Ozymandias
Senior Member
- Joined
- May 4, 2005
- Messages
- 660
- Reaction score
- 0
The Star - Wendy Knowler
Catch a bus on the information superhighway
Telkom says it plans to slash the price of ADSL, but many say we're still paying obscene sums for shoddy connectivity. So what are our options?
What you don't know can't hurt you, as the saying goes.
Those of us who have never accessed the Internet from a home anywhere other than in South Africa don't know the experience of cheap, super-fast connectivity. We just pay up and put up, grateful for any little scrap which Telkom deigns to throw us.
So it comes as little surprise to learn that according to Telkom's market research, the "satisfaction rating" among its ADSL customers is 82%.
The latest scraps - or "slashed prices", as Telkom prefers to call them, were advertised a week ago and included an "up to 32% decrease on ADSL access costs". The average ADSL reduction, effective from August 1, is 24%.
Let's take a closer look. Telkom is scrapping its slowest speed ADSL offering - 192 kilobits per second (Kbps) - currently costing R270 per month, and the 384Kbps will become the minimum speed offering, which from August 1 will drop in price from R359 to R245. That's the 31,8% "price slash".
So in other words, if you're a Telkom ADSL 192Kbps customer, from August, presuming the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) approves the new tariffs, you'll get "bumped up" to a faster speed and pay R25 a month less.
But that's not the whole story.
Because, as Rudolph Muller, founder of the thorn-in-Telkom's-side website myadsl.com, points out, that "average 24%" ADSL reduction claim is misleading, as it applies only to the access part of ADSL.
"Both the line rental portion and installation charges for this service will increase," Muller says. "So the effective price reduction on the full ADSL service is actually only around 12%."
To bring the country to "within acceptable international standards", Muller says, Telkom needs to reduce the total cost of ADSL by around 70%. Even countries like Chile, India, Morocco and Egypt have far cheaper connectivity costs than South Africa, he says.
"Unless this happens, SA will continue to fall further and further behind the rest of the broadband world. This will seriously damage the IT industry and the economy as a whole."
Myadsl.com forum member Philippa Davis says the relatively high cost of connectivity in this country is due to Telkom's unorthodox multi-tier charging system.
"We pay for the phone line, then we pay for the ADSL line, which is in fact the same line, then we pay even more if we ask for a faster service, but it's still the same line! Then we pay an Internet Service Provider (ISP) for a connection service, then we pay for extra bandwidth so we can do more."
Steven Hayward, managing executive of Telkom's retail marketing, puts it down to "economies of scale".
"This is a very capital-intensive business," he says. "As the number of people using ADSL increases, so we are able to bring down our prices."
And no matter what ungrateful people like Muller may claim, Hayward says, the price cuts have been "dramatic". While the costs will continue to drop, he says, they won't be quite as dramatic, so don't eye your London-based sister's Internet bill with too much hope.
"We are never going get the economies of scale of the UK or USA," Hayward says. "So our costs are always going to be higher than theirs. That's why we feel that Muller's price comparison is unfair."
In spite of the costs, though, there's been a huge response to Telkom's ADSL service.
In January 2005, some 50 000 people were connected. By the beginning of this month, there were more than 143 000 - in other words the number of ADSL customers has almost trebled in just 18 months. Half of those customers are paying for the 512Kbps speed. Telkom's target for 2010 is 1-million broadband subscribers.
And given how our lives are becoming increasingly dependent on a permanent connection to that great big invisible thing called the Internet, that target is probably not unrealistic.
Dial-up, or ISDN (integrated services digital network, giving you access to the Net which requires you to dial up every time you want to do an Internet search or send an e-mail) is just too slow, and too expensive, as many of us have discovered.
Not having some kind of permanent connection is becoming very hard to justify, especially if you have teens under your roof.
But navigating your way through the adverts to find the connectivity most suited to your needs - and pocket - is no easy thing, particularly if you're techno-challenged.
So if you don't know ADSL from your elbow, here are a few tips on getting connected:
nThink of ADSL (asymmetric digital subscriber line) in terms of comprising a physical connection - the road - as well as a logical connection - the bus which rides on it.
You need Telkom for the road, but you have a choice when it comes to the bus you ride in, although Telkom sales agents are incentivised to get you to buy the Telkom bus-ride as well. And Telkom's ADSL order form is designed in such a way as to get unsuspecting consumers to sign up for both the line and the ISP (the bus) at the same time.
nYou will need a modem (different from the ISDN modem) which costs from R400 upwards. Telkom will provide it free, provided you take out a two-year contract. Given that a second network operator is due to enter the market next year, you may want to think twice about becoming "locked in" to Telkom for two years.
nOther "buses" include M-Web, Absa, Polka and East Coast Access, and competition in this sector is fierce.
