Do small businesses need a leased line?

Leased lines are becoming increasingly popular among UK businesses. But, there is still a misconception that these dedicated connections are only beneficial and cost effective for larger companies. Leased lines for small businesses has grown dramatically in popularity recently.

The widespread availability of leased line ‘alternatives’ just isn’t happening in the business world. In fact, reports show that while 83 percent of residential properties in the UK has access to superfast fibre broadband. These services are only offered to 68 percent of small businesses.

This leaves SMEs with limited choices for their connectivity: standard copper phone line business broadband, fibre broadband if available or dedicated leased lines. Broadband connections are unreliable and cannot reach the higher speeds often needed which is why so many small businesses opt for a leased line.

Due to a rise in technologies such as ‘cloud’ computing and VoIP services , speed & stability has never been more important. Ofcom reports that 20 percent of small businesses are unhappy with the speeds they receive , leaving symmetrical leased lines an understandable choice for SMEs.

We have seen just how important being able to work from home is during Covid-19 pandemic. Zoom calls, skype meetings and cloud platforms have been more important than ever to keep the economy going. Working from home may be the normal so its key we have the right internet connections.

Benefits of leased lines for small businesses

There’s numerous benefits of having a leased line. Most companies who have multiple sites will already have dedicated internet. Many smaller businesses will not because they are used to paying £20 a month for broadband and the cost of a leased line is greater.

However, its important to understand why they cost more & how they can save your business money. Some of the benefits include:

• Uncontended Service – Having your internet service dedicated only to your business means you get symmetrical upload speeds and download speeds even at peak times. This often means faster uploads for those important files you need to send.
• Service Level Agreement – A small business relies upon the consistent and continued productivity of its employees for success and profitability. Perhaps slightly more so than huge corporations that already have an established support network.

Consider that a poor internet connection costs each employee an average of 15 minutes productivity per day, according to Virgin Media Business. At 30 employees, that’s 37.5 hours per working week down the drain. However, with a leased line you have guarantees around your service and the support/time to fix should anything go wrong.

• More Secure – Safe internet usage is a big concern for many businesses regardless of their size. Using a standard shared broadband makes browsing less secure as its easier for hackers to intercept communication and cause data breaches for your company. Leased lines and private and monitored 24/7 so makes it harder for hackers.
• Scalability – Fibre Optic cable used for leased lines means you can achieve much higher speeds than traditional broadband. This means you can arrange for your internet to grow as your company does without any hassle.

Leased Lines just for Large Companies?

Leased lines are not just for large companies. In fact, they can provide significant benefits to smaller businesses, too, including a more reliable connection, faster, guaranteed speeds, and improved communications both internally and externally.

The available budget of a smaller business is not as much a larger corporation. But smaller companies rarely need as much bandwidth. This helps lower the price and makes them more affordable for all company sizes, with prices starting from £150 per month.

At Leased Line Comparison, we’re committed to finding you the best deal around, so we do all the hard work for you. We compare major UK providers of leased lines in your area, finding you rates that you just can’t say no to. So get in touch today and let us help you improve your connection.

Leased Lines Or Fibre Broadband For Your Business Location?

A leased line is a bidirectional fibre line that has been leased for communication use. Generally, a leased line comes with a long-term contract, which may be for one year or more. The internet service provider also provides installation and equipment support for the service.

There are advantages to leasing lines over fibre broadband. For instance, a business may have more than one location, with various departments tapping into the same internet connection at different times. In this scenario, broadband might be slower when transferring multiple files from various people. There may be interference from other telephone lines and even the heavy video downloading from neighbours with broadband. This is something that is not a concern with dedicated leased lines.

A leased line’s connection speed depends not on the distance between the business location and the service provider; however, it is for broadband. The longer the distance, the slower the speed of the connection. However, leased lines only work from distances less than 30km from the nearest exchange. Over this distance, satellite internet is your only real option.

If you’re a small business, a leased line may give you the best options as far as high-speed internet is concerned. A dedicated line rental can give you reliable connectivity, as well as fast connectivity. One of the main features of leased lines is its high performance. High-speed connections make a huge difference in business operations. Most companies require high performance so that they can provide a fast and easy interaction with their customers. To retain customer attention and interest, most companies try to offer excellent customer service, and you can only do this with reliable communications.

It is easy to find dedicated fibre lease service providers with an internet leased line comparison company, which offer affordable plans and high-quality service. These service providers can give the required bandwidth, enabling you to handle more traffic without any problem. These service providers also help you save money where possible, which you can utilise to increase the revenues. It is essential to understand the details of the plan you are signing up for before subscribing to it. It would help if you compared download and upload speeds with the monthly charges. This will enable you to get the one that suits your requirements. However, if you are looking for a very cheap plan, you can find these service providers, which offer unlimited broadband plans which may be more suitable for you that a dedicated line.

If you are looking for a high-speed Internet connection, then the high-performance class of service is best for you. High-performance leased line speed is faster than other class connections, which will help you download and upload large files quickly. However, you need to pay more for this service. The service providers use high-performance bandwidth for downloading and streaming purposes, which may be suitable for your high-speed office.

