Compare UK business broadband, phones, IT & energy.

For most micro and small businesses doing general browsing, email, video calls and a handful of cloud apps, FTTP full-fibre broadband is fast and affordable enough. A leased line (dedicated/DIA) makes sense once you have around 30+ users, need guaranteed upload speeds, run public-facing or hosted services, or simply cannot afford downtime. What you get with a leased line is uncontended capacity, symmetric speeds and a real uptime/fix-time SLA. The practical test: work out what an hour of internet downtime costs your business, then weigh that against the leased-line premium.

The old analogue phone network (PSTN) and ISDN lines are being switched off, completing by 31 January 2027. Anything running over a traditional copper line will stop working. That includes desk phones, but also fax machines, alarm systems, door entry, lift emergency phones and some card payment terminals. You need to move phones to an internet-based option (hosted VoIP, SIP or UCaaS like Teams Phone), keep your existing numbers by porting them, and audit any alarms, lifts or card machines that use a phone line. Don't leave it late: porting takes 10-14 working days and you'll want to run old and new in parallel for a couple of weeks.

Business energy is bought on fixed-term contracts (often 1-5 years) negotiated up front. There's no domestic-style price cap, and you can't switch freely mid-contract. Your bill is unit rate (pence per kWh) multiplied by usage, plus a daily standing charge. To get a decent deal: have your annual usage in kWh, your MPAN/MPRN and your contract end date ready; get quotes 3-6 months before renewal; and avoid lapsing onto 'deemed' or 'rollover' rates, which can be 30-80% more expensive. Electricity and gas are usually contracted separately, and you generally can't have overlapping suppliers, so timing the switch matters.

Brokers (energy 'TPIs') can save time and money, particularly if you'd rather not ring round suppliers yourself. The catch is how they're paid. In energy, commission is an 'uplift' baked into your unit rate, typically 0.5-3p/kWh. Anything above around 3p is worth challenging. Since October 2024, brokers must disclose commission in writing to all business customers, so ask for the uplift in pounds and pence before you sign anything. Also worth knowing: a Letter of Authority only lets a broker get quotes on your behalf. It is not a contract to buy, which you must sign separately.

Most MSPs charge a fixed fee per user per month. A full managed service for SMEs commonly runs around £60-90 per user per month, covering helpdesk support, monitoring, patching, security essentials, backup and cloud (Microsoft 365) administration. Lighter 'pay-as-you-go' or 'co-managed' models cost less but cover less. Look for a clear SLA with defined response and resolution times, UK-based support, a proper onboarding process, a named contact, and a written breakdown of what's in scope versus what gets charged extra (projects, hardware, out-of-hours).