Broadband did exist and had done since the late nineties but for the small business or home user it was a case of geographical location that decided the speed of your connection. Cable operators were providing a broadband service but only if your business or home was located in their catchment area. It was a bit of a lottery and the availability sporadic at best.
Late 2000 enter British Telecom (BT) clutching their generic DSL products and rather than hogging the retail rights they opened up a wholesale channel programme allowing ISP's to resell BT generic DSL products.
Broadband services began their evolution and as wholesale bandwidth has become cheaper so the prices for provision of DSL bandwidth has become cheaper. Higher DSL speeds of up to 24Mbps are now possible thanks to Local Loop Unbundling (LLU) which allows ISP's to install their own equipment in local BT infrastructure. At the present time these LLU based services are mainly found around cities and large towns.
As each year passes the demand for broadband suppliers in the UK is growing. More and more people are using computers for their work and in their homes and as the demand for the broadband product increases so it is becoming a buyers market. The current broadband suppliers find themselves in an extremely competitive market place dealing with an increasingly well-informed consumer.
Broadband suppliers are responding to this competitive market by:-
Dropping Prices
Bundling in freebies such as routers and web-hosting
Free Incentives
Faster speed DSL
All these are good news for the consumers and there has never been a better time to be on the lookout for broadband suppliers or even for you to switch your broadband supplier. Do be aware however that if something seems too good to be true then it probably is. Check any stipulations the broadband supplier makes with regard to a cap on bandwidth or times of day that the broadband connection can be used. You could find your broadband cut off or you have to pay more than you thought.
Having checked all the incentives and any stipulations you are highly likely to find a broadband supplier that will meet your needs and you will get a great deal from them and good all round service will be provided. You will wonder how you ever survived the Internet without broadband.
