Tiscali changes LLU pricing

Changes to Tiscali's pricing structure mean the ISP will discriminate against customers living outside its unbundled network, despite winning praise for not doing so days ago. From this week, customers of the ISP living outside areas where Tiscali has LLU (local loop unbundling) equipment installed will be charged more than those living within the boundaries of its unbundled network. Price-comparison service uSwitch.com slammed Tiscali for introducing a two-tier system where some customers will have to pay around £8 per month more than others. "It’s very disheartening to see Tiscali jumping onto the anti-consumer bandwagon of imposing additional charges on customers that fall outside their LLU network. It's simply not acceptable that one customer has to pay more for an identical – or sometimes inferior – service," said Steve Weller, head of communications at uSwitch.com. Tiscali customers in LLU areas will now pay £19.99 per month for an 8Mbps service with free UK calls and line rental included. However, those outside LLU areas have to pay a total of £28.24 - £99 extra per year. Tiscali spokesperson Jody Haskayne pointed out that the service uSwitch was referring to was new and said it had made the choice to offer a product to those outside LLU areas rather than not offer a product at all. "Do we not aim to introduce new services for all our customers? We offer standard products no matter where you are in the UK," she told Web User. Haskayne also said that where customers had to pay for the line rental, they were paying just £8.25 compared to the standard £10.50, a deal as yet not matched by any other provider. As Web User recently reported, uSwitch last month criticised AOL, TalkTalk and UK Online for charging different prices to customers in different areas. Tiscali and Pipex were praised for not implementing a two-tier system. However, Pipex stopped short of ruling out changing its pricing policy when Web User asked it last month. "We maintain one consistent price for each of our packages, regardless of where our customers live," said Dominic Crolla, managing director of Pipex. Tiscali has also recently suffered problems with its email services after other ISPs blocked incoming emails from Tiscali servers. This measure was taken after spammers began using @Tiscali.co.uk addresses to send large volumes of unsolicited mail. www.uSwitch.com

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