile operator EE’s 2G and 3G spectra when it launches in March.