Setting up telephone and Internet from scratch

Hello All

Having looked carefully through other posts I have not found what I need so here goes:

I am moving to Berlin in 2 weeks time and would like to get a telephone and internet connection asap. I speak minimal german (I can just about order a beer!).

My requirements are:

1. The cheaper the better
2. A good, fast internet connection with a substantial download limit - wireless would be even better.
3. A telephone connection where I can call England cheaply.
4. If there is any information regarding getting sky/cable TV in with the package also this would be great but not very important right now.

I don't think this is a lot to ask but I am having trouble finding any information out. Who do I call? Where do I go? How long will it take? Will they provide the modem? Is it like England where you have to sign up with the equivilant of BT for the phone and then chose the intenert provider? Do the people on the telepnoe speak English? How do I do it? Where do I begin? Help me please!

Thanks - looking forward to your replies.

All the best

Fibi

Eventful-communications can order your Telephone line and internet services for you...

You can find them on the Advertisers page.

Cheap and good normally do not like each other.

Krieg - so true...you are right and I will probably pay dearly for my Northern English tighness. How much do you pay and who are you with?

I have Telekom, I think I pay something about 39.99 or 49.99, I do not really remember. Telekom is expensive but I have no complains from the technical point of view. If I were going to choose a provider right now I would go with Kabel Deutschland.

The ISPs normally provide all the hardware you would need (but normally they are shitty quality) but in return you will have to sign a long term contract (except Alice, as far as I know).

International cable TV packages are not worth, you get only a couple of channels and most of them are not so interesting, at least it was like that last time I checked. If you want International TV you better check the chances of installing a satellite dish, but this might be tricky in some situations. i.e. wrong orientation of your balcony/apartment, your building been historically protected, weird policies from your landlord, etc.

Then you really didn't look very hard.

You're hard but fair YL6. I'll give you that.

Tele2 are probably the cheapest, you get a wireless router too. Free calls on a Sunday Germany wide, not sure about overseas but I'm sure if you call them they can give you a good deal? Speak English too.

he, he... A good deal for Tele2 you mean?

Charges are 4ct a minute for abroad.Have them myself and am very happy also being a tight Northerner

Get a dodgy box and FTV card before you come over & bring them with you, then if you are allowed a dish you are all set, if not you can probably sell the box pretty easily.

If you had telekom you could be phoning abroad for 1,19 cents a minute, at least to the UK. It's a bit more to the States, 1,33 cents a minute.

YL6 I don't know why people like you have to be so arsy on here. Isn't this forum designed for us to help each other? Please remember a time when you were new to Germany and needed some help. It amazes me that if you hold people who post questions as I have done in such contempt that you would even bother wasting your time by posting such a reply - obviously you don't have much else to do and have forgotten what it is like to have many questions as a newcommer to a foreign country. Thanks anyway.

Also - thanks so much to those what have replied with sensible, much appreciated advice. Stars - all of you!

Wrong. That's just one aspect of the site...as has been explained many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many times before.

Plus, if you think YL6's response on this thread was 'arsey' you're in for a few serious shocks to the system. Definitely time to liberally apply that skin thickening cream.

You say you've "looked carefully through" the previous threads on the subject. Based on your questions that doesn't come across at all. Eh, at all, at all, at all.

You have got it wrong. Go through YL6's posts and you will get all the answers you need.

Plus some great cookery tips.

Agree with minga. YL6 answered loads of my questions, even when I thought they were dumb (like how to refill my boiler). But I also looked for the answers first. I say YL6 should be awarded the highest honor on TT - King Know-It-All And I mean that with

@ Fibi

You stupid plonker. You should read the forum guidelines before firing away with questions. I bet you're hopeless at building IKEA furniture too, aren't you? Yorkshire Pudding's knowledge lays in the search function. Once he's said something then there's no need for anybody else to chip in with their contributions.

The Vicar's tip. Go to a Telekom shop and find a nice young man who speaks English. You'll find it much easier sorting things out face to face. They'll be able to help regarding telephone and internet. *warming glowing feeling*

In reply to your nasty comments and since you all know the rules so very well you should be aware that one should stay on topic.

Stay on-topic
Try to keep the discussions "on-topic". If you find the discussion wandering off in a direction completely un-related to the original topic then start a new thread. Off-topic posts are routinely moved to new and/or other existing topics by the moderation team.

This is where you fall down I am afraid. If you can't say someting nice or answer the actual topic subject matter - don't bother.

In fairness Fibi, the guideline you quote says nothing about saying "something nice". As to answering the actual topic, SpiderPig directed you to Eventful-communications, Krieg told you who he was with and what he paid and YL6 very correctly pointed out that you obviously hadn't searched very hard. He would know this because he, amongst others, has answered many of your questions in the past.

