EE squashes Orange UK: France Telecom's been 'destroying it for years'

With BT now expected to complete the deal to buy EE, it has been reported that EE will kill off the T-Mobile and Orange brands in the UK. The mix of brands from BT, EE, T-Mobile and Orange is all a bit confusing. Nobody will mourn T-Mobile, and it was always a bit uncomfortable after the success of the One2One brand which …

[Anonymous Coward]

Tell us more !!!!

Will the child of this unholy union be called EP? (Easy Peeler)

Will their European Headquarters based on the sunny island of Cytrus to avoid being squeezed dry by the UK taxman?

OK, I'll shut up, drink my juice and go to work now....

[Richard Jones 1]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

Oh come on you are giving me the pip with all of this pith taking.

Perhaps it is time to give vegetables a turn, how about Onion?

After all the way it fails in so many ways it makes you cry, it has more layers than, well an onion.

Its bulbous and not in great shape with its service offering

Its great in stews - it certainly makes customers stew all the time and as for getting to the root of problems.

It should certainly grow well the amount of fertiliser that it produces!

[frank ly]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

"... to get his teeth into a new brand ..."

A juicy one, I assume.

[wowfood]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

I just wonder if this will be a fruitful venture for BT, or if they'll juiced squeeze it dry of the bits they want, and then sell of the skin to somebody else.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

Dunno what it is, but I remember that:

Orange tree is very pretty and the Orange flower is sweet, but the fruit of the poor Orange is impossible to eat.

In other words, can we use BRANDING in its original 16th century english meaning. On the marketing moron (the one who is having an arousal from discussing branding) forehead and have some F**** engineering instead. Preferrably one that produces a working network with national DATA coverage.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

> Orange tree is very pretty

Lemon Tree ITYM. The Seekers, among many others. Not impossible that the result of this merger will be a Lemon, I suppose...

[Danny 14]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

lets not be bitter about things.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

Lemon Tree ITYM.

Orange, Lemon, Grapefruit, Pomelo, whatever. Some... cirtus... Probably sour (for the customers).

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

That's Lemon Tree, not Orange Tree! Sheesh. Come to think of it, perhaps Lemon would be a more accurate reflection than any of the corporate marks.

[Phil O'Sophical]

Re: Tell us more !!!!

I just hope that relations remain cordial between the merged groups.

[Fazal Majid]

Oddly enough

France Telecom never tried to use the Orange brand in its short-lived foray in the Netherlands, a country actually ruled by the House of Orange-Nassau (confusingly, the eponymous Orange is actually the city in the South of France).

FT is phasing out its branding for Orange, which is basically the new, country-neutral name for FT both in France and worldwide.

[Marc 13]

Orange was great... 'till the French arrived

I had an Orange phone soon after they launched, it was cheaper p/min than the BT payphone in halls (once you'd bought the handset, but Radio Rentals (remember them!?!) did a nice deal on that) and it was almost half the price p/min of Voda and Cellnet. It was great 'till the French bough them, out went the great customer service, out went the free this, free that, in came the price gouge for everything and duff billing - I paid a bill over the counter and they (to this day) never applied it to my account!

I'm now on Three who has much the same ethos of the early Orange (Hutchinson's hand?) and soon will have O2's network to play with ... O2 the only network I have never been on.

mjcp

[wowfood]

Re: Orange was great... 'till the French arrived

I remember when we first got internet we went with wanadoo which was brilliant, apparently cheap (I wasn't the bill payer so don't really know on this) unlimited data, good speed (for the time)

Then wanadoo changed to freeserve and things carried on in the exact same way.

Then it changed again to orange, and everything went to shit. Started getting letters threatening to cut us of for going over a data allowance we never agreed to, our speed started to gradually drop to a snails pace where we were told we'd have to upgrade out package to get decent speeds back (which would also tie us into another two year contract with them). Effectively they were shit.

As far as mobile went, I couldn't really fault their customer service recently, I'd get through quickly and they'd normally sort my issue there and then. What did bug me was how often I had to call them, pretty much every month. The phone came with some pre-installed orange crapware on it which I couldn't uninstall, and was hooked in to some orange subscription service. In the end I rooted the phone to get rid of it because it was pissing me off. Then there was the free deezer data that wasn't free every other month... In the end I left for giffgaff. Simple, basic, PAYG (well rolling monthly contract really) no real issues.

[Austin Montego]

Re: Orange was great... 'till the French arrived

I hate to be that guy, but I'm totally going to be that guy. Freeserve was the original company that was then bought by France Telecom subsidiary Wanadoo.

[anothercynic]

Re: Orange was great... 'till the French arrived

Sorry Wowfood, you're wrong.

