What you get:
- Unlimited 8MB BT broadband
- Free evening and weekend BT broadband calls
- Free Wireless BT Home Hub with Hub Phone
- BT ToGo smartphone to take broadband with you everywhere
- 50 minutes and 50 texts included
Let’s start by saying that this isn’t the cheapest broadband offering on the market but hte mobility features more than make up for that. The BT ToGo deal effectively gives you all the advantages of BT’s Option plus mobile broadband and a free handset - more on that in a moment.
Ok, the free smartphone - there are two choices. The package comes with a free HTC s620 which is great for reading emails or browsing on the move. Trying to create documents on it is a different story - don’t bother. It’s far too fiddly. Now, if you want that little extra in the form of the HTC s710 you have two options: pay an extra £29.99 for the smartphone or FREE when you upgrade to 250 or 600 additional minutes. The sliding keyboard on the s710 is far easier to use. I had no problems creating documents. The only downside to this device is that it has no 3G - so if you’re not range of WiFi you’re back to the GPRS snail express! The real bonus with the ToGo package is that you can use BT cells to connect to WiFi - there are currently thousands of these around the UK and the number is growing. The best place to find these cells are either in large towns or cities (and motorway service stations). You get 500 free BT Openzone Wireless hotspot minutes so unless you spend your life online whilst you’re travelling you’re unlikely to use these up.
Both handsets feature Windows Mobile Edition with the usual range of additions like voicemail, Snap and Send (send photos from your handset BT Digital Vault - for FREE), contacts and calendaring services etc. The usual things you’d expect in a smartphone. I was pretty impressed the the Snap and Send feature - this actually worked rather well. The only problem I found was that transfer times could be slow over GPRS.
Free texts, etc.
The standard package gives yout 50 free texts and 50 free minutes to any UK network. Not great if you’re a textaholic!
You also get unlimited BT FON Wireless minutes.
The BT FON connection is made up of other BT customers around the country who offer a little secured section of their broadband service for wireless users. In return, they get access to the other BT FON hotspots around the country.
There are heaps of these, and they’re rapidly gaining in numbers.
Right, let’s get down to the crux, home broadband. I’ve been using BT for about 3 years now and I have to say that I haven’t always been impressed. All I can say is that I’ve made a lot phone calls to the helpdesk. Things have changed since I upgraded to BT ToGo. Now this could simply be because it’s a relatively new product and BT want to pull in as many customers as possible or it could be that they have got their act together. BT states a connection speed of 8Mb on their site but I’ve yet to see that. I’m seeing a max of 5Mb. But remember this; BT states that you will receive a maximum of 8Mb - that doesn’t mean you’ll get 8Mb. The really nice part about this package is that there’s no download limit - but do check AUP first.
The home broadband package comes complete with the updated Home Hub which provides connections of PC’s and consoles. On top of that you can connect your house phone to the hub and make internet calls, which is just like using Skype. Internet call quality over the Home Hub was very good. Not like the bad old days of VoIP!For more traditional phone users you get free evening and weekend landline calls.
Overall signal strength from the Home Hub was very good. I could even browse the web from the comfort of my garage (no comment!) which has pretty thick walls.
One aspect of this package that catches many peoples eyes is the free telephone support -24/7 and considerably better than what I’ve become accustomed to. The only gripe I have about the free support is that it seemed to be frequently engaged - users must have been having problems at exactly the same time! That said, when you get through the teams are genuinely helpful but sometimes need a little push if you want them to put you through to deeper technical support.
The contract is 18 months long but there are no set-up fees!
On the whole, I’m pretty impressed by the BT ToGo package. I’m not so concerned about the home broadband, even though the overall service was very good. For me mobile usage was key as I travel a great deal. I’ve never had any form of outage with the mobile aspect of the package but I’m frequently in London where there are a huge amount of BT cells to connect to. If you’re happy with periodic use of EDGE when you’re on the move then this could just be the mobile broadband offering for you.
If you’re interested, here’s the link so you can take a look for yourself: BT ToGo.
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