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Review by Linegeist 
UPDATED: 310 days ago
member for 310 days, 0 visits, last login: 310 days ago
 undisclosed location
 $35 per month (month by month)
 about 2 days
 "Very professional, Human operators not machines, UK call centres"
 "Cost - but then you get what you pay for - especially over here!"
 "Customer for life!"
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I'm a freelance computer support engineer and I live in the UK, the land of smoke and mirrors.
That single unfortunate fact means I have the millstone of British Telecom (an oxymoron) and its decaying 19th century telephone cables hanging around my neck if I want to access landline telecoms for my business. Being stuck in the UK, with an infrastructure that was installed around the end of WW2, means that successful comms owe more to ju-ju than technology, and I needed an ISP that would help me get it without promising everything and delivering zilch.
I finally joined up with Zen Internet because I got sick to death of failed connections, busy servers, vapourising ISP promises, terminally dim 'helpdesk' operators and incompetent Asian call centres who were at best unintelligible and at worst downright rude. None of them would stick their necks out and state the obvious (that my problems were entirely the fault of the telecoms provider - BT) neither would they provide me logs of my connection speeds and disconnects, despite being asked on numerous occasions. Mostly they hadn't a clue what I was talking about ...... The other ISP's I'd tried were wonderfully keen to take my money but, when it came to stumping up anything more than a mediocre 1Meg connection with free line-crackle, they all, without fail, refused to get involved.
Zen did, they stood up to BT, and I'm sticking with them!
Within a couple of weeks of signing up with Zen (after a spectacular spat with the particularly dishonest British ISP I was ditching) they had collected all the technical ammunition we needed to grab British Telecom by its corporate throat and force it, squealing in anguish, to finally provide me with a telephone line that would reliably support ADSL.
My previous problems with dropped connections, slow and erratic speeds and disappearing email were all traced back to the dreadful state of the phone cables - which British Telecom have now had to replace at their expense (after sneakily trying to hit me a $700 bill) and this is all down to the expert help I got from the nice techie folks at the Zen helpdesk.
I've only had the need to call them twice since (after 3 years) and the telephone was answered on both occasions within seconds, I was immediately put through to a techie who knew precisely what I wanted to know and who fixed my problems. Sorted! End of story. Nil drama. ADSL Heaven.
It's not often over here that you can buy something that does exactly what it says on the tin - and more. When you can, you tend to stick with it. Zen're just a tad more expensive than most ISP's in the UK - but they deliver in spades.
Top people!
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Review by telespan
Posted: 1.1 years ago
member for 7 years, 221 visits, last login: 1.1 years ago
UK
$30 per month (3 month contract)
"Rock solid connection, does not fluctuate"
"None that I can think of"
"Not the cheapest ISP around in the UK, but definitely the most reliable"
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I signed up because I needed a short contract, and I have never needed to review this. Zen consistently win the Consumer's Association best ISP award.
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Review by lucky1
UPDATED: 1.8 years ago
member for 350 days, 1 visits, last login: 347 days ago
Hampton,Hampton City,VA
$59 per month (12 month contract)
"Solid Connection never had a day without DSL"
"Disconnects up to four times a day to give users a better throughput, NO good for online gamers"
"Overall very good however I regret not keeping a solid connection, upto 8mb well I dont see more than 1mb anyway"
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I have been with Zen up to 8mb for three years. If and when ZEN change the bandwidth to users and I am in an online game, I do get cut off. This happens because ZEN likes to change the throughput due to the amount of users on the contention. As I dont download alot or play online games that much when I do get cut off it can be very annoying. When I asked ZEN about this they said they cannot do much about it, although I am on a 20gig cap.
This can happen twice in an evening. On the whole a great customer services team and never has there been a day when I have been without internet. If you want a good all round experience then ZEN is a good one. This is by far the best provider I have used in this ever increasing demand for DSL products. I do believe that people with lower speeds like my one meg should be looked after more when I do not demand a higher speed. When the bandwidth does get changed I am always on the same speed anyway so getting cut off for no reason is the point I am making today.
Thank you
Ashley B
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Review by arjp
Posted: 1.8 years ago
member for 2.2 years, 16 visits, last login: 100 days ago
UK
Contract price not specified.
"Excellent reliability"
"A tad pricey"
"You gets what you pays for!"
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I migrated to Zen after my existing ISp was swallowed up by a competitor and customer service hit rock bottom.
No problems with the migration, everything happened within the time table they gave. The connection is extremely reliable.
I have an 8mB package and am managing about 4.5. I'm in a fairly rural area, and about 3.5km from the exchange.