Freeserve came first. Then it changed to Wanadoo (and I left them), then they changed to Orange.

:-)

[wowfood]

Re: Orange was great... 'till the French arrived

My apologies, in my defense however, I was quite young when this happened, i just remember it getting much worse when orange took eventual ownership.

[anothercynic]

Re: Orange was great... 'till the French arrived

Agreed. The Orange service until around 2004 was awesome and second to none. Line 2, Wildfire, man... those were the days.

And then... it all went down the pan, very quickly.

[Anonymous Coward]

Orange might have many customers..

But Orange Wednesday's (2 for 1 cinema tickets on Wednesday + some food deal) is ending soon..

How many people are going to leave when the time comes to renew?

[Cynical user]

Re: Orange might have many customers..

It does seem that EE are slowly removing all the "value-added" freebie add-ons. Business customers recently lost Everyphone & Single Number services. Enterprise and big corporates are getting more comvergence-type stuff setup, but that aside for Joe Public...it's slowly becoming all about the network and "being the best" in that one department.

Whether that fits for you, is a whole debate.

[Lamont Cranston]

Re: Orange might have many customers..

I think I originally went with Orange because of the Orange Wednesday deal. Switched to Three, when I realised I wasn't going to the cinema very often. The only thing keeping me on Orange now is the Deezer subscription that came bundled with my contract. Lose that, and I'll be off.

[Anonymous Coward]

This title has been simplified

For the last time.

[Alastair Dodd 1]

So BT has GOOD connotations to the consumer?

I for one as a current EE user am very close to jumping ship now let alone when BT have fully taken over them. The company that screwed up ADSL roll out and put the UK back at least 5 years, whilst dumping the expensive ISDN systems on us. The company that runs to it's timescale and changes a 2 week lead time into 2 months with no notice.

They have a GOOD reputation? Really?

[Captain Hogwash]

I expected...

more navel gazing in the article.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I expected...

sour grapes ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I expected...

Nuts!

[Stretch]

Having worked with EE/Orange IT I can suggest you keep the customers and ditch the staff. Apart from the Orange guys in Bristol that actually know what they are doing. But the Orange Digital peeps? Drop 'em like a bad smell.

Oh they are now "Hiveworks". http://hiveworks.co.uk/#/ Fuck look at all those horrible crapbooks. Useless, lazy idiots. Do some work you slow ass lamers.

[MatthewSt]

Oh Two, Zero Two

Is everywhere using s0me d0dgy 0CR s0ftware n0w to get their news 0ut? There's a difference between 02 and O2 (the former being a couple of numbers, the latter being a company about to merge with Three).

Maybe it's a sign that someone replaces Os with 0s for their passwords still ;)

[Indolent Wretch]

Re: Oh Two, Zero Two

Don't tell everyone that you evil man!

At least give Microsoft slightly more than 9O days to change their passw0rds

[SimonM]

Re: Oh Two, Zero Two

Second this, does wind me up when people get it wrong, guess it boils down to they way people say 'o' instead of zero in numbers for example...

[Timbo]

Re: Oh Two, Zero Two

The trouble is that it's "easier" (and lazier) for people to say "OH-8-4-5" then to say "ZERO-8-4-5"...and everyone does it...on radio and tv commercials, news presenters, every level of a-to-z listed celeb, everyone....

One can either "run with the pack" (as we all know it's a zero and not an "O"), or you say it with a "zero" and people say "pardon" because they are expecting you to say ""O", and you've said something else.

[RockBurner]

time to jump ship

So, one bunch of consumer ignoring cretins is being taken over by another bunch of consumer ignoring cretins? Life goes on in the corporate dogpits.

Still - as good a reason as any to drop the bloody annoying 2 year contracts, the impossible to cancel marketing text messages; and jump into the giant peach of buying the phone I actually want to have and getting something like a giff-gaff or similar rolling deal.

[Colin of Rame]

Re: time to jump ship

"So, one bunch of consumer ignoring cretins is being taken over by another bunch of consumer ignoring cretins? Life goes on in the corporate dogpits."

It could be worse... I am in the middle of moving to TalkTalk Mobile.

You have to be an existing customer of TalkTalk. No probs. Been with them for 9 months.

Get an email asking me to phone an 0845 number to verify credit FOR AN EXISTING CUSTOMER.

Worse, a 1 option IVR system - 'Please enter the number you are calling about'. You could not make it up.

Enter random number beginning with 07 to get through. After 3 drones gave someone my cc details.

Go online to transfer number. What day do you want it. Tuesday would be good I thought.

Tuesday get text - transfer will be done wednesday.

Tuesday night get welcome text and configuration text for Internet and MMS. ALL TO MY OLD HANDSET. Tossers!

