Telstra (and banks) -again

I'll throw my hand in here and ask for advice.

We just received a letter from Optus last night informing us that due to uncompetitive rates from their supplier they will be changing our house phone to a $55/mth plan:o . STD & mobile rates would remain the same.
We were dumbfounded as it was when the line rental recently went up dramtically. We use our own handsets.
Last bill we had made $4 worth of calls from home. We would just get rid of the home line but for the www. We jumped on the optus site and saw a $19 basic deal which is more suitable but it is aparently not available in our area (suburban Brisbane). The next one up is $34. I haven't spoken to their call centre yet (I just can't endure the pain) but I can't see reason why they would presume to put us onto a $55 plan, perhaps they are just hoping that we wil not question it and they will get away with it.
I like Nat130's deal but we want the www at home.
No, Dan must have www.
Any suggestions out there of who IS a good carrier will a realistic deal.:confused:

Bank story.

When me and the x bought our first house all went well until we took possesion and exactly 1 week later were told we owed exactly twice as much.

Each day we rang up to sort it out they told us that we couldnt argue as we had signed the contracts etc etc.

We pulled out the contracts and faxed them to them to proove what we had borrowed and their reply was that it couldnt be sorted out for 30 days from that date.

When we got our first statement we had been charged interest on the whole amount calculated daily of course.

After about 2 or 3 months we sorted it out, the actual amount owed that is but not the interest that was driving us into the ground.

it took 2 years to get the interest out of them and of course nothing to pay for our time or hardship for the previous 2 years.

Telsra is stuffing Mrs Mc around at the moment, they give her a free phone as far as the contract says on a capped plan and then charge for the phone and calls to other than telstra phones were not included in the cap which wasnt in the contract anywhere.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by oldzook

Any suggestions out there of who IS a good carrier will a realistic deal.:confused:

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G'day oldzook,

Have you had a look at Broadband Choice?

You may find more help there...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mcrover

After about 2 or 3 months we sorted it out, the actual amount owed that is but not the interest that was driving us into the ground.

it took 2 years to get the interest out of them and of course nothing to pay for our time or hardship for the previous 2 years.

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One thing I noticed whilst in Switzerland is that the Swiss are very good at giving the interest back! We even got the interest from our telephone line deposits / rental bonds / etc. back. It seems really quite bad the way they hang onto the interest in other countries - having experienced it the other way around! :D