Oh my goodness!!   I have been with UWDC for over 18 months & had generally been very pleased with the service, I had found the broadband trouble free (in contrast to the problems experienced with broadband by most people I know who use other servers - I have the unlimited download officially at 256k but which automatically loads at 1mg which is fine for me).   As I have always concentrated on checking the bills, I hadn't noticed the change in the customer service number.   Needless to say, I have now fired off a very angry email to them and will pass my comments to my agent, who as the person whom we have dealt with for all our computer needs for nearly nine years as his son was a friend of our son, may just take some notice.   I did notice that their new package was rubbish.  

Now I also need advice.   As I may well now seek an alternative provider, does anyone know a good broadband service with unlimited download (we don't have cable or satellite, I know AOL and Tiscali are rubbish - the latter charging extra to a relative for what should be unlimited download!) at a reasonable price (currently pay £15.95 per month), together with a good inclusive call package (24/7 as I do most calls during the day and we pay line rental to UWDC as well).   I don't want to be bothered with extra boxes or dialling codes before numbers, I did try OneTel but they were awful.   Ideally I want UK call centres (which UWDC did have last time I called them).   I also use UWDC for electricity (we have no gas and when we changed to them it was the first time we had ever changed), can't remember who we were with previously but they were really rubbish, they were seriously criticised on Look East recently & when we changed I had to report them to the regulator who confirmed their poor reputation.

Any help gratefully received & thanks for alerting members to this issue.

I have just recived the following response quote" I apologise that you are unhappy with the changes we have made, however going forward [word missing here I think] these changes allows us flexibility with regards to expansion, better services and savings for our customers."  

You may imaging the furious response I have sent to that!  I said I would post their response here & have been asked not to give the name of the person sending the reply "under the data protection"!!!!   I have demanded a personal response to my emails from the Chairman/MD - don't expect I will get it as these people really don't care about individual customers.   I did point out that my daughter & husband have already ditched them (they were thinking of using TalkTalk so probably even worse move!) so I would expect their customer base would drop.   Also asked how charging me for a hitherto free service would save me money!!!  

Am still interested in advice on an alternative telephone/broadband provider, just one system no predial codes and 24/7 inclusive call package (we have no cable, poor phone lines - we live in the country about 50 miles from London so what should we expect?!)

TBH unless you are making 60 or 70 calls a day it would be cheaper to just use a prefix like the 18185.com and have your broadband on it's own.

I have just received an email reply from Ravi Khanna, customer services director, which, of course, does not really address the issues.  I would like to post this here but am not sure how.  Last time this happened (in another thread) someone with more tech knowledge than me let me forward the email to them & they then posted it - is there anyone prepared to this for me this time?   Thank you.