Why is there not an option to add morer than 1 FAIL icon?

[KroSha]

Re: time to jump ship

I also left Orange due to their inability to stop sending me spam text messages. I asked them about 15 times to stop before I gave up and moved to Three.

I wonder if this will affect giff-gaff and the other MVNOs that use the O2 network.

[Alister]

Kumquat may, fruits of BT merger won’t include Moss' baby

I wish to downvote this article for the use of the above...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know, personally I found the fruit puns appealing.

[Anonymous Coward]

BT taking over...

...can only mean one thing. Confusing extra charges.

It frustrates me that Caller ID is extra, voicemail is extra, failing to make 2 calls a month costs extra.

And last week, I was almost enticed by a low monthly payment for Fibre, but there was an implication that this is an introductory rate, but no mention of the normal rate anywhere...

[MJI]

Seems silly they are not rebuying Cellnet

I mean they created it, so now they buy a competitor for what was their own system (and also I found had better coverage).

Or as I said to someone trying to sell me a Post Office telephone system "I already wih BT."

[Graham Triggs]

Obvious solution...

EE / BT don't want the Orange brand? Fine... sell the name (not the network) back to Hutchison. Three doesn't make sense as a brand anymore with 4G services rolling out (or the potential acquisition of O2), Hutchison can do a lot more with the brand.

[davidp231]

Re: Obvious solution...

"Three" could be renamed to "Four"?

[Paw Bokenfohr]

I think using Cellnet would be a good idea.

It's recognisable to most people still (not the yoof of today of course, but anyone 35+ at the very least) and we know it's BT, and it says what is it - a cell network. And costs £0 to research.

[bpfh]

A couple of caveats about the article...

Today, France Télécom no longer exists, and has not done for about 2 years. Progressively since 2001, all their brands have been renamed Orange, starting with their mobile brand Itinéris in 2001, and the ISP Wanadoo in 2006, and the company as a whole in 2013.

Also, who told you that the French thought that "The future's bright" slogan was communist? This was never used over here (in English or in French) - the tagline was just "Orange!" spoken by an annoying enthusiastic kid at the end of any TV or radio advert.

[earlyjester]

Re: A couple of caveats about the article...

Perhaps the reason they just said Orange was due to some market researcher telling them after a huge expensive consultation that there was a remote possibility that someone somewhere in France might think that phrase promoted communism.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: A couple of caveats about the article...

remote possibility that someone somewhere in France might think that phrase promoted communism.

It's France, that wouldn't necessarily be considered a bad thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

"t, but maybe that’s just taking the pith."

Sounds like they are employing an Igor to do the stitching together of old parts from different bodies.

[Anonymous Coward]

..and get the garlic ready for the magpies.

[Anonymous Coward]

Does that mean the outstanding credit on my dormant PAYG T-Mobile phone can finally be transferred to my live Orange PAYG phone?

[Fiddler on the roof]

Hate orange...love oranges!

My Daughters mobile was on Orange for 2 years, twice they put up the price of the contract and twice told me (effectviely) to eff off when I complained. So never again, I did get some pleasure toying with the poor Indian operatives who tried to make me stay with them. I used to say, I wouldn't stay with Orange if the world was flooded with Pi$$ and staying with you meant I could sit in a tree.

[Tsiklon]

Please don't kill my unlimited data

i've been on orange for the past 2 and a half years, on one of the seemingly completely extinct Unlimited Data/Unlimited Tethering tariffs... kill my tariff kill my custom

[Steve Jackson]

Yeah can't wait to leave EE, worst phone contract I have ever been imprisoned in. Mainly billing grief and petty additional charges. Website outages and arrogant CS staff. Mobile data is often not forthcoming. And I stupidly gave up voicemail, but dug my heels in and refuse to give them any extra money. Just counting the days.

[David Beck]

Who sees this as a "good thing"?

I don't get it, BT a bunch of proven wankers who couldn't piss their way out of a tissue bag, are going to take over EE a brand which has three things going for it, an early start at 4G build out, Orange contracts and T-Mobile contracts. So the first thing they do is piss off two of their major assets. Sounds about right. I've seen a lot about how all the new contracts are for EE 4G, but nothing about the actual distribution of subscribers across the three brands. This alone makes me suspicious of attempts at "bandwagoning" 4G. I'm not sold, 4G is all about improvements for the carrier, almost none for the subscriber, a one trick pony of "speed". I even saw some idiot telling me that streaming was so much better on 4G (if you don't understand why this is a stupid statement stop reading now). I forecast higher prices, zero innovation (technical and marketing) and even worse voice coverage. And those are just the good bits.

[advertiser]

But why?