“The South African telecommunications industry is so saturated with internet service providers that one would feel there isn’t space anymore for new players, suffocated inside a bubble”, this is a fact that needs to be taken with a pinch of salt, as many are migrating their connections from LTE (mobile data) to fibre internet.

Making a wise choice when choosing an intenet suppler is vital to ensuring you get the service you expect and the package and that suits your needs.

3G, 4G, 5G or LTE (Long Term Evolution) transmit data through radio waves, and use cellular towers to bounce the signals to your devices, companies, organisations and homes used to rely on this data to access the internet, but due to the monopolistic environment enjoyed by these cellular providers, complacency and lack of competition have driven up prices and driven down service to unacceptable levels.

Many have been yearning for an alternative way to access more affordable, less restrictive internet, and now that fibre internet access is becoming more widespread they are migrating to fibre-based internet. Fibre internet is a broadband connection designed to hit speeds of up to 10 Gigabits per second (Gbps), this allows for drastically increased bandwidth allowing some fibre internet companies to sell their services at much more affordable pricing at much faster speeds and with no data limits.

So which fibre company should you choose in an industry that is already congested with multiple brands competing for clientele in most area’s?  

When choosing an internet provider there are a few factors to consider, namely who is your FNO, and who is your ISP?

The FNO (Fibre network operators) are companies that build and maintain the fibre internet infrastructure. They work with the government and municipalities to build their fibre infrastructure in cities and towns, across roads and into buildings.

FNOs then rent access to their infrastructure to companies like ISP’s that use the network to serve customers with telecommunication services such as the Internet.

ISP (Internet service providers) These companies rent the use of the fibre infrastructure that the FNO builds to facilitate their services and provide internet access to their clients, they are the companies that advertise pricing and speeds, and they are involved with serving the client as their name suggests.

ISP’s are responsible for configuration of services, billing, and allocating payments from their clients, managing queries, question and issues and reporting issues to be resolved by the FNO.

To have a good internet experience both the FNO and the ISP need to work together seamlessly and the better these companies can work together the better service they can provide to their clients.

Unfortunately in many circumstances, the ISP blames the FNO for the issues faced by its clients or the FNO blames the ISP, leaving the client without a clear path to resolution or any accountable party, as the ISP and FNO pass the buck back and fourth. As you can imagine this can be an incredibly frustrating situation for the paying client.

Ensuring you get a good ISP and FNO that can work together to solve issues is key to a good fibre internet experience, fortunately, there are many ways to tell if the ISP or the FNO is good at maintaining good service.

Websites like Hello Peter allow customer complaints to be addressed in public and measure the response time, trust index and Net Promoter Score (how likely a customer is to recommend their friends and family members)

A higher score for Trust and NPS indicates better service and a shorter response time indicates that they are taking their customer complaints seriously.

Google and Facebook review scores are also a great indication of customer service and i higher score usually means customers are enjoying their experience better than those with lower scores.

Lastly viewing the websites of your prospective FNO and ISP is important to ensure that there is an easy way to get hold of the company. If the company hosts a callable number it’s usually a good sign that this company is able to manage its customers, while sites that only have an issue ticket form with no other contact methods can be a bad sign for potential customers.

One of the key differentiators of Net Nine Nine is that it is both the FNO and the ISP this means that we build all of our infrastructure and we also serve our client’s internet on that same infrastructure, this means that there is no passing the buck to our partners if there is an issue its solely our responsibility to resolve the issue.

At Net Nine Nine, not only do we have call centers manned by support, billing and sales agents but we have taken it a step further placing physical fibre stores in our coverage area’s so that customers can get human assistance with any of their queries. Most ISP’s and almost all FNO’s exclusively offer assistance through the internet, through issue tickets.

Unfortunately, if you are having issues with your connection, forcing clients to submit a website-based form may not be the ideal solution, and clients often will call our call centre or walk into one of the stores to resolve these issues.

Selecting a package can also be as important as choosing a reputable ISP and FNO, Line Speed, contract type, cancellation clauses, installation costs, device limits, data shaping and promotional offer all considerations that need to be taken into account.

Line speed is measured in Mega Bits Per Second or Mbps, the higher the Mbps number the faster the download and upload speed of the service. Often download speeds and Upload speeds differ on the same package and are advertised as 20Mbps download / 10 Mbps Upload. Download speed refers to how quickly data can be downloaded which is important for browsing, streaming video, receiving e-mails and more. Upload refers to how quickly data from your device can be uploaded to the internet, this is critical for online gaming, sending e-mails, and sending files to others via the internet.

Not all agreements are the same and some require more commitment than others, when signing a contract take the following into account. Is the contract month to month, is there a cancellation fee, or is there an installation or setup charge?

In many cases an ISP may offer free setup and installation provided you sign a contract for 12 or 24 months, this allows the ISP to offset their costs over the term of the contract, however, if you are not happy with the service and want to change this may mean you have to pay an expensive cancellation fee. As with any contract ensuring that you are aware and understand the terms is vital.

At Net Nine Nine we do not lock our clients into any contract, there is no installation charge and there is no cancellation fee’s this means that we are a truly pay as you go, month to month service, we are so confident that you will enjoy your service on our network, that we do not need a contract to protect our investment into your home with a cancellation clause.

When entering a new area, both ISP’s and FNO’s may offer a great deal for new clients, these seem like great value for money and are specifically designed to hook clients. Be careful though as these low prices may not be maintained for very long. According to ICASA (the telecommunications regulator), ISP’s only need to give their clients 30 days notice before changing a price. If you sign a long-term contract with your ISP ensure that there is no cancellation charge or that the pricing is guaranteed for the duration of the contract, if you are fooled by a promotional offer and the promotion ends you may end up paying a lot more for your service than you expected with no way out other than paying an expensive cancellation fee.

At Net Nine Nine our pricing has stayed the same since the company launched, this is because Net Nine Nine does not need to pay a rental for the use of the infrastructure, Net Nine Nine pricing is still at R379 for a 20/10 Mbps, R499 for a 50/50 Mbps and R699 for a 100/100 Mbps line which is the same pricing that was advertised at launch of the company back in 2020.

We hope that this article will aid you to ask the right questions and take note of the most important factors so you can have a great fibre internet experience.