Advantages Of Having Dedicated Lines

There are so many companies in the market offering Dedicated Leased Lines for your fast internet needs. They are of different service types, including EFM, EoFTTC, SDSL, Fibre Leased Lines, and all come at different costs. Before you sign up with any company, one should read all the offer document details. If it sounds too good to be true, then probably it is. Read through the details and make sure that the deal offered to you is worth it.

As Dedicated Lines are used for high bandwidth applications, they can handle heavy data, download, and upload large files. The fibre optics would assure you of top speed services. This is an expensive service, so you must check the terms and conditions before signing up for these services. Check on the guaranteed bandwidth that the company would provide.

A typical Dedicated Lease Line would allow you to connect faster than a regular broadband connection. For instance, if you wanted to check your mails or browse the net, you would not need to change your broadband internet connection speed. But if you’re business uses large files or pictures or has much staff accessing the internet all at once, it’s likely you need a better connection.

You should know that Dedicated Lines generally allow you unlimited downloads, so you check out if there is any limit on that with your chosen provider. When you opt for Dedicated Leased Lines, you would be given a dedicated line of connection with a specific amount of bandwidth. These lines can meet all your web applications and data storage requirements. Some companies offer these services in packages and also custom-built. In such a case, they would give you the details about the number of lines and the bandwidth you will be given. They can help you build a package that works for your business.

When you opt for Dedicated Leased Lines, there are certain advantages as well as disadvantages. One advantage is that these lines would let you get high-quality voice and data connections.

The main disadvantage of a Dedicated Line is that it is costly, and you would have to consider all the installation costs before choosing a provider. It can also be affected by the distance between your premise and the provider’s POP or exchange. You will have to pay extra costs if they need to dig the line into your premise. This sometimes has a considerable cost, and you would have to bear any expenses for its installation.

Fibre optic cabling is expensive because it sometimes has to be installed from the exchange to your building if you live in a remote area. However, most locations nowadays are already connected, and the install will be £0.

Understanding How Leased Lines Work

Leased lines are a type of connection, which is used mostly for business telecommunication. It may be either an intranet or extranet, which enables a user to connect to other computers. This facility of connecting computers is called a network managed by an IT support service provider (ISP). Various providers offer these services. The main advantage of such connections is that they offer the user high-speed internet services. Many users are using such networks to access the web.

Generally, a leased line is either a dedicated internet connection or a computer circuit, offered as a public telecom service based on a commercial agreement between two or more places. In simple terms, it can be called a circuit, and just like any other circuits, it has specific characteristics which make it unique. Generally, such circuits are used for personal communication in the form of voice and data cabling. In some cases, it has even become possible to run the largest data centres on these connections.

Due to the nature of leased lines, you can get connected to the fastest possible broadband internet. That is why so many people today are deciding to make use of such a connection. When you opt for a connection such as leased lines, you are purchasing a portion of a provider network to connect to the exchange and internet directly.

In the case of a circuit leased lines, there are usually two types of bandwidth that can be used. There are low-speed copper channels and high-speed fibre channels. The former is utilised for minor communication purposes, and the latter is utilised for high-speed data transfer. Typically, copper channels give out the kind of speed comparable to what you would get from your internal computer network. On the other hand, high-speed fibre connections possess the ability to transfer large amounts of information in a shorter time. This is important for telecommunication applications, like video conferencing.

There is also a third type of connectivity offered through leased lines – Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS). This service supports the concept of client-server, where there are separate connections for the different computers of an organisation. This is important, as it allows for fast data transfers between different computers in the same physical network. The reason for this comes from the fact that MPLS offers significantly faster speeds than that offered through any other form of private line service.

Most businesses know that they have two options when it comes to getting a good internet connection. They can either go with a managed copper dedicated IP connection or opt for fibre leased lines. What is the difference between an uncontended fibre connection and an IP-based copper connection?

The fact of the matter is that IP services are quite reliable. Unlike conventional circuits, the signals sent by leased lines do not drop and are not affected by external disturbances. Also, they do not become congested, just like a conventional circuit would. What does this mean for you? For starters, when you use a leased line’s service, you get faster speeds and better overall quality because there is no circuit traffic on the other end of the connection.

If you are interested in improving the speed you can get online; you should consider getting an IP connection through leased lines. However, there are certain things that you need to keep in mind. Remember that while this option offers good speeds, you will likely pay more money than you would with a cable or DSL provider. Additionally, you may find that the number of providers offering this service is quite limited. Use a leased line comparison service to find your best option today.

Choosing an Internet Leased Line Provider can be confusing. There are so many managed internet providers to choose from including: BTNet, Virgin Media Business, TalkTalk Business, Aspire, Giganet, Gradwell, Zen, BroadbandChoices, LineBroker, Daisy, M247, HSO, Glide and many more. You may find yourself pulling your hair out selecting one!

We have gone through 50+ providers in the UK with a fine toothcomb to bring you the three most reliable, best and cost effective ISP’s. Fill out an enquiry to compare leased line prices today and save yourself time and money.