Carphone Warehouse to offer free broadband

Carphone Warehouse is expected to launch a UK price war for broadband this week

9 April 2006 21:40 GMT / By Stuart Miles

Carphone Warehouse is expected to launch a UK price war for broadband this week when, if the rumours are true, it will announce the launch of a cheap, possibly free broadband package.

Rumours online and in newspapers suggest that the offering of a free service will be tied in with its TalkTalk service allowing customers to surf while they talk at heavily discounted if not free prices.

The company, which is expected to make an announcement on Tuesday, however has denied the claims.

"We will reveal our strategy at our annual update on Tuesday", a spokesman for the company told AFX News.

Pocket-lint was unable to get through to the Press Office at the time of writing to get a quote, however the company has said in the past that it plans to launch a broadband service some time this year.

Newspapers including the Sunday Times claimed Carphone Warehouse wants to launch an assault on the broadband market to help build TalkTalk.

Other industry experts believe that the company will offer new customers a free connection for the first 3 months and £4.99 thereafter.

Currently standard broadband packages start at £14.99 a month. However no information has been given to suggest the access speed or whether or not the service will come with capped download limits, something which other Internet Service Providers do to keep costs down.

If the mobile phone shop is entering the broadband market, it will be entering a very crowded market with new players launching services by the day.

The news comes just a week after BSkyB confirmed it is to start offering broadband connections from this autumn that could possibly be tied in with allowing people to have greater control of downloading films.

We will keep you posted.

Full tags

Software, Networking, Broadband, Carphone Warehouse