My advice to you is to get over the feelings that you are being hard done by, ignore any responses that you feel slighted by, thank those who have given you assistance, whether you agree with the form of that assistance or not, and actually do some proper research on this site instead of bitching and moaning and you will find pretty much everything you have been looking for.

If you want everything handed to you on a platter then you can follow the advice of the first reply you got, contact a professional and pay for the assistance.

I think there is a deal with Conrad right now that if you get a Kabel contract through them, you get a 200 yoyo conrad voucher.

I just changed my deal with Telekom. I pay 39.99 € per month, includes DSL 2000. flat rate for calls to the German network plus 4€ per month flat rate for calls to Europe and Northern American. Calls to cell phones are charged extra.

For the same amount (€ 34.90 during the first 12 months) you get the Paket Deluxe from Kabel Deutschland ...

I find it quite shocking that someone can sign up to a forum with almost 1.4million posts, then 3 months later ask basic questions about a common commodity only slightly less popular/necessary than air and not do a simple search, or send me a PM (as many do).

I have to admit that you ask some incredibly naive questions, Fibi (this, based on your previous posts) - you won't get a step-by-step guide, you are going to have to put a bit more effort in it than that.

Anyway, Telekom have reduced their prices in cities such as Berlin, you can get Call and Surf for Euro 5 less than on their webpage. You get a pretty big bonus by signing up for it online too. In Berlin you can get DSL 2000 including a telephone flatrate (for landline numbers) in Germany for Euro 24,95 a month, I think that is a pretty good deal as Telekom is the biggest ISP /telecom company in Germany. Also, you can make really cheap calls to England using call by call . You can't use call by call if you go for any of the other telecom companies such as Arcor, Alice, Versatel ... Telekom is probably the best bet for you for cheap calls to England unless you get a decent all inclusive flat rate at one of the other companies. You are probably going to have to learn minimum German or get help to navigate these websites though, but I'm afraid that is just the way it is here, everything is in German, it is Germany after all

The only way you can get Sky TV in Berlin is by arranging a subscription in England (with an English address) and getting a HUGE big satellite dish - and you probably won't be allowed to mount the dish if you are renting a flat, so you can forget it. You cannot get any English television on Free TV here in Germany except for the CNN and BBC World news programmes. There are various Pay TV alternatives (not comparable toSky though), on cable TV you can subscribe to Premiere or the Kabel Deutschland English package - pretty pricey though. Premiere simulcasts (English/German) about 75% of its movies on the main movie channels and they also simulcast some (but not many) series on the Series channel. Kabel Deutschland has a pretty lousy English package to my mind, the best channels being BBC Prime, and National Geographic. There are IPTV packages to be had as well, but I've never been able to figure out if any of the movies are actually broadcast in English and you'd need a minimum of DSL 6000 for that, so you can probably also forget that from the get go.

Hope this helps!

This bit is actually wrong. There are plenty of grey market suppliers around who will provide a Sky subscription, without a UK address, albeit at a premium. A big dish is not a necessity in Berlin unless you want channels such as BBC and ITV (which are not Sky related in any case) . Most Sky (subscription) channels can be received in Berlin on an 80cm dish or less, so for English language TV are better than nothing. It's difficult, but not impossible to prevent dish installation on an apartment, as as a foreigner especially, the law is on your side, even if, post signing, your rental contract or house rules specifically exclude one.
Sorry if I went off-topic ("Setting up telephone and Internet from scratch") and sorry I suddenly became helpful. That's the sort of YorkshireLad I am. Heaven help you if you'd met the previous five.

Thanks for correcting my information about Sky TV, Yorkshirelad, - quite useful
I also realised I could answer a few of Fibi's questions more specifically (without actually giving a "step-by-step")

Firstly, I should qualify my info on not being able to get English TV in Berlin: I refer to free-to-air DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcasting – Terrestrial) and cable TV - and you have to add in Yorkshirelad's info on Sky TV (satellite) to that.

Secondly, the German Telecom is the equivalent to BT, and you don't necessarily have to get your telephone and Internet connection through the same provider. If the two providers are different, you have to have German Telecom though for the telephone plus DSL through a third party such as Freenet.

If I were in your shoes, Fibi, (practically no German), I wouldn't break my head with too many details as to whether this provider is going to be 2c cheaper than the other, I would go for the most simple option that is a good deal. And that, to my mind might well be the Telekom. The easiest thing would be for you to go to a Telekom T-Punkt shop when you get here and someone there will definitely speak enough English to get you through the procedure. Do remember, however, that most of the Telekom companies sign you up for two years! If you aren't going to be in Berlin for two years your next best bet is Alice, and I can only hope that you get someone who speaks English when you call them.