So here's what generally happens - when Telkom advertises ADSL, the price is for the line - the road. The other costs - ISP (the bus), voice calls and installation - are not included, which, coupled with the fact that Telkom bills in advance, explains why most new ADSL customers get a huge shock when the first bill arrives.
When the ISPs advertise their services, the price they quote is for the logical connection - the bus - and the softly mentioned, small-print extras are Telkom's cost for the line (the road), installation, etc.
So make sure you know exactly who you are paying for what.
You pay Telkom for the speed of your choice - 384Kbps (reducing from R359 to R245 in August), 512Kbps (reducing from R477 a month to R362) or 1 024Kpbs (or just over 1 megabit) which will drop from R680 a month to R516. So much for the "road" costs.
When it comes to the bus costs, you pay according to the amount of Internet access you want - in other words, bandwidth, which is measured in gigabytes (GB).
And here's where you need to have your wits about you. It varies from 1GB to 30GB, but the most common bandwidth is 3GB, which would be ample for e-mailing, downloading music files, images and the like, even with a teenager or two online.
If an advertised price seems cheap, check the bandwidth - if it's 1GB or 2GB you may run out of bandwidth two or three weeks into the month.
Absa's advertised R122 a month for Absa Internet banking clients and R136 for non-Internet banking clients is the cheapest ADSL access on the market, but note that it's for a cap of just 1GB. Absa's 3GB and 6GB options are, naturally, more expensive.
There are other options: wireless operators Sentech (MyWireless) and WBS (iBurst) are not reliant on Telkom's copper line infrastructure - offering permanent Internet connection via radio - and thus offer a single price for Internet connectivity, depending on bandwidth choice.
Both offer more portability than ADSL, their modems being pocket-sized.
But do your homework on speed, bandwidth and cost, because wireless options may not offer consumers a real solution to Telkom's stranglehold, in terms of price and speed.
nVodacom and MTN have launched 3G and high-speed (HSDPA) data cards, which offer ultimate portability. And for those who live outside of the metro areas, they are a godsend, as the networks have erected masts in key towns throughout the country; places Telkom deems "not viable" in terms of ADSL investment.
But watch your bandwidth … if you overshoot your usage you can run up a huge bill in no time, and without the protection of a modem, your PC or laptop is particularly vulnerable to "hackers".
Finally, the smallest cellular operator, Cell C, has launched a wireless broadband offering; a USB modem which can be used with a PC or laptop, which offers good coverage, and like the other wireless products, you don't have to wait for line installation to hook up to the Net. Cell C's initial speed will be slow, but a high-speed version will apparently be available before the year is out.
Wendy Knowler
Catch a bus on the information superhighway
Telkom says it plans to slash the price of ADSL, but many say we're still paying obscene sums for shoddy connectivity. So what are our options?
What you don't know can't hurt you, as the saying goes.
Those of us who have never accessed the Internet from a home anywhere other than in South Africa don't know the experience of cheap, super-fast connectivity. We just pay up and put up, grateful for any little scrap which Telkom deigns to throw us.
So it comes as little surprise to learn that according to Telkom's market research, the "satisfaction rating" among its ADSL customers is 82%.
The latest scraps - or "slashed prices", as Telkom prefers to call them, were advertised a week ago and included an "up to 32% decrease on ADSL access costs". The average ADSL reduction, effective from August 1, is 24%.
Let's take a closer look. Telkom is scrapping its slowest speed ADSL offering - 192 kilobits per second (Kbps) - currently costing R270 per month, and the 384Kbps will become the minimum speed offering, which from August 1 will drop in price from R359 to R245. That's the 31,8% "price slash".
So in other words, if you're a Telkom ADSL 192Kbps customer, from August, presuming the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) approves the new tariffs, you'll get "bumped up" to a faster speed and pay R25 a month less.
But that's not the whole story.
Because, as Rudolph Muller, founder of the thorn-in-Telkom's-side website myadsl.com, points out, that "average 24%" ADSL reduction claim is misleading, as it applies only to the access part of ADSL.
"Both the line rental portion and installation charges for this service will increase," Muller says. "So the effective price reduction on the full ADSL service is actually only around 12%."
To bring the country to "within acceptable international standards", Muller says, Telkom needs to reduce the total cost of ADSL by around 70%. Even countries like Chile, India, Morocco and Egypt have far cheaper connectivity costs than South Africa, he says.
"Unless this happens, SA will continue to fall further and further behind the rest of the broadband world. This will seriously damage the IT industry and the economy as a whole."
Myadsl.com forum member Philippa Davis says the relatively high cost of connectivity in this country is due to Telkom's unorthodox multi-tier charging system.
"We pay for the phone line, then we pay for the ADSL line, which is in fact the same line, then we pay even more if we ask for a faster service, but it's still the same line! Then we pay an Internet Service Provider (ISP) for a connection service, then we pay for extra bandwidth so we can do more."
Steven Hayward, managing executive of Telkom's retail marketing, puts it down to "economies of scale".