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Review by Manstein1
Posted: 2.1 years ago
member for 3.1 years, 5 visits, last login: 2.1 years ago
UK
 Business customer
$50 per month (month by month)
about 4 days
"About an hours downtime in 5 years."
"Slightly more expensive but cost not important."
"Solid reliable service with excellent tech support."
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Been with Zen since ADSL became available on my exchange and my 20gb cap is more than enough. Speed regularly shows in excess of 7mb but not really important compared to reliability of connection. Connection was painless although I supply all my own hardware from the socket.
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Review by dale303
UPDATED: 2.1 years ago
member for 6.8 years, 19 visits, last login: 169 days ago
UK
$71 per month (month by month)
"Great support and reliabilty (although nowhere near 24/7)"
"Expensive, lack of range of higher bandwidth options. reliability at ISP does not mean things can't go wrong elsewhere."
"Don't go to Zen if you're a high bandwidth user or need tech supp 24/7"
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We chose the highest home service Zen provide (Zen 8000 Pro) but unfortunately, it's 50GB cap is nowhere near enough for a household of three moderate users.
After three weeks of hell due to intermittent static on our BT line (which Zen were powerless to help with) we finally got a very good service. However, his problem did bring up another of Zen's failures, a total lack of support after 8pm (5pm weekends). If I were a business, this would not be a problem but it's somethnig home users should be very aware of.
However, maybe a year ago 50GB would have been plenty but we watch a lot of streamed content (BBCs iPlayer and others) and play a lot of online games (sometimes all three of us at the same time). We average good 2.5GB-3GB per day. This means we get through half our allowance in just over a week and have to severely ration ourselves for the next three weeks. There is an option to buy extra bandwidth at £1.50 per GB but we would need to spend an extra £60 per month or so if we didn't want to limit our enjoyment.
There is an 'unlimited' business option but at £92.80 that is also way out of our league.
We would be willing to pay £50-£60 for a 100GB cap option but there are no options between the £35, 50GB cap option and the £92, unlimited one.
Sadly, we've come to realise that bandwidth is a much higher priority for us than customer support and reliability and will be moving away from Zen ASAP.
I'm sure it's great for a household of one moderate user but it's totally unsuitable for a heavy user, someone who may want to regularly use streamed TV/film services or for households with more than one moderate user. Their technical is great (when they're in) but it's not 24/7 which is a surprise and an annoyance.
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Review by pintosal
Posted: 2.2 years ago
member for 2.2 years, 0 visits, last login: 2.2 years ago
undisclosed location
$40 per month (month by month)
about 1 days
"fast access to Tech Support, who know their stuff"
"expensive, especially considering 2Gb limit"
"you get a good service, but you pay for it"
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Moved to Zen from Plus net who were cr*p.
Ordered the 8000 lite + bronze hosting. Total £22 per month
Smooth order process.
Used own equipment.
Tech support are good and you don't have to wait hours and hours to talk to someone who know their stuff.
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Review by hypergiant
Posted: 2.3 years ago
member for 2.3 years, 0 visits, last login: 2.3 years ago
undisclosed location
Contract price not specified.
"None"
"Worst Experience Ever"
"Avoid this company if you value your sanity"
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We got cut off without any notification for going over our limit. Wasted hours buying more bandwidth ended up paying twice.
So angry we cancelled the same day and migrated. Zen have been chasing us for £2.50 YES £2.50 ever since.
Just had a phone call from a credit controller arguing and wasting 30 mins of my time saying they want the £2.50 Ive never been treated/spoken to so badly by a business in my life.
What the hell is wrong with this company they certainly do not deserve any “excellent customer service” accolades at all.
Chasing a very unhappy ex customer for £2.50 is frankly ridiculous.
Patrick S
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Review by phantom66uk
Posted: 2.4 years ago
member for 2.4 years, 2 visits, last login: 2.4 years ago
UKing
Contract price not specified.
"Reliable, Fast, UK Based Support, No vague FUPs, Webbased Portal for usage checking and line stats"
"Slightly pricey, but you get what you pay for"
"Excellent! one of the best :o)"
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Migrated in from BTBroadband after they started bandwith throttling, easy move, excellent phone support & best of all only downloads are used against your bandwith quota for the month.
Recommended!
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 Review by harvSki
Posted: 3.1 years ago
member for 5.7 years, 521 visits, last login: 6 days ago
Suffolk, UK
Contract price not specified.
"Rock solid connection"
"Starting to cap services"
"realable - know what that are doing"
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Been with Zen over 3 years now and cannot remember a single fault.
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