All the Telekom companies provide modems (you might have to pay a bit for them, but they are subsidised prices) and you should just choose one that has W-LAN.

As to how long the process of getting a phone and Internet will take, only the Gods know THAT! The Telekom might well be the quickest, all the other companies (except for Kabel Deutschland) are dependent on the good will of the Telekom as regards allocating DSL lines, so they tend to need more time.

OK, now you are DROWNING in information, but you should have all you need to get it all sorted.

Im glad someone brought up freenet. Ive had their broadband for a while and Ive just changed to their "Komplett" package, which is a "16000" (hohoho) broadband flatrate and a VoiP flatrate that includes landline connections to 7 European countries including the UK. I think new customers pay €29,99

I know what Im doing with this stuff but even so, the box was a plug n play install and although the telphone audio quality isnt quite up to the ISDN I had before, the functionality is the same (two lines, three numbers) and its perfectly OK. The switch from Tcom to Freenet was good too, despite the horror stories.

andy M

Thanks to everyone for the advice. Much apreciated.

As for the rest of you who think they're something special or that you own this forum in someway - I will ignore you in future. You are a waste of time.

My business partner God rest his soul changed us from Telekom to Freenet. It took them 2 weeks to switch over the numbers. Now we often find the system crashes and we don't get any incoming calls. It may be ok for the private user but I wouldn't recommend freenet for a business.

Couldn't just let it lie, could you? You had the golden opportunity to come across as the bigger person. Christ, you even got more information in the last few posts from those you originally denigrated. Pathetic. It is those of your ilk who stop others from wanting to bother their arses offering help and assistance.

Go away Keydeck - you're boring me.

Here, knock yourself out...Manage ignored users.

Glad to be of assistance

You know Fibi, even though I gave you as much information as I could because I can empathise how it is when one is starting up in a new country without any experience and not speaking the language, I have to say that I find your attitude very irritating! You can't just assume that people are inclined to fall over themselves to want to help you. You ask naive questions and you ask LOTS of questions, and you are going to probably need advice again in the future, so maybe you don't want to be annoying people on the forum.

There are practically identical horror stories on the web about all the majort providers - I think the moral is, dont use any of these cheap packages for a business.

My freenet experience has been fairly painless- They switched on a friday and although Tcom didnt seem to want to play, the system way working on Monday evening. Ive had m,y router crash a couple of times, but a quick off/on solves that. If it happens more often ill buy a different one, but for the moment things are ok. (and seeing as Im saving 40-60 euros a month on my bills compared to my old tcom contract, things are excellent :-) )

andy M

Again, if you took time to use the search function you would find there is an ability in the forum to actually ignore users you prefer not to see... (FYI the search function is to be found in the upper right of each forum screen)

Thanks YL6 - found that lovely search tool bar! Phew!

Seriously - thanks for the help guys (everyone that is) even though you didn't like the new post, you have been very helpful overall. Much appreciated.

Just a thought though - genuinely wondering here and no sarcasm indented - if you don't like people posting new threads when the questions have already been answered, why do you guys get involved? If you ignored these threads then I am sure people would use the search function more carefully. Do you see what I am saying? I found out a lot of information from most people, but if it annoys you guys so much I can't understand why you get involved. I'd just ignore it if it made me so annoyed. I'd be interested to know.

Yeh - I do ask LOADS of questions but I am excited about moving and interested in all things German....that isn't so wrong is it really? Better than being apathetic about life.

Anyway - thanks again.

Fibi

Because, you remarkably silly person (wanted to use something stronger but don't want to get deleted), a large number of us spend a lot of time working, thinking, researching, and providing detailed and unbelievably accurate answers (not opinions or guesses) to a myriad of questions, and it's bloody disheartening when some newbie bounds in and doesn't have the common sense or patience to spend a little time researching the forum and getting answers to basic questions (like yours) before they start asking numpty questions. This forum is an absolute fountain of knowledge for people like you, as well as a fun place to be insulted. It'll save you a fortune and won't cost you a penny. Once the numpty question is asked others, less able than some members provide stupid, or just plain wrong replies which then mean we need to come back to correct the chaff arising and make sure the numpty is put straight (because we care). Check my posts (all of them - it'll take time, but it's worth it, I assure you) - check how often I provide a detailed and correct response. And check how often I ask a question myself.

Asking questions like you do is apathetic in itself. You simply can't be bothered to look for the answer yourself.
Sigh...

Oh well - never mind!

But we do. And your comment would have been better received without the smiley.