"This is a very capital-intensive business," he says. "As the number of people using ADSL increases, so we are able to bring down our prices."
And no matter what ungrateful people like Muller may claim, Hayward says, the price cuts have been "dramatic". While the costs will continue to drop, he says, they won't be quite as dramatic, so don't eye your London-based sister's Internet bill with too much hope.
"We are never going get the economies of scale of the UK or USA," Hayward says. "So our costs are always going to be higher than theirs. That's why we feel that Muller's price comparison is unfair."
In spite of the costs, though, there's been a huge response to Telkom's ADSL service.
In January 2005, some 50 000 people were connected. By the beginning of this month, there were more than 143 000 - in other words the number of ADSL customers has almost trebled in just 18 months. Half of those customers are paying for the 512Kbps speed. Telkom's target for 2010 is 1-million broadband subscribers.
And given how our lives are becoming increasingly dependent on a permanent connection to that great big invisible thing called the Internet, that target is probably not unrealistic.
Dial-up, or ISDN (integrated services digital network, giving you access to the Net which requires you to dial up every time you want to do an Internet search or send an e-mail) is just too slow, and too expensive, as many of us have discovered.
Not having some kind of permanent connection is becoming very hard to justify, especially if you have teens under your roof.
But navigating your way through the adverts to find the connectivity most suited to your needs - and pocket - is no easy thing, particularly if you're techno-challenged.
So if you don't know ADSL from your elbow, here are a few tips on getting connected:
nThink of ADSL (asymmetric digital subscriber line) in terms of comprising a physical connection - the road - as well as a logical connection - the bus which rides on it.
You need Telkom for the road, but you have a choice when it comes to the bus you ride in, although Telkom sales agents are incentivised to get you to buy the Telkom bus-ride as well. And Telkom's ADSL order form is designed in such a way as to get unsuspecting consumers to sign up for both the line and the ISP (the bus) at the same time.
nYou will need a modem (different from the ISDN modem) which costs from R400 upwards. Telkom will provide it free, provided you take out a two-year contract. Given that a second network operator is due to enter the market next year, you may want to think twice about becoming "locked in" to Telkom for two years.
nOther "buses" include M-Web, Absa, Polka and East Coast Access, and competition in this sector is fierce.
So here's what generally happens - when Telkom advertises ADSL, the price is for the line - the road. The other costs - ISP (the bus), voice calls and installation - are not included, which, coupled with the fact that Telkom bills in advance, explains why most new ADSL customers get a huge shock when the first bill arrives.
When the ISPs advertise their services, the price they quote is for the logical connection - the bus - and the softly mentioned, small-print extras are Telkom's cost for the line (the road), installation, etc.
So make sure you know exactly who you are paying for what.
You pay Telkom for the speed of your choice - 384Kbps (reducing from R359 to R245 in August), 512Kbps (reducing from R477 a month to R362) or 1 024Kpbs (or just over 1 megabit) which will drop from R680 a month to R516. So much for the "road" costs.
When it comes to the bus costs, you pay according to the amount of Internet access you want - in other words, bandwidth, which is measured in gigabytes (GB).
And here's where you need to have your wits about you. It varies from 1GB to 30GB, but the most common bandwidth is 3GB, which would be ample for e-mailing, downloading music files, images and the like, even with a teenager or two online.
If an advertised price seems cheap, check the bandwidth - if it's 1GB or 2GB you may run out of bandwidth two or three weeks into the month.
Absa's advertised R122 a month for Absa Internet banking clients and R136 for non-Internet banking clients is the cheapest ADSL access on the market, but note that it's for a cap of just 1GB. Absa's 3GB and 6GB options are, naturally, more expensive.
There are other options: wireless operators Sentech (MyWireless) and WBS (iBurst) are not reliant on Telkom's copper line infrastructure - offering permanent Internet connection via radio - and thus offer a single price for Internet connectivity, depending on bandwidth choice.
Both offer more portability than ADSL, their modems being pocket-sized.
But do your homework on speed, bandwidth and cost, because wireless options may not offer consumers a real solution to Telkom's stranglehold, in terms of price and speed.
nVodacom and MTN have launched 3G and high-speed (HSDPA) data cards, which offer ultimate portability. And for those who live outside of the metro areas, they are a godsend, as the networks have erected masts in key towns throughout the country; places Telkom deems "not viable" in terms of ADSL investment.
But watch your bandwidth … if you overshoot your usage you can run up a huge bill in no time, and without the protection of a modem, your PC or laptop is particularly vulnerable to "hackers".
Finally, the smallest cellular operator, Cell C, has launched a wireless broadband offering; a USB modem which can be used with a PC or laptop, which offers good coverage, and like the other wireless products, you don't have to wait for line installation to hook up to the Net. Cell C's initial speed will be slow, but a high-speed version will apparently be available before the year is out.
Wendy Knowler
Last edited by a moderator:
