About BT

BT is the UK’s largest broadband and landline provider. Alongside those services, BT offers TV and mobile phone in triple-play (broadband, home phone and TV) and quad-play (broadband, home phone, TV and mobile phone) broadband packages.

The company’s product range includes standard ADSL BT broadband packages, as well as its fibre broadband Infinity connection. In select areas, the latter provides a headline speed of up to 330Mbps.

BT has a long history in the telecoms market. Founded over 160 years ago as the ETC, BT was the first company outside the US to manage and transmit commercial telegraphs. This venture eventually led to amalgamation with the GPO (General Post Office).

After more than a century in the private sector, though, the communications industry was nationalised and split into post and telecommunications. From the split, British Telecom emerged. In 1982, the company was re-privatised and 10 years later it was re-branded as BT.

Today, BT serves 7.59 million broadband customers in the UK and operates in 170 countries.

BT’s super-fast Infinity broadband service went live in 2010. In 2013, BT became a broadcaster with the launch of BT Sport, which shows live Premier League football, as well as coverage of Aviva Premiership rugby and minority sports.

More recently, BT launched the BT Mobile mobile phone service, with a range of tariffs and 4G data.

BT customer service

Calls to the BT broadband customer service helpline, which is open 24/7, are free from customers’ landlines.

Alternatively, there’s BT’s Tech Experts subscription service, which comes in two grades: One priced £8 per month and a more comprehensive package priced £10 per month.

The £10 product gives customers access to expert advice for all their gadgets and tech, including security and home networking. BT also provides a free annual PC health check worth £80.

For £8 per month, customers are entitled to assistance with their computer and get the same annual health check for free.

Subscribers can also access BT Broadband’s online support page at BT.com. This includes a ‘virtual assistant’ that provides answers to frequently asked questions for BT landlines, phone lines, new lines, BT deals, TV, BT internet & calls. These sit alongside video guides.

Equipment

BT gives customers a free wireless router with all BT broadband deals, although the type you get depends on which package you subscribe to. You’ll either get the BY Smart Hub or BT’s Home Hub. Although both are excellent routers, the Smart Hub is one of the best top-tier routers on the market.

The BT Smart Hub has seven antennas to give it an impressive range, which allows you to access Wi-Fi throughout your home. It runs on next-generation AC Wi-Fi, so you should get super-fast speeds as well.

Supplied when customers sign up to BT internet packages that include TV, BT’s YouView box enables TV customers to pause and rewind live TV and aggregates all pay-TV channels and on-demand services in one location.

The YouView+ set-top boxes that come with the Entertainment Plus packages have space to record 300 hours of TV in standard definition or 150 hours in HD, and the YouView+ Ultra HD set-top boxes that come with the Total Entertainment package can record up to 600 hours of TV in standard definition.

Software features

All BT packages come with e-mail, anti-virus, spam blocker, anti-spyware protection, pop-up blocker, online fraud prevention and parental controls.

Perhaps the biggest ‘sell’ for BT, though, is the BT Sport channel. This is free to all broadband customers and offers live coverage of the Premier League and other major sports.

Customers also get the BT Sport app, which enables them to set the set-top box to record programs remotely using their smartphone.

E-mail features

BT offers all customers free use of the BT Mail service and an e-mail address ending in ‘bt.com’. This is a web-based e-mail service so can be checked anywhere in the world on any device.

All BT broadband accounts come with advanced e-mail security, SpamGuard Plus for junk e-mail protection, and advanced virus cleaning. BT Mail users also get 10 additional e-mail addresses for family and friends.

In the event that BT customers choose to leave BT, they can keep their BT e-mail address active by signing up for BT Premium Mail.

Extras

All BT broadband customers also qualify for free BT Cloud storage, enabling them to access their favourite files and photos remotely wherever they are, on mobile devices or on a laptop or desktop computer.