BE’s first “Ask the MD” session

This week, we opened up a forum room asking for questions to be put to our new MD, Chris Stening.

Chris found it to be a really good way to spend a Monday evening and wanted to say thanks for everyone who asked a question. The BE Usergroup have helpfully posted up an overview of the most interesting talking points, of which we’ve picked out some key points below.

Keep an eye on the forum as we're planning on doing it again soon.

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On Fibre:

“Providing a Fibre service for BE customers is one of my top priorities. What I don't want to do if offer something which is a "me too" service or offers an experience where the service runs slow at certain times or is heavily shaped or capped. From the recent blog post we know that you like our stance on provided an unlimited and unshaped service where your connection runs free. I believe the way we run our network and the quality of our service and support are absolutely fundamental to the BE DNA and are not qualities I am prepared to compromise on… You only have to see that as there is less than a handful of ISPs offering a fibre service at the moment - it's really hard to make it work... Nevertheless I want to ensure we have looked at all the options. My opening premise is that let’s see what it would cost to provide the sort of service we know you want and then work out what we would have to charge for it.”

On IPv6:

“We are working across O2 to implement IPv6 on the new next generation core network we are building. Customers will start to migrate to this new core network in the fourth quarter of this year. “

On BE's 5-Year Plan:

“We have two key areas of focus this year in BE, both of EQUAL importance:

1. BE Wholesale - launch a new business

2. BE Unlimited - continue to support our BE consumer base and do more of the things that have made us successful.

“There are two key things that I think are embedded in the BE DNA - running a high quality unshaped, uncontended service and offering exceptional levels of technical and customer support. Many of you are very reliant on your broadband and we see these as "non-negotiables" for BE customers moving forward… What we have here has taken a long time to build and get right and it has earned us a lot of loyal customers (thank you) If it ain't broke we won't be fixing it.”

On IWF:

Later this year we will be moving to a solution which allows the end user transaction to cross the IWF filter with its own source IP for legitimate websites even though if they are hosted on the same IP address as illegal sites… These websites will be able to see the actual source from where the end-user is trying to connect which is currently masked by the current solution but with new solution it will not be masked… The new solution will be in line with industry standards as most of the ISPs faced a similar issue with the old solution.”

On payment a year up front:

“I like the idea of a year up front :-) I have run this before in a previous ISP and it was surprisingly popular. Leave that one with me.”