Digiweb has launched a new website, www.nolinerental.ie, to inform people of its wireless alternative to fixed-line broadband.
According to Digiweb, Irish consumers are paying as much as €290.16 a year unnecessarily on line rental. Ireland is the most expensive country in Europe for line rental, with Irish consumers paying 63pc more than the EU average, according to the 12th Report on the Implementation of the Telecommunications Regulatory Package
Colm Piercy, managing director at Digiweb, stated: “We hope that the site will be a useful and informative resource for Irish consumers. The purpose of www.nolinerental.ie is to reinforce the concept of getting the best deal for quality broadband and phone services without paying unnecessary line rental charges.”
A spokesperson for Digiweb told siliconrepublic.com the inspiration for the new site came from ComReg’s www.callcosts.ie website.
“We were finding we were performing quite well because www.callcosts.ie did such a good job of breaking down the cost – it showed us as quite a good service.
“Line charges are quite substantial. There’s a lack of understanding about all those charges, particularly with bundled packages – what might seem on the surface a good and interesting deal often isn’t.”
The spokesperson claimed about two thirds of Digiweb’s customers come through word-of-mouth recommendation. “A lot of our competitor’s products have given wireless a bad reputation but we’re finding our current customers are very good at recommending us,” she said.
She said the market saturation of mobile phones has made the need for line rental redundant for a lot of customers.
“A lot of people, particularly the younger market, if they do buy a house or a flat they often don’t want to pay their mobile phone bills as well as line rental. If you have a mobile phone subscription, is it really necessary to have a subscription for a land line as well, just to get your broadband?”
By Niall